Category: da rez blog

they used to say the month of march  ‘comes in like lamb, goes out like a lion’. or vice versa. I didn’t notice it being rough or mild. it will warm up the first part of april. temps will be in the 70s or near that for the next 10 days. my spring cleaning will begin now. same with walking on the paved road.

we are going into our third week of self quarantine. trying to do our part about not helping the virus spread. I am not afraid to die. I just don’t want to die. thats the worst case scenario but i dont want to get sick either. I am an older guy with pre-existing health problems. I don’t want to take any chances. why be sick if you don’t have to be. staying home is a small price to pay.

staying home  hasn’t been boring. i am a home body anyway. we have plenty of things to keep us busy. I have my chores and I am getting ready for gardening. it is still too early to start most seeds outside. I am starting seeds indoors. when it is time I will transplant them into my grow boxes or garden.

I ordered another heating pad, a thermostat for it and plant light. i like the ones i already bought and am using now to start seeds. I will use the equipment i bought in coming years too. it will be a good investment in my gardening. I wont have to buy plants from nurseries anymore. I do start warm weather crops directly into the ground. don’t need equipment for that.

we have been doing good about staying home. I did go after water. I wasn’t concerned because I would be in my car the whole time except at the water place. it only allowed one person in at a time. I got my water and left. I have to have bottled water for my coffee. I can taste the chemicals in my coffee if I use tap water. I love my coffee too much to allow that.

our coffee maker went out on us last week. we had to use a cowboy coffee pot for a day. our son brought us a new coffee maker. gotta have my coffee. I have changed to drinking it black the past few years.

another time I was out I went for a drive on the rez. I wasn’t planning on being around anyone. I drove over to the buffalo pen to take pictures of our tribal buffalo. I took the pictures with my Nikon camera. I got a few good shots. the picture above is one i took. my cell phone cant zoom in as close as my nikon.

i got an email that said I was chosen for a grant to study coronavirus. I sent it to my junk mail to be deleted. I cant get over how some one would even try to scam during this time. I wasn’t surprised by the ones trying to profit off it though.

gonna see what happens….

I am using the time I am staying home to do some gardening. it took some doing to get hills mound up for planting potatoes in. I did it though. I have a row and a half each of red potatoes and Yukon gold potatoes. my rows are about 80 feet long. I like the red potatoes and mary likes the gold.

I transplanted strawberry plants that developed from runners last year. they took root outside my grow boxes. I put all of them into empty spaces in my grow boxes. I now have 4 boxes of strawberries. I planted onions in these boxes as companion plants to keep bugs away. I get two crops from the same grow boxes.

I also have a grow box of carrots, radishes and peas. the radishes have broke ground. I put up a tomato cage I made out of fencing wire for the peas to climb up. I transplanted my cabbage plants to two other grow boxes. I put onion plants in them too. I grow a lot of onions because we use them in our cooking.

the seeds I am starting look good. I will be able to transplant the kale plants soon. I will have to move the tomato and cantaloupe into bigger pots. my water melons and hot peppers haven’t come up yet. if they don’t I will put more of their seeds into the starting flats. I have plenty of seeds I saved.

I have a couple of grow boxes that need repairs. I will fix them and get the rest of my grow boxes ready for planting. it is still early for planting most things. I am only getting  in cool weather crops now.

I may be a little ahead of the game. usually it rains so much in the spring that it is hard to get my garden tilled. as soon as the ground dries out, it rains again. I have been depending on the tribe. now I have a small tiller. I used it to  turn over the ground for potatoes. with the tribe shut down I  might have to  till my whole garden. glad I bought that tiller now.

we walked on the road yesterday. did our usual two miles. it was kinda foggy out but the temperature was  57 degrees. not warm but not cold. we kept moving so it wasn’t bad. no one on the roads while we walk, other than the ones going by in cars. we are still able to have social distancing. we are going for another walk today even if it is windy.

we are doing more facetime calls since we are home. I like that feature on phones. we get to see our daughter and grand daughters when we are talking to them. I never did do the skype thing.

I have wild onions growing every where in my yard. I transplanted some from the timber years ago. they took off from there. I will dig some up. I like wild onion gravy. I will  also dice some up and dry them for use later this year.

now I am waiting for morel mushrooms to come up. wont be long now.

this don’t look like much but it is the beginning of my garden. I will plant in this field this season. it layed fallow last year. I only had a row of potatoes in it. I planted in the plot on the other side of my drive. I will rotate growing between the two plots. gotta do that so the soil can rebuild itself.

