Small Town Sunday #8 - Deer Season

It's here! One of the most important times of the year for so many people in the Ozarks...Deer Season.  Schools are canceled and people take off work. Seriously.

My school takes of the first Monday of deer season. A few of the more rural schools in the area take off the whole first week of deer season.  I cannot believe they do that, but... The reason schools do this is because of the attendance rate. If the attendance is low, then the school actually loses money being in operation, so some schools just plan for a day off. Even with Monday off, I will still have some students who will take off additional days. I had a boy come up to me the other day and tell me that he was going to be "sick" Tuesday through Friday.

I don't hunt, but I grew up in a family of hunters. My dad is a serious hunter. Every year he goes off to Colorado elk hunting right before deer season. Dad has quite a few acres of land and even creates food plots that encourage deer and turkey to stay on the land.  We have deer camp every year with men in orange all over the place. All the men stay in a cabin in the woods and get up early to head out to their deer stands or to walk the woods.

This morning I was woken up by what had to be the world's loudest 4-wheeler driving around my house. I can't imagine it didn't scare away any deer in a half-mile radius.

This year dad built a new deer stand that is semi-movable. It is one of the most interesting stands I've seen. 

 

 

 

Unique Deer Stand

I want to wish all the hunters good luck this deer season. Be careful! And if you are going to kill a deer...eat the deer. It is irresponsible to do otherwise.  For those who like to hunt, but don't need or want the meat, there is a great program called Share the Harvest here in Missouri that has been created by the Missouri Department of Conservation.

Two Day Weeks Are Exhausting!

We only had school Thursday and Friday this week due to all the snow. The kids were surprisingly well behaved considering (except for my last class of the day, but they tend to be the exception to all the rules...) It was weird only have two days of class, but last year we had two weeks in a row with only one day: the Monday of one week, then the Friday of the next due to a huge ice/sleet storm.

Last night I finally went to the grocery store to re-stock the pantry and fridge. I was dangerously low (or out) of some of my favorite items. I guess that's what happens when you're stuck in your house for four days strait!

As I left my house to meet my Mom and SiL to go shopping, I saw the opossum that has decided it lives in my house. This time, it was walking around the front of my house. I slowly retreated back into the house to get my gun (which is the world's oldest 22). Of course, when I got back outside the stupid thing had taken cover. I swear it knew what I was planning. I stalked it around the house, but to no avail. I got tickled while doing so as a mental picture of myself formed in my mind: there I was, quietly stalking an opossum...in my work clothes; gun in hand. I still had on my good shoes and I was traipsing around in my very soggy yard (all that snow melting) trying not to get my shoes all muddy. I could only imagine what my students would have said if they could have seen me. After they stopped laughing that is.

So I have set a trap for the opossum. It is getting into the house through the cat door on my back door. Since it has to come up onto the deck to get to the back door, I am putting out food on the back deck in order to lure it to one spot (not in the house) so I can shoot it. I'm keeping the porch light on and occasionally looking out the window to see if it has taken the bait. So far no luck. The other day it had eaten some of the food, but I missed seeing it out there. I guess I should be more vigilant.

Wish me luck!

Snowed In

Just another snowy winter in The Ozarks. No school for the past two days, and they've called off school for tomorrow. We now have added two days to the end of the year and have lost four days of our 5-day spring break! So how have I spent the last two days...



This picture isn't great, but it shows what the field behind my house looked like Monday during all the snow.

Monday: I did some laundry (sort of...), but mainly I surfed the internet a lot and watched an all-day Grey's Anatomy Marathon. This was a marathon of my own making; I had about 17 episodes saved on my Tivo and managed to get through most of them. So, basically, I didn't do much.

Today: I finished the Grey's marathon, did the dishes (well, I unloaded the dishwasher), studied some photography tips, spent 3 hours figuring out how to get my Linksys wireless router to work with my DSL and then called my DSL provider to complain about my speed (paying for 1.5mbps and I'm getting 270kbps).

Stupid Linksys tech support wanted me to pay them $30 for their help. Seriously? I hung-up and searched the internet and finally figured it out myself. By the time I called them, I had already spent over an hour working on it, I sure wasn't going to pay them $30 bucks when I knew I could figure it out if I spent some more time on the internet searching for an answer.

