Short update, Jess has a cast on from a slip on the ice and a fractured wrist, She is doing her best to help out around the adventures of “Livinghazzardously”
Al has bacterial Pneumonia, and will be home this week.
I have pig, chicken, and dog care. Snow Plowing/shoveling duties. Cooking, dishes and laundry. Installations of heating equipment, no heat calls and servicing furnaces. Plow truck is dead in the driveway at minus 9 degrees… The list is interesting BUT God provides for us just what we need, when we need it… it’s an exercise in faith. I’m tired, but so glad I have everything I need to be able to provide for my family.
Let’s take a tour of my cold winters bleak…
I am a bit of a Tim Taylor kind of guy, I call it being “lazy”… I think the guy that fills his leaky tire everyday before he goes to work is less lazy than the guy that fixes the tire as soon as possible…. Why? Simple, the guy that constantly fills the tire, day after day after day works much harder and for more hours than the guy that fixes the tire and doesn’t have to fill the tire more than once… I am told that I’m not lazy, what do you think?
My pigs require water, the chickens require water too… in the mid winters bleak this becomes a serious challenge, you need water that doesn’t freeze, or you fill the water every day, sometimes three times a day. ENTER CHARLIE, THE LAZY! I really don’t want to go out three times a day, or even once a day, I’m way too lazy for that! So I sit and think of ways to make the water systems I have work better.
The first try was a “Drinking Post” that worked great until I discovered the water table is too high and it wont drain to prevent freezing. I tried adding a small fan powered heater, and a few modifications (what I mean is a bunch of mods) … NOPE, don’t buy this unless you live in a warm climate and have clean critters! The drain plugs up from pig food from the mouths of pigs and it freezes, freezes and freezes… The company was so unapologetic, they made the sale and now I’m on my own… money spent, gone forever, when will I learn my lesson and not try gimmicks, no matter how good the seem to be?
Another attempt was to simply add a heater to a tank of water that the pigs can get into from the top. That was my first step, it worked “OK”. but the water evaporates and is consumed pretty fast. If you know anything about pigs, they drink a lot of water and can’t reach over the top of a tank to access the water, so I was filling everyday, remember, I am lazy, I don’t want to go fill water every day…
So my pursuit of becoming the laziest farmer continues!
I got a tank made for pigs, a tank designed for pigs! It has a valve that keeps a lower dish full of water and fills it from a large heated tank that is integrated. That works better from the perspective of volume (it’s a week’s worth of water) and keeping the tank clean (the pigs only drink out of the lower bowl and not the tank… ) but it too has a downside, heating the tank wont keep the lower bowl from building ice. Now what! Reptile heating pads are only for dry locations, I can fabricate a heater to attach to the bottom of the bowl but I am concerned the pigs’ curiosity will kill them or at least hurt them from a shock…
MINI FOUNTAIN PUMP! What a great idea Charlie, add a mini fountain pump to the bowl, a few holes drilled in the right locations, run some tubing from the pump back into the tank, add a line to circulate the bowl! VIOLA! HEATED WATER, CIRCULATED INTO THE BOWL… my best invention to date, lets see if I can get a patent on this, well first, how long will this hair brained idea actually last?
My next invention? How can I provide pig feed via a WIFI app? Jess sits and gives me praise for my inventions, many work really well, but the water for pigs and chickens have been my biggest challenge to date. Maybe going with no chickens can be next, but have you seen egg prices?
I stop and think on days like this, how many different ways does Satan try to get us to do what he wants, gimmicks, laziness, no-self-control… I think of all the lies told to us by the media, big networks and platforms… Satan loves chaos and infighting, he loves to see the Church divided on things God has clearly spoken… Satan loves to see friendships forsaken, families destroyed and lies believed.
We need to be so careful to not forsake the ones we love because of a misunderstanding or as I like to put it…. PRIDE. I can think of no sin that does not start with pride, it’s either blatantly prideful or it’s subtle. Either way, God has already revealed all truth, we become prideful when we reject HIS truth for the truth we prefer… either way, I can’t see any sin without some element of pride.
The spirit of pride will convince a person they are right, or that somebody else is wrong… regardless of truth… I have heard both sides in politics lately, both sides are demanding they alone hold the truth, both sides are fully convinced there is no rational opposition… I have one thing to say on this, listen carefully:
You can not have two opposing views of the same concept in the same relation and both be correct… but they can actually both be wrong!
I like numbers, they can’t lie, they can be manipulated by words, but they can not lie or be wrong. There is literally only one truth claim that is actually the reflection of reality, but there can be many truth claims that are not a reflection of reality… let that sink in!
There is Truth! “Truth (big “T”) is reality as seen by GOD”.
There is truth. “truth (little “t”) is not reality but rather it is opinion as seen by the father of lies”
I hope as this “SUPER BOWL” Sunday progresses, we can see more truth and less lies. I pray this nation sees healing, I pray God will be glorified this day and the eyes of the blind can see. I pray for you my friends!
May God bless you this day and may your team be the one that glories God..