Guilt Ridden Retirement

[LDS]

You always figure that when you retire you will take it easy. I have found the opposite to be the case. I am doing more projects than I had anticipated while feeling like I am getting nothing done.

I think the difference is the lack of preasure. Since I officially "retired" and stopped the quest for a paycheck due to the pension company paying me back all the money I have given them over the past 50 years, I have accomplished some major project each week. The difference now is that I am not under preasure to finish the project today or tomorrow so I can get back to work on Monday. If the project takes three days it takes three days. If It rains tomorrow the end of the world has not come, I'll finish the job when the rain stops.

Yesterday I woke to find that the steady 10-20 mph wind we have hosted for the past two months had died down. I imidiately loaded up the Cherokee with the appropriate rifles that needed the scopes checked and pistols that needed breaking in and headed for the range. All the projects can be done on a windy day, a calm day is for shooting. You can not verify a scope setting at 200 yards with a 20 mph wind going in five directions!

I am also finding my outtings have a different complection. For years I planned trips around what I could do and get home on sunday for the Monday work routinue. Weekends out were a stolen period of time shen I SHOULD have been doing something at the house and was ignoring it to go to the woods. I had to get all the weekend chores done in advance so i could get away with the trip, which had to be taken, rain or shine, or else the work was wasted and there would be no outting for at least another week or two.

Now I plan a trip around the gear that stays packed and ready to go. If I go out on Wednesday to avoid the crowd I can be home before the weekend warriors invade the woods or lake. If it rains or the weather turns miserable I stay home, I can go tomorrow. Fishing is not for Saturday after the work is done, fishing is for any sunny morning I happen to feel like fishing. I can fish until the sun is too hot, go home and drink iced tea until it cools outside and mow the lawn just as the sun sets.

Still, I have the old work ethic needling me. Almost every evening I sit and review what I have accomplished for the day. I still measure my worth by what I can do or have done. Perhaps some day I will be able to accept this lack of preasure and not give myself a grade for every day, week or project.

I'll think about this some more tomorrow, I think right now I need to go fishing.

[dixieangler]

Well I went to the woods late this afternoon on one of my days off to find some punk wood to char. The punk wood I found and charred did not light up so I charred some old cotton jeans squares instead. Stunk up the little work shed with smoke something fierce because the wind was too strong to char outside. Must have been the wrong kind of punk wood. I don't know. I will keep on trying to find some punk wood to char that will work. May try some Yucca pith to char sometime also. It can be dead calm outside but when I get ready to do anything with fire, the wind will blow like its making up for lost time just to spite me.

[LDS]

I find that maple is the best punkwood for char, closely followed by white oak. I have also charred hackberry and some of the elms with success. It depends more on the "state of punkiness" than the type of wood.

Make sure it is punkwood too, and not the bug infested crumbly stuff.

[dixieangler]

I find that maple is the best punkwood for char, closely followed by white oak. I have also charred hackberry and some of the elms with success. It depends more on the "state of punkiness" than the type of wood.

Make sure it is punkwood too, and not the bug infested crumbly stuff.

White Oak we got of one variety or another. Maple is hard to spot in its dead state unless its right near a live tree. No elms. Not sure about hackberry. The stuff I used was a type of scrub oak punkwood and it was spongy, not crumbly bug infested. Don't know why it didn't work but it would not light up. I will keep on trying to char some natural stuff that will light.

[LDS]

Were you throwing the spark into the punk or trying to hold the punk on top of the flint while striking downward with the steel?

I find punk works best if you put a bunch of it in the lid of your chartin and throw the shower of sparks into the pile of charpunk and let it hit whatever it hits. that seems to give the stronger sparks their best chance at finding a random target.

Many people like to hold the char on top of their flint and I find that technique difficult when using charpunk or most other natural fine tinders.

[dixieangler]

Like I said, I will keep on trying. I could have done something wrong when I cooked it. Never have had any problems cooking cloth though.

[LDS]

It should look black and crispy, just like commercial charcoal. I have always made it in the same tin as my charcloth using the same method.

Might know that Florida would have defective punkwood! I make it out of anything I can find up here. I prefer the mapel or oak, but have never had a problem with any punkwood I pick up, though I do not use punkwood that has been directly on the ground. If it is a big log I will take what is on top, but nothing in contact with ground moisture.

Most of my charpuk is made from chuncks I pick up as I have to cross downed logs.

[dixieangler]

Yep. I also pick from the top of downed punky logs. Live Oak and Willow are my usual favorites. This time I got some sort of Scrub Oak. It charred down to tiny bits that did not light. Don't know why it wouldn't light. I never heard of defective punk wood either. LOL I have a bunch of it so I might give it another shot with that stuff. I would prefer Live Oak though. I have to be careful picking around that stuff. We do have Florida Bark Scorpions here and I do run across them picking through punk wood. Supposedly highly venomous. The big ones can make a quick snack after the tail is cut off. Most of the time I pick through punk with a stick first just to make sure.

[dixieangler]

Well I did char some Willow punkwood and that worked. Lit up real good.