I started to till ground to plant my potatoes. I have said you cant till mud. you can work around it though.  I broke the ground first. I let that dry some. then I tilled again so the tiller went deeper. it has dried some more over night.  I will go till it again today. the ground will then be workable enough to hill it up. I gotta do it before it rains tonight.

after I till and hill it up I can plant my potatoes. I cut up my seed potatoes a week or so ago. they  have sprouts coming out of the eyes. they are ready to plant. I will be able to do that later today.

I am glad my tiller fired up with no problem. I had it sitting in my car port over the winter.  it works great. that tiller will be a work horse this year. I will have to till my whole field later so I can plant my corn. it is still too early for that.

i have been busy around the home place. i have enough chores and spring clean up to keep me busy. i don’t know if i will build more grow boxes. i would need materials from the supply places to fill them up. Shawnee county is shut down. that is where i would buy supplies.

i am a little disappointed that with all this going on, our government is desperately trying to bail out the rich.  as an after thought they will give  a thousand bucks stimulus check to some. like a chemok per cap. i will take it as others will. most wont care that the rich will benefit the most from this though.

why not give it to the poor and middle class. they could use the help more than people with a million or billion dollars in the bank can. instead of the trickle down theory it will be the trickle up theory. reality is it will still end up in the hands of the 1 per cent anyway. as soon as the poor and middle class buy food, pay rent, shop, pay bills etc. it will end up in the bank accounts of the rich.

in a time of crisis the rich still find a way to profit. their congressional flunkies and puppet leader will see to that. they can operate on money that aint theirs to make it theirs. the national government is more concerned about the economy than in stopping the spread of the corona virus. profit over lives.

this corona virus will change the world. once it passes will we be better people because of it? we know where our leaders stand. we see that average people are the ones stepping up to help others. we should vote out the ones not helping. they got rich enough, give someone else a chance.

I got my grow light delivered to my door today. I plugged it in as soon as I got it. good thing. some of the seeds I am starting have broken ground. the light will stop them from growing too tall too soon. the light will make them stronger.

i havent had a light like this one. it has red and blue lights. I aint sure about which light to use so I am using both red and blue for now. I will read up on it. one is for budding, one for root development or something. like I said I gotta read up on it. the light has a 3, 6 and 12 hour timer. I set it for 12 hours to begin. I will adjust as needed.

once these plants get off to a good start I will put them in sunlight. after that I will start another 72 plants. I am determined to have a garden again this year. if i cant get out to buy plants I will start my own. I save many of my seeds such as indian corn, indian beans, squash, cantaloupe, watermelon, etc.

today i also had 4 blue berry bushes delivered. they are year old bare root plants.  they were delivered by mail. I put them into 4 inch pots with peat moss. I will transplant them after they develop a good root system. we eat a lot of blue berries. I want my own bushes. I tried growing  some before and they didn’t take. i am trying again.

I will dig holes on this slope I have that is hard to mow. I will add peat moss and pine needles to the holes. I will plant my blue berry bushes there. they can bush out without a problem on the small hill side. that is a good place for the bushes to be.

i seen my strawberry plants are greening up. I have 4 grow boxes full of them. I seen that some of the runners that took off last fall have rooted. I thought alright, free plants. I transplanted them into the boxes where I had bare spots. last year I had real big, sweet berries. the boys ate them as soon as they turned red. I will have plenty this year.

i am pulling weeds and raking leaves. I have a big compost pile already started. i will keep adding to it. I threw my eggs shells and coffee grounds into the grow boxes over the fall and winter. now they will go into the compost pile. I will add chicken manure to it too. got piles of it in the chicken house.

I turned over a shovel full of soil in my field. it wasn’t clumped together as mud. it may break apart as it warms up. tomorrow it is suppose to be 70 degrees. that might be enough to dry it out some more. I will fire up my tiller and break ground for my potatoes. I will also till in front of my chicken house and tool shed. I grow vine crops in front of those buildings.

if it sounds like I am getting ready to garden I am. this stay at home thing means I might have to do what I can to get a garden going. I don’t think anyone will be out tilling this year. good thing I had some cash last year when I seen a small tiller up for sale on craigslist. it will be valuable to me his year.

our casino has been closed down. the parking lot is empty. didn’t think I would ever see that. I don’t know where this areas’ old people are hanging out with the slots, bingo and the buffet shut down. that corona virus has shut down much of this country.

this picture was last week. i had to get gas at $1.50. now it is selling for $1.15. my tank is still full because i havent been anywhere. no cabin fever yet though. i have been a home body for years so staying home don’t bother me.

