“If I had a place to stand and a lever long enough I could move the world.”

Yeah but he had no concept of the influence exerted by the corporations and moneyed interests! But I diverge – so back on track.  I single handed moved the ton plus chugga bugga into its new home two days ago! It is a rainy day here at camp today so you all will reap the rewards of said weather with a long and erudite blog – so be warned if you don’t want to be bored and or pissed off go read Leather Egg.  (Just kidding this should have almost no political  commentary – although I am not in the least surprised to see the motherfucking Democrats selling out to the HELLth insurance Robber Barons on health care!) Ok ok – thats it. Yes Archimedes was indeed correct – I backed the trailer with the chugga bugga on it over to the shed and blocked the trailer securely. I then blocked up and supported all 4 corners of the trailer and leveled it transversely and provided a slight downward grade to the back. The chugga was already up on pipes ready to roll, from the earlier transfer to this trailer, so all was poised for action! The preferred action of a snail – the way I like to move things significantly weightier than me.

Yes – but after said preparations I came to the undeniable realization that yes – yes indeed the chugga was facing the wrong way and I would have to turn it 180 degrees inside the shed! SHIT SHIT SHIT! After measuring I saw that there was indeed room inside the shed. But a rhyme that I heard from Dad and Dave Henderson immediately came to mind!

The Ballad of Moby Dick…

Here’s to a man named Moby Dick,

the only man with a corkscrew prick!

So around the world over he was on the hunt,

to find himself a woman with a corkscrew cunt.

His hunt ended way down south,

when he found a woman with a corkscrew mouth.

But when she went to blow him the shock killed him DEAD.

The goddamned woman had a left hand THREAD!

Dad and Dave rarely dabbled in poetry unless they could incorporate vast quantities of  colorful imagery. This was definitely one of Dad’s favorites since it employed machinist humor and Dave liked it because of the direct rhyme to that most vile of terms – cunt. He would recite this rhyme veritably drooling with delight. So this is basically how I felt when I realized that the chugga was facing the wrong way and it was not done with smoke or mirrors!

But nothing was to be done to change the inevitable so I moved forward. I set up two large timbers inside the shed to roll the chugga on. I shored them up and leveled them transversely and inclined them similarly as the trailer. I then applied a small amount of leverage with my small crow bar – not even the big one! The chugga moved an inch – seemingly without effort! Hallelujah! I checked the pipe rollers and side clearances. Everything was going nicely but I did have to adjust the rollers to keep the sides clear – there was only about an inch to spare on either side. Then once I was satisfied that everything was copacetic I pried again.

Chugga inched forward. After repeating the process several times the chugga exited the trailer without nary a lurch or bump. I then removed the trailer and surveyed the sitchiashun.

I then levered it forward to the approximate center of the side of the shed and jacked it up, blocked it and removed the beams. I next formulated the plan for spinning the chugga 180 degrees after moving it to the center of the shed. I then called in a consult with Sled. Sled nodded affirmation that it could work as I outlined my my plans and left. I put a transverse set of 2×4’s and two sets of roller pipes so that I could prise the chugga to the center of the shed and then spin it in place. After it was in the center I blocked one edge of the chugga against the sill plate of the shed wall and pried the opposing side of the chugga so that only one corner could move around. Hmmmm – this is actually working maybe Sled wasn’t shitting me when he said it might work. I thought he was just saying that so he wouldn’t have to get involved! And so – after many iterations and adjustments and many cycles the chugga turned as majestically as the space station in 2001 a Space Odyssey but there wasn’t any waltz  music while I was turning it! Dammit Janet where’s your boom box????

And so in the fullness of time that is how the chugga bugga came to be in the small manger provided for his comfort! It really looks sweet in place! Now all I have to do is pipe the exhaust outside, change the air cleaner, pipe the coolant to the coolant drums out side the shed, set up the coolant drums, put the heat exchanger for the hot water tank preheater in place, pipe the diesel fuel line to the chugga, pipe the diesel fuel return line back to the main tank, and raise the diesel fuel tank about 2.5 feet to facilitate gravity feed. So there is still much to do.

The next day was beautiful and with all this work staring me in the face I threw my hands up with dismay and said – “Lets go fishing!” Sled didn’t feel like he wanted to be in the boat all day with Janet and Barb drinking so opted instead to work on the addition to villa Colombi. It was a gorgeous day of fishing – the lake was nearly glass and the bass were hitting the surface all over. The lake temperature was about 76F. But there was one problem – we wanted to catch fish for supper. It took us most of the afternoon to catch 4 small eating sized fish – we kept catching very tiny bass or big honking bass!

Here’s Barb with an excellent bass that nearly did her in after about a 15 min. tussle! But we persevered and seemed to time the consummation of our catch at precisely the same time that we ran out of Labbatt 50! YeeeeGads what timing!

Well its still raining here and I am getting a bit parched so I must sign off.