My DSL provider is sending someone out tomorrow to figure out why my speed is so slow. My mom is calling them too because hers is a lot lower than what she's paying for too. We're on the same main line, so...

I'm enjoying the time that I get to work on my photography. I've got lots of books and magazines that I need to read through. I learn more and more every time I pick one up. Plus I've been learning a lot about how to edit in photoshop. I used to only use photoshop for more design projects, not editing photos. Needless to say, I have a lot to learn.

I got my new camera backpack in yesterday. It is HUGE! Way bigger than I thought it would be. Mostly it is just a lot deeper than I thought it would be, and it is hard foam, so it doesn't get any smaller. The depth of the pack is really too much for small lenses (and I have two). Anyway, it will be what I use when I want to carry all my equipment. I'm tired of carrying two bags shoved full of equipment when I know I will want to use multiple lenses. It's especially frustrating when I know I'm going to want to do some macro shots.

I'm hoping to get more photography stuff done tomorrow. I really need to grade the Macbeth tests I brought home with me, but I feel like this is my spring break and I don't want to spend 3 hours of it grading tests...

Hope you're enjoying your February!

Summer Camp

This is gearing up to be a busy week for me. Not only do I have summer school during the regular work day, but I then go out to our local church camp for high school week as soon as I get off of work. By the time I leave from camp to go home, it could be anywhere from 9:30 to after 11pm.

I absolutely love summer camp. Our church is the host church of our campgrounds because we are one of two churches within 10 miles of the camp. It is officially out in the middle of no where (considering the nearest "town" is 6 miles away and that town has a population of less than 3,000). We have kids from churches all over the Ozarks show up at camp--even kids from a few Arkansas churches manage to make their way up to our camp. We basically have the same faculty there every year (mostly made up of the church youth ministers), and during high school week, most of the campers have been there for years as well. It's a very small town/family environment.

All camps seem to be different, and this one is nothing like the summer camps you see in movies. We don't have individual cabins; instead we have a boys dorm and a girls dorm. The boys dorm is a converted house, so there are individual rooms with multiple bunks in each room. The old girls dorm is the same as the boys, but a new girls dorm has been added to the old house. The new section is a large room with about 20 bunk beds in it (room for around 40 girls). As old and run-down as the house is, most of the girls would still prefer to be in the old dorm because of the more private rooms.

We have a multi-purpose room that acts as a gym and a dining hall. Lots of activities go on in there throughout the day.

There is also a worship pavilion. It's very unique considering it is all open air. They have put tarps on the side where the rain would normally blow in, and there is a wall stage-side, but other than that it's fairly open to the outdoors. Churches have donated old pews for the kids to sit in as well.

Classes are taught in the multiple small pavilions that sprinkle the camp grounds. They are usually found under shade trees, looking picturesque.

There is also a pool, outdoor basketball court, soccer field and sand volleyball for rec time.

I never have a real job at camp. Instead I act as a gopher/secretary/snack sales person/jack-of-all trades. This year I am also taking the camp pictures, which is proving to be a profitable summer side-job.

I hope this causes you to think back to your days at summer camp. Whether camp for you was a week long or all summer long, the memories will last a lifetime.

I may post pictures as the summer progresses, but right now I'm at work and can't really load pictures up for everyone to see the beauty of the camp.

For more small town moments, check out On The Front Porch.

The Highway Department is Trying to Kill Me

I really think that our local highway department is trying to kill me. This is the view out of my car looking down the highway from the direction in which speeding cars may be approaching. Can you see very far down the road? Neither can I. When they mow the right of way, they only mow one mower width from the road. I would hate for them to use any gear on their tractors other than 4th gear. I would hate for them to use something like, oh, let's say...REVERSE!

I used to work for the highway department (in a different town), and I've mowed my fair share of right of ways...you are supposed to mow the grass on either side of an approach so people can actually see if a car is speeding down the road at them or not. The only way my approach gets mowed is if my dad hooks up the brush-hog and does it himself...IT'S NOT HIS JOB!

It's ridiculous. I have to actually pull so far forward that the front of my car is IN THE ROAD if I want to be able to tell if someone is coming or not.

So, I conclude: the highway department is obviously trying to kill me!

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Good Morning from the Ozarks!

This doe actually stopped and let me take a quick picture this morning. This is just one reason I love living in the country.
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