the tribes’ face book page reported a person under investigation for the corona virus. no one has confirmed  whether the case turned out to be negative or positive.  we don’t know if the virus has hit our rez or not. the announcement has been shared over 160 times on facebook. no way of counting how many times it has been read.

this is the rez. people believe the first thing they hear. if the truth comes out later that don’t change what people wanna believe. no update yet. haven’t seen anything on the local news. they report how many cases there are in the state and where they are located. none said the rez had a case under investigation. should practice social distancing anyway.

maybe I am overly cautious by staying home. but it is my choice. I am a little older and I am diabetic. they say a guy like me would be more at risk. I stay home to be on the safe side. I want to live long enough to see what my grand kids are gonna do in life.

our grand sons have been staying with us out in the country instead of living in Lawrence. they are keeping us company. I haven’t seen my grand daughters. yesterday they called on face time. we got to see them and talk to them. my daughter called on face time too. modern technology brought them into our home. their smiles brighten our day.

it rained again last night. that will put off tilling my garden. the potatoes I cut up are ready to go into the ground whenever. they will keep. I also have onions to put into my grow boxes.

while i was in the mood for gardening I started some seeds. I have them in seeds flats that are on top of a heating pad. the pad is suppose to have an 80 to 90 percent germination rate. I hope so. I started seeds in the past that didnt germinate because it was too cool. that’s why I bought the heat pad. I also ordered a grow light.

i started kale, watermelon, cantaloupe, tomato, bell pepper, habanero peppers, jalapenos and cucumber seeds. I have some hatch pepper seeds somewhere that i havent found yet. I want to start some of them so I can have green chiles. I also want some zucchini but I have a problem with bugs getting them. I will have to try companion planting with them. certain plants keep bugs away.

i am gonna butcher a coupla hens. I am waiting some egg drop soup. fresh killed chicken makes the best broth for that. I will use fresh eggs with that soup. I want some tortilla soup too. home raised chickens make it taste better. I have 15 hens and am getting plenty of eggs. I can afford to clean a couple.

dont know what made me think of that bob marley lyric ‘what be, got to be’.  yeah.

I have been staying home. I only ventured out to my quarterly lab test. other than that I haven’t gone anywhere. well yesterday I did go for my two mile walk on the road. that is still social distancing. aint nobody on the road. N Road is a thousand miles from nowhere.

Andrew rode his bike along side us. it is the second time he came with us. I imagine he will do that more often now. he likes to hang out with misho and gramma. he can coast down the long hills. we help him push his bike uphill. so it isn’t too much for him. we wanted him to get out side and off the video games he and Samuel play.

it was a little windy but the temps were in the low 70s. I pulled weeds in my raised beds. when it warms up again I will finish turning over the soil in my grow beds. I only got 3 of them done. the soil looked good. it also had that good earthy smell that rich soil has.

the ground is too wet to till. cant till mud. I an anxious to get my potatoes in the ground. I did plant some carrot and radish seeds. it is suppose to get cold today and tonight. it will start warming up after that. the seeds should still germinate. I have plenty more if they don’t. it is cheaper to lose a few seeds instead of plants.

I have some compost left from last year. I  will add it to my raised beds. I have a lot of leaves laying around from the many trees I planted in my yard. I raked some up and started a new compost pile. I have more leaves to rake up. I will add chicken manure to the new pile later. gotta get something back from my chickens other than eggs.

i wanna see if I can get some of the buffalo manure to add to my compost pile. don’t know what that will take. it is just mizi laying on the ground rotting away. not worth anything to anyone. but once someone wants it, I bet there is a law against it. viva la sovereignty.

we are trying our best to be self quarantined. we aren’t taking unnecessary chances. thing is people no comprende that. we have had people come over for various reasons. we cant be rude and chase anyone off. I was taught to welcome people into your home.

we just trying to be safe. now we hear some one on the rez is being tested for the virus. nothing confirmed. but it hits close to home. other indian communities have cases in their homelands. we are not immune from it. I remember old Indians saying ‘everything the world has, we have’. I hope it doesn’t hit our rez. life is tough enough.

will see what happens.

the boys are staying with us since all Kansas schools are closed. Andrew has an online site that he is supposed to do school activities on. dont know if that is still on or not with school closed. he and Samuel got no problem playing video games though.

i have been staying home. I recently filled my gas tank at $1.50. now gas is $1.29 at nation station. yeah after I filled up. I don’t plan on going any where. that tank should last me awhile. I will need gas for my tiller and mower though. I will get it at that price.

some one asked me if I was practicing my social distancing. I replied I have been doing that for 20 years. I never know if someone is mad at me or not. don’t know if they don’t like me, or my family or my dog. I usually go around people I know that aint petty over trivial stuff.