When we get here in May everything is about 2 to two and a half weeks behind! The leaves hadn’t even come out fully by the time the Watsons, Walkers and Jackson’s got here about 3 weeks ago. The water temperatures then were not even at 60F. Now we are about 2 weeks ahead of normal season! I shit you not. The lake temperatures at noon are running about 75f and reached 80F in the late afternoon. In the past week the Evil Janeeto from the planet Janetron has been going swimming every day. I myself – The Coldblooded One – have even gone swimming – In Fucking June! Of course after basking in the sun on the beach with my reptilian brethren. The lake does have some stratification but not as marked as I would think. The lake was absolutely calm the other morning (11:00 AM) and the bass were hitting the surface as if it were late JULY! And now for the really great news – the black flies are almost completely knocked down by the dragon flies! The mosquitoes are pretty bad at dusk but they aren’t bad during the day as long as you’re not in the bush.  So its summer time and the livin’ is easy! So along those same lines I present my annual photograph of my lupine patch.

Along with the way things are ahead of schedule now I wouldn’t be surprised to have bass hit jitterbugs on the surface. The deer flies and horse flies are also out! Mike (the bear whisperer) is now in camp but I haven’t seen any nuisance bears yet. But the camp has been invaded by a nasty pack (two) of ravening wolves!

This fierce pack of wolves have been known to fully disembowel a stuffed toy in a matter of minutes! So beware when walking around camp you could be attacked, jumped up on, or heaven forbid, even shook on after they have been in the lake!

This year appears to be one of those watershed years – new generator, underground wires for the cabins at the beach, new addition on cabin 11 – villa Colombi, upside down tomatoes and a host of other cool things. The first two plywood boats that I built appear to be in sad shape so my next summers project will be to build  new ones. There is just too much fun to be had here – and oh yes the new Trebuchet – Gordowulf II – is slinging rocks like David on steroids!

The world is spinning in greased grooves!

In the last week two old friends came home:

First:

Second:

What we have been waiting for:

The big dragonfly hatch ocurred today!  All is well in Northern Ontario.

And one old friend never really left.  It stayed around all winter awaiting our return:

The big weed bed is already sporting weed!  Everything else is late but the weeds are early.  All is well.  A few big bass have been caught in the weedbed already this spring.

And a note to our hunter friends:  A calf moose was spotted on our property between cabin 8 and cabin 11 around 10 AM today.  Another first!

Water temperature is 68F and the outside temp is in the 80’s F. We are preparing for a campfire tonight.  I have had more than enough Caesars today and I am switching to beer.  I wish everyone was here to join me.  Party on!

Too much fun stuff to do! No one is in camp now but I am busy as hell! I am getting over my cold and have some energy – in between bouts of exhaustion. The weather up till now has been really shitty so these past two beautiful days have really helped. There are several roofs that need to be attended to, we need to integrate the Sportsmen’s Camp website with the blog and get the domain name tied back in, but I ripped out the sink in number 5 and will be replacing it tomorrow, took down the overhead wires between number 5 and number 6 and rewired the transmission wires underground (I am going to try to complete putting all the wires between the cabins underground this year) today, picked up two old hot water heaters to dismantle for use as the cooling system on the new diesel when I took the garbage to the Beauty Lake dump, ( I can’t wait to get to them!), begun cleaning out the new diesel shed (took some crap to the dump – see above), cleaned out the shop to accept the good stuff from the diesel shed, need to get the docks in place (the weather has been very windy) and have to get the new garden planters constructed on the patio, get the blades sharpened on Janet’s mower, take the front off the new diesel house, put up the new fuel tank, put the new diesel in side the shed, wire in the new diesel and so on ad nauseum. I haven’t even fired the new trebuchet yet this year!!!! But in my spare time I have been able to plant two upside down tomatoes as an experiment.

Its odd they are starting to curve upward.  I wonder if they will re-correct downward as they get heavy? But at least they are getting lots of sun. I also got all my bonsais set up and pruned and they look great.

The first copious crop of dandelions is in bloom now and its a sight to behold – even if it is seen through a mist of hungry black flies.

But its just the harbinger of the heavy mowing that will soon be in the offing. Its odd though everything is about two weeks behind and there is still very little evidence of leaves on the birches!

Now for the bad news – the fact that the black flies are out and eager and the trees are still refusing to set leaves indicates that the water temps are lagging badly and will make for a late dragonfly hatch and thus a LONG black fly season. Oh well its still just too damn fun being here with all the cool things to do and besides I get to go to the dump a lot!

Do any of you recall the sound that the Morlock’s machines made in the original movie the “The Time Machine”?  Bugg bugg BUGG bugg bugg BUGG bugg… syncopated and soothing even though, in the movie, the machines were maintained to sinister purpose. Not so here at Sportsmen’s Camp. When the new diesel generator is on-line I am sure that all of you will acclimate and enjoy the new engine sound. Not withstanding Jim Baxter who has voiced some dissent after listening to it online!

