No Love for Ragweed

This morning on the radio I heard some wags going on about how the ragweed pollen count was high and it ought to be eradicated.

Radio wags ought to be eradicated!

About 600 years ago or so, ragweed was abandoned by humanity on this continent in favor of corn. Until that time, it was an important grain crop for early man. It kept us alive! Without ragweed, there might be no radio for the wags to go on.

We abandoned ragweed and it thrived still, growing up and making us sneeze to remind us of its importance. It's seeds are tastier than corn, and healthier for us. When we've finally hybridized corn to its final weakness and a disease wipes it all out, we may have to fall back on eating ragweed again if humans wish to survive.

So leave the ragweed alone, radio wags. As usual, you don't know what you're talking about.

Slow Shop Day

In the 24 hour period of today, I had exactly 7 people visit my Etsy shop to look at knives. Normally I have at least 40.

I think it's time I found a new radio show to advertise on. The last one was cheap and sold me a lot of knives, but I think it's off the air now and there's a lot of drama associated with that. I would prefer to distance my business from any drama.  Plus, that audience is sort of mined out.

Are there any other good internet radio shows that might fit? I don't really know what's out there these days. I need to find either an internet radio show or put up a banner on a forum somewhere.

New Poll on Facebook

Trying to decide if I should add Green River blades to my inventory. It's a famous (and old) name brand of blades that collectors seem to like. They aren't very expensive either.

https://www.facebook.com/questions/633531413342731/

Let me know what you think.

Dogs and People on the Internet

I don't have a lot of interaction with flesh and blood people these days. At least not people outside my family. My main window into the world and the current thoughts of people is the discourse on internet forums.

I have two male dogs. Normally I put them on two separate chains in two separate locations. They get into trouble when I let them run together. But last night, after a long romp through the fields, I decided to put them both into the same pen. I was reminded most of the night why I had stopped doing that before.

Their purpose is to bark at danger or trouble and alert me to it. But they will often bark at nothing. Only when they're in the same pen, one will bark (possibly at something real) and then the other will take it as a sign of aggression and they will fall to fighting each other. So I lay there in bed, in the wee hours of the morn, listening to dogs fighting and wondering if the original thing that one of them barked at might possibly be real.

This greatly resembles the internet.

Mexican Hat

There is a patch of Mexican Hat growing out in a bare patch of ground near my workshop. It's a very pretty plant, but it ignores me. It very deliberately ignores me.

It has absolutely zero regard for me.

It is a very unsocial plant.

Dog Scaring

We have two watchdogs here on the farm. One is in a pen behind the house. The other is outside on a chain on a fence by the garden in front of the house. This way I know (theoretically) if anything comes around.

A few nights ago, the dogs were making one heck of a ruckus outside at about 3am. I couldn't see anything out the window to be alarmed at. It's very dark here, since we're off-grid and don't have outside lighting. So if I ever look out the window and see a light, I know it's someone up to no good. I certainly would not want to go poking around some hillbilly's shack in the middle of nowhere late at night with no light.

The dogs were going crazy and so I armed myself appropriately and slipped out the back into the treeline to see what was going on. Nothing was moving. No lights. After about ten minutes of observation, I determined that it wasn't a human out there and I flipped on my headlight.

Sam, the dog at the back of the house, was scared out of his ever-lovin' mind. He was hiding in the middle of his pen by a big oak tree there, his head down and whimpering. Normally when I'm investigating strange stuff at night, I flip open the gate so he can run out into the dark ahead of me. This time he wouldn't go. Unh uh, no way, boss.

So this left Fang. I slipped down to the garden to see if I could turn him loose so he could go out into the night to try and find whatever had been spooking them. Fang is chained up more in the open than Sam is, but he's a much bigger dog. He's part German Shepherd, part Lab, and part Rhino.

Fang wasn't where he was supposed to be. He'd climbed OVER the garden fence (6' high) and was now in the garden, on the opposite side of where he is normally chained. If his chain had been 2' shorter, he would have hanged himself when he went over that fence.

Whatever it was, it scared him so bad he climbed over that fence to get away from it.

Didn't find any tracks in the morning, nothing was missing or damaged, and none of the wild-roosting chickens had been taken. Still don't know what it was that came calling.

Economics of the Small Craftsman

I've found a new supplier for some of my knife blades, so I can lower my prices a bit. I think this has been a sticking point for some of my customers in the past. Well, as much as money is ALWAYS a sticking point when you're wanting to buy something.

I don't make a lot off of each knife as it is. I added up the costs and time once and came out right around minimum wage. On a more complicated design, a significant amount less than minimum wage. Still though, I'm in my workshop doing what I love doing instead of assembling burgers and listening to some pencil-neck drone on about mission statements.

Lowering prices and selling more knives is going to be the goal for May.