I am thinking sooner or later trips to china will be cheaper.  travel there is halted. once all this passes, and it will pass, then prices will drop  no doubt. they will have to attract tourists. it might take a year or more but it will eventually happen. then I will be able to afford the price.

temps were be in the low 70s tomorrow. I will make use of the warm weather to work on my raised beds. I will pull the weeds. I will also turn the soil over and add compost to them. after that I will transplant the already started cabbage plants I got from the nursery.

I will plant some of my onions. not all though. I will stagger their planting. I want to eat them for most of the year like i did last year. I will also scatter some radish, kale and pea seeds. maybe some spinach too. don’t wanna get too carried away. I will only plant cool weather crops.

I will start some seeds on the heat pad I bought. they will be warm weather plants like tomatoes, squash, melons and peppers. they will have a good start before I transplant them outside.

charlie our gold fish has made it all winter. i bought a dozen goldfish last year to put in my rain barrels. they eat the mosquito larvae and other bugs in the barrels. i had two left when it got cold. my barrels had an inch of ice covering the water. i thought if they made it that long they deserved to live.

i broke the ice in the barrels and got the two out. i moved them inside. one made it a day then died. charlie survived all winter. the boys wanted him as a pet. he will move outside to the barrels as soon as it warms up. I will buy more gold fish to keep my rain barrels clean.

edgar winter was scheduled for a concert at our casino. he would have performed tomorrow night. i hope he reschedules. I might play his song ‘Frankenstein’ tomorrow night.  i say that indian casinos were built so you could see all the acts you missed 30 years ago. they should pass a law that anyone over the age of 70 shouldn’t rock n roll anymore.

gotta do  chores.

its hard to believe what is going on in this country.  schools and businesses are closing. church services are cancelled. even casinos and pow wows are closing. hmmm must be serious then. or most likely it is a precaution. maybe if our government acted sooner we would have contained the virus better by now.

I wonder if people are actually staying home. I know I am. we are cancelling our trip to New York City. it would have been at the end of April. still too soon to know if it will be safe by then. we are even getting one meal a day delivered from our senior citizen program.

I don’t know what will happen because of the corona virus. I can see how some people react out of fear or greed though. the hoarding is stupid. again I say you cant eat a case of toilet paper. I also seen that people were bulk buying and reselling online for a big profit. one guy had 17,000 bottles of hand sanitizer. amerika.

I am getting scam emails about what to do about the corona virus. I don’t read them so I don’t know what all they are offering. they are sent to my junk mail. they get deleted after a while. I check my junk regularly so nothing important gets deleted.

I am scheduled for my quarterly lab and med check tomorrow. haven’t heard of that being cancelled. I didn’t walk as much this past three months. I only recently started walking again. I hope my numbers are okay. I know my weight hasn’t gone up. I cant lose but at least I aint gaining more weight.

life goes on. no doubt it will be changed for awhile. we are staying home for the time being. we aren’t bulk buying. we usually have food put away.  we have nenwezhek, dried corn, wild rice, dried squash, indian beans and frozen veggies. besides turtle, squirrel, deer and buffalo we have meat from the locker. it isn’t full of chemicals like some at the grocery stores. we get fresh eggs daily.

that is not because of the virus though. it was what I learned. work during the year and put away for the future. it was a part of our life. them old Indians knew something. maybe things will come to that again.

I bought some pants about a week ago. it was from a place that was going out of business. I found some that had a 29″ inseam. I bought two pair of them. usually they only have 30″ inseam.  that is too long for me. the bottom hem drags and eventually becomes frayed.

I seen some jeans that had holes cut into them. that is a style now. the jeans were on sale for $159.  I remember back in my hippie days wearing pants with holes in them. I can still remember the looks I got when I wore pants like that. people were looking down at me. now its hip. it aint cuz they poor and its all they have.

tomorrow is st. patricks day. that is when some plant potatoes. others do it on good Friday. I tell people I am neither irish nor catholic so I plant in between those dates. my potatoes I cut up are about ready to plant. an old lady told me she already planted onions. I haven’t yet but bought my onion plants.

