Darn, that ain't gonna grow back

[Redoverfarm]

Don unlike the power company where you pay for the KW that you use the telephone company is a different story.  There you get charged daily.  I would call them again ( If you can get through) and let them know that you are going to deduct each day from your bill until your service is repaired.  Not that they would really care but it would lower your monthly charge.  At least they will have a record of your complaint to justify the deduction.  That great internet  should also be deducted. 

[MountainDon]

... well I could retire down by the spring with a few sheets of copper and several feet of line

   I've read that at one time you could follow any creek in the Appalachian hills and find a still. 

[Redoverfarm]

Got to have good water.   

[Don_P]

I'm kinda partial to apple sauce   

I was building one house up near the head of a creek and saw some likely looking places along the banks. One of the old timers said that was where the "community still" was set up. There were 2 in the cove I'm in now. Old Mr. Collins said that as a boy the revenuers came into the cove, he pointed them in one direction up the big branch and dashed off around the mountain to warn everyone. An old sawyer I know was doing it as a supplement to his retirement, they caught him a couple of months ago. I had never known it was his, I hope I was complimentary.

The phone co supervisor made the mistake of calling me from her direct desk line, until she blocks me we're gonna be friends 

[MountainDon]

I met the descendants of an old moonshiner family years ago in UT. The family homesteaded along the green River, south of the town of the same name. They pumped water from the river uses a Model T Ford engine driven pump. They grew lots of corn. Then made moonshine. Father then drove over the rocky trail up to the town where he sold Treasure Maps. The treasure were jugs of moonshine stashed at various places along the banks of the Green.   The section of the Green where the family homesteaded is now designated "Wild and Scenic". The BLM was/is totally blind to the homestead buildings that are still there. Blind too, to the dugway (Ut term for a cut up an embankment) and it's 250 foot long hand laid rock retaining wall they built in the 20's. Still standing, but now invisible from the river because of the shores being overgrown with Tamarisk (salt-cedar).  It's now impossible to drive to the homestead as the BLM closed the area to all motorized vehicles when it became a "wilderness" area.  Sorry to rant but this is one of my pet peeves about closures out here.

[peternap]

I haven't met any moonshiners for years but I do miss the Old Timers. They were likable old fellows as long as you didn't get to personal about the still.

When I was 11 or 12, I hung around with Crack Baker and Frank Boyers, long dead now. They taught me more about the mountains than any other people I can think of. I'm not sure they ever made any money off of Moonshining because it looked to me like they drank up more than they sold.

Crack was in his 70's and had a heart condition. One evening we were all sitting around a Campfire on Chestnut Ridge and he just fell off of the log he was sitting on.
Frank walked over, pulled the nitro pills out of his pocket, stuck one in Crack's mouth and sat back down. Crack came to in a few minutes and started sucking on that mason jar again just like nothing happened.

I think a lot about those days this time of year. It was normal for us to dip net Suckers in the spring. We'd sit around the fire all night by the river, pulling the net ever so often. I asked Jim Riddleburger how he knew when to check it. He said "Well....you eat a piece of cheese then you take a drink of this stuff, when it quits burning, you pull it up".

You don't get good advice like that on Bill Dance.

The world lost a piece of history when these Old Timers died.

A lot of the farmers that made shine, started growing marijuana because it was easier and more profitable. They are a different breed and I can't say I ever cared for any of them.

[Redoverfarm]

There is no place like home.  God I love this place.  Seems like we get the brunt of the jokes but in fact although we may be behind the times of the mainstream it actually gives us time to sidestep the mistakes made in modern society.  Legends are built locally and their stories linger several decades beyond their existence.  New stories arise but with a more modern twist.  But never the less they are firmly attached to our mountain heritage. 

The "jar" as it is often referred is vital to fuel conversation, "fine tune" the music, and give oneself the sense of roots.  The byproduct is that of pride and self worth.  So take you decade seasoned bourbon, wiskey or scotch and leave me with my no label to enjoy with my friends. I pray that if a story would arise about me that it would be pleasent to represent this proud heritage.   

[peternap]

Well said John!

[Don_P]

Y'all probably couldn't see me nodding my head, I'm bad for that on the internet.

I had a checkup today, he manuevered it around to the current limits, feeling it and showing me my new limits for the next while. I did just tweak it  . He showed me the photos from down the scope during surgery and where I had probably tugged some early attachments and made it mad. He showed me the whole set of before and after pics. It was a pretty sad sight of meat and tendon shredded to fibers over exposed bone. They drilled and tapped dissolvable, I'd call them helicoils, into the humerus. They have a couple of non dissolvable sutures that they tie around everything. The next shots look like a trussed up roast. Those sutures are permanent, I'll scar over them and will know they are there. As he rolled me around he would watch and feel and tell me where they were biting, explaining a couple of clicks and binds that will get better over time. Much of the "sack of kittens" feeling back there I described to him is a combination of those sutures and the condition of the muscles, they've been unhooked and chilling for awhile, they aren't real enthusiastic about going back to work. The rest of me has dropped 10 lbs but it sure hasn't been my deer gut, if you don't use it..  My first visit with the terrorists is tomorrow, life is good  .

[MountainDon]

Good news!!