The new diesel generator made a speedy trip here. I was assisted by none other than Bob Z and Harvey for the driving and truck usage and Tom Pitts and his dad for the use of a heavy duty single axle trailer. The trip went a little like this – I rode to Randolph NY with Bob and grand son Tyler and was transferred to Harvey at Pete’s Tavern. Tom Pitts showed up and we all had a few rounds discussing the trailer situation. The new diesel generator is pretty hefty weighing in at just over 2000 pounds and we would be covering a lot of mileage so this discussion was very important. We bandied about the possibility of Tom’s double axle trailer, but dropped that one as being overkill on the capacity and it would be a bear to trail, and then decided to go with Tom’s dad’s single axle trailer load rated at 3000 pounds as the best choice. It was also licensed so that was a plus too. We were driving Bob Z’s truck so he agreed to pick up the trailer  the following day.  In the fullness of time Harvey and I adjourned to his back yard and drank beer with Janice around the fire until the rain drove us inside. It was a late night but we awoke bright and early to attend services at the First Church of the Cooperative Porcine. I presided as a guest lay speaker. Whilst Harvey and I were engaged in ensuring the salvation of our mortal souls Bob picked up the trailer and took it over to his son-in-law Kevin’s for a thorough rework of the lights. Then it was back to Harvey’s house for a post services cookout of ribs and beer. As we were slated to leave for Bangor Maine (yes Bangor Maine kids!) at 10 PM I opted to take a short siesta. I was awoke by Harvey promptly at 9:30 PM and we met Bob Z and the trailer at the Randolph truck stop. Its a good thing that we didn’t meet at tavern! So we were promptly off on schedule at 10PM. Harvey took the first shift and drove till he got a little drowsy then the late night specialist took the vampire shift. Bob Z contributed by keeping the driver alert with sporadic snoring. I drove through the night and got us around Boston through New Hampshire and into Maine. Harvey then took over and brought us into Central Diesel in Bangor around 11:00 AM. There she was – it was love at first sight – on a pallet connected to the cooling drum green and gorgeous! *Sigh* My heart still goes pitter pat when I remember the sight! I was given a demonstration of starting it with the crank (I can now honestly say that I am indeed a crank yanker!) And we reveled in music provided by the twin lunged pipe organ of ancient technology. Bob Z couldn’t wipe the grin off his face exclaiming, “I had no idea they still made these!” After the demonstration the work of art was loaded onto the trailer, tethered down and covered with shrink wrap. Then it was back on the road for the long (~16 hour) run through Quebec to camp. There is no rest for the wicked. But HEY – Harvey and I were just at services???? Whats up with that?

We cut directly west on back roads (directions courtesy of Nancy at Central Maine Diesel) and crossed into Quebec without incident. I had previously called Canadian customs and procured the requisite importation numbers and forms. No duty was required but we were liable for the 5% GST. And off we were again only to be caught for about an hour and a half navigating around Montreal in the drizzling rain. Harvey was showing his experience here as a long haul trucker! Glad he was driving.  Then I took over again as night fell – but there was a difference this time I was beginning to feel the effects of sleep deprivation and the onset of a son-of-a-bitch of a chest cold. I managed to drive into the wee hours of the morn whiling the hours away looking for moose sign in the misty fog of the night. As Harvey and I got “logy” we would spell each other in shorter intervals. Bob Z did his best to keep us bright with his sporadic snoring. We were in the home stretch driving through Rouyn Noranda when we all got hungry. We knew not much would be open but were directed by the girl at the truck stop to a great all night eatery – Le Morass Poutine. There was not a letter of English in the entire place but the food was great and they didn’t bat an eye when three unsavory long haul truckers from the states invaded their domain.

The last leg was pretty tough on us all Harvey and I driving short shifts till our sleepy weaving would rouse Bob from his feckless slumber. I don’t even remember the my drive from Elk Lake into camp at all. But what the hell – I am getting older and perhaps the Alzheimer’s is catching up with me.

Here we are, after a good sleep and a shower, posing with the green goddess.

It was quite an ordeal all told  covering about 1700 miles in about two days but she’s here now safe and sound.

Harvey and Bob were going to do some pike fishing with me before they left but after they saw how bad the cold had knocked me down they were nice enough to insist on a rain check – allowing me to get back to bed for another 16 hours of sniffing and coughing sleep. They then took off for home – taking my manifold thanks with them and saying that it was great fun!

This week is finally warming and the black flies are out with a vengeance – I am finally feeling better and starting to get some things done. Janet has supper done now and is making preparations for another Hockey Night in Canada so I must bid you all a good evening. Just one thing though if you ever find yourself peckish in Rouyn Noranda in the middle of the night try Le Morass Poutine!