BG got fired. LOL No doubt he will find a new home on some other TV network. He still has his books and gear royalties besides the DVD sales of his shows to keep him swimming in the loot for the rest of his life. I was doing some searches on canteen combos on the web and the BG Gerber canteen combo keeps popping up. I have not had the opportunity to test mine out yet to give a review. The knives are good Gerber quality as you might expect.

One forum I was reading outside the BG jokes had one member busting folks for carrying BG gear but others correctly set him straight that the image to portray is one that gets folks off the couch and into the outdoors. All busting folks for the gear they carry (no matter what the brand) is going to do is tick them off. That is counter-productive. Having said that, like one of the members said,

"There should not be a price-point to get people outside. A 1 litre soda bottle and a soup can that it can sit in, properly cleaned up, is just as effective at the job of carrying life giving water and offering the option to heat it up for a cuppa brew."

I bought the BG Gerber canteen combo to test it out and see what it can or can't do. I am not a fan of BG and did not buy it on account of him but I do like to test things out including gear. Gerber is a good company so why not see what its like? So is some jerk going to bust me as a fan for carrying BG gear that I am testing out? Bust me instead for carrying Gerber gear.

[LDS]

As much as most other folk I am not a fan of Bear either. However, I must applaud Bear and Gerber for one factor in their gear production.

They have kept their gear at a price that most newcommers to the outdoor world can afford.

The Brand Name GERBER has become accepted as a quality product at a reasonable price, even among the nonsporting public. If i saw a person new to the woods equipped with all BG orange and black gear I would be assured that if he perished it would probably NOT be due to the quality of his gear.

We have so many people these days wanting to get outdoors and who have not one bit of experience or training. They watch one of the many survival reality flicks, be it Bear, Cody & Dave or Mike and the Babe, then merrily go to the internet and "learn" what they think they need to know, buy the gear the "experts" recommend and head to the big north woods.

These are not kids I am refering too, but what we used to refer to as "adults". However, during my teaching days I realized that the world is filled with stupid people, easily led and convident in their ignorance. "It won't happen to me, I learned how to do it on the internet!" is their mantra. We should make badges and sell them.

In my reading of various "old time writers" I have come to realize this has been the norm for generations. In the old days they simply bought a book, now they advertise their presence on the internet. Nesmuck, Kiphart, Whellen, Col. Adkins and the others refered to them as tinderfoots, greenhorns and "City Folks". Farmers painted the side of their draft animals with COW, HORSE or MULE to protect the livestock from hunters who had never seen a deer and could not properly identify one. My own experience has been the loss of an entire heard of 75 goats during two consecutive hunting seasons, to novice hunters.

While the Ron Hood Buck Hoodlem runs $175, Hawkes Hellion runs $270, Tom Browns inspirations run $180. One can outfit themselves with the BG Gerber, add the Parang, minisurvival kit, canteen/cup, a tarp, a sleeping bag and a dozen Mountain House Meals to the mix and get change back from the cost of any of the previously listed blades. At least Gerber is giving them a usable product at a reasonable price and improving the quality of our yard sale experience as time goes by.

[dixieangler]

We have so many people these days wanting to get outdoors and who have not one bit of experience or training. They watch one of the many survival reality flicks, be it Bear, Cody & Dave or Mike and the Babe, then merrily go to the internet and "learn" what they think they need to know, buy the gear the "experts" recommend and head to the big north woods. These are not kids I am refering too, but what we used to refer to as "adults". However, during my teaching days I realized that the world is filled with stupid people, easily led and convident in their ignorance. "It won't happen to me, I learned how to do it on the internet!" is their mantra. We should make badges and sell them. Nesmuck, Kiphart, Whellen, Col. Adkins and the others refered to them as tinderfoots, greenhorns and "City Folks".

Today we would call them preppies (and I don't mean prep to prepare for the unexpected) and yuppies. Or is that 80s lingo? lol

Farmers painted the side of their draft animals with COW, HORSE or MULE to protect the livestock from hunters who had never seen a deer and could not properly identify one. My own experience has been the loss of an entire heard of 75 goats during two consecutive hunting seasons, to novice hunters.

Hahaha. LOL That is so funny it is pathetic.

Yes, Gerber makes good affordable gear to date. I hope that does not change. But with the BG endorsement all over some of it, it makes me want to test it just to see if the quality is the same. Let's just say that my trust in Gerber is shaken with BG in on.

The term preppy derives from the expensive pre-college preparatory or prep schools that upper-middle-class children on the United States's Northeastern states sometimes attend.[3] Characteristics of preps include a particular subcultural speech, vocabulary, accent, dress, mannerisms, and etiquette reflecting Northeastern, upper-class families in the United States.[2]

Yuppies are mocked for their conspicuous personal consumption and hunger for social status among their peers. self-absorbed young professionals, earning good pay, enjoying the cultural attractions of sophisticated urban life and thought, and generally out of touch with, indeed antithetical to, most of the challenges and concerns of a far less well-off and more parochial Middle America. For the yuppie male a well-paying job in law, finance, academia, or consulting in a cultural hub, hip fashion, cool appearance, studied poise, elite education, proper recreation and fitness, and general proximity to liberal-thinking elites, especially of the more rarefied sort in the arts, are the mark of a real man.