I bought a tiller off craigslist last year. I may fire it up soon. I don’t know when the tribal garden program will be up and running. my potatoes and onions gotta go into the ground soon. I can take care of that. corn wont be planted until the first part of May.

will see what happens.

i was outside last evening. as soon as I opened the door I seen deer standing by my mailbox. I went back in. I didn’t reach for a gun. instead I grabbed my camera. the Nikon’s batteries were dead so I got my cell phone. I walked back out and the deer took off as I started shooting pictures. there were 5 of them.

the corona virus scare is forcing many to stay home. i stay home already. so I guess I am not a forced quarantine.  I prefer to stay home. after years of bumming around the country, i value a place I call my own. I don’t know what will happen but I aint taking  any chances. I will stick close to home.

my planned trip to New York City will have to be rescheduled. we had plans to see the yankees play while there. I also wanted to go to soak in the hot springs in Colorado. I would have camped out. that will have to wait until another time.

I really don’t know what to make of all this corona virus stuff. I usually buy in bulk already. I can eat food I grew, picked or gathered all year long. there is no need for  me to stock pile like what is going on. I will go to the meat locker to get a bundle of meat though cuz its per cap. cant eat toilet paper or hand sanitizer.

people are demanding that coronavirus tests be made available. I don’t want a test. I want a vaccine that decreases the  chances of me coming down with coronavirus. I don’t understand why our country was so slow to react to this crisis. our government should have jumped on this as quick as they do making tax cuts for the rich. again our government proved how inept it can be.

I cant believe all the cancellations going on. it is better to be safe I guess. I am disappointed that the ncaa tournament was cancelled. I wanted to see if KU would win the national championship. we had a real good shot. pow wows have been cancelled. I planned on having a stand somewhere this year.

I was watching the news as I always do. one report said a side effect of the shut downs will be people will become more socially withdrawn. we are being told to be socially distant. don’t understand that. I see many that already do more texting than conversing with others.

yesterday I went to the senior site for the one day flea market. I wanted to visit the people with the stands. I knew all of them. mary always has a stand. my sister also had a stand.

the last few days nation station (where everybody knows your name) has gas on sale for $1.50. a lady next to the pump I was at said it was on CNN. the story was we had the cheapest gas in the nation. I didn’t see it so I don’t know if that was on tv. I filled up my tank. usually it don’t go on sale until after I have a full tank.

gotta do my chores

the onion plants came in at the nursery. I bought 4 bunches of them. I will stagger their planting again. i don’t want them to mature at the same time. usually I cut off the top third of these plants. then I soak them in root stimulator. that encourages root growth. I get a good crop of onions from that. I prefer plants to bulbs.

I also bought 3 pounds of yukon gold potatoes. I have them cut up and curing already. I will have red and yellow potatoes. they both taste good. I will fire up my tiller when it gets slightly warmer. I wont till the whole field. I will turn over just enough to plant two rows of potatoes.

i ordered some seeds from this heirloom seed place. I ordered kale, green beans, peas and some Abe Lincoln tomato seeds. I ate one of those tomatoes and liked the taste. I had to grow some of them. I want to freeze or can the green beans and peas for the coming  year.

some one asked me once when do they plant a garden. I answered when that indian plants, then you plant. he asked what indian? I said me. it was a joke. I been doing this for many decades. but there is always someone that knows more than me.

I will not let the coronavirus scare stop me from planting my garden. eh. if I don’t plant, the fear mongers will have won.

I don’t know what will happen with this virus thing. hey lets shut down all ball games, schools, pow wows or large gatherings. well at least we trying to keep sports fans safer. we cant protect school kids from shooters but we wont let a virus get to them. Italy tried all that and the virus still spread.

some believe if they stock up on toilet paper they will be alright. others think it only affects older people with health problems like diabetes. if that’s true then I should be worried. some say if you  avoid large crowds, stay home and become socially isolated you will be okay. in that case I will be alright.

but wait I am heading to new York at the end of next month. I dont know what this will do to my trip. I wanna go anyway. this country indian needs to see the city lights.  I have said if I aint dead yet, I may never die. you will either catch the virus or not. and if you do catch it, that doesn’t necessarily mean you gonna die. I figure whatever happens, happens.

the coronavirus scare cause edgar winter to cancel his concert at our casino. well damn. I had front row tickets. I am too old to be doing drugs while listening to Frankenstein. that is one concert I would have wanted to see though. i like blues. I don’t care to see 80 year old country singers or disco.

today I am ordering another pair of walking shoes. a tribal program gets me a 50 per cent off on Nikes. my old ones are wearing out. I only wore them for my walks. they lasted.  what the hell, it is per cap tomorrow. most of mine goes toward paying down on my newer rav4. so this indian aint running to town to spend it.  I will get a new pair of shoes.

I need chicken feed. do I  venture out? maybe if I take a roll of toilet paper with me I will be safe.