canadian club?

fruncle paul, ya'll.

friend + uncle +paul.

and that's what you get.

the cucch and i took a very early trip this mornin'.

we had to see a guy about a ride to the airport.

really flippin' early like.

he left for vancouver,

y'know, in canada,

for a few months of heavy duty restaurant opening..

like my man wyclef sang,

he'll be gone 'til november...

we all already miss him already.

i got a whole bunch of treats from a whole bunch of folks.

yesterday was apparently 'make albie psyched day',
because my ill gotti gigante stump connection brought by a quartet of warrior war logs,

and,

the weiner guy dropped off a fresh pumpkin coobook.

nice, kids.

i have the very best clients there could possibly be.

no joke.

i spent the day whalloping wallets and beatin' up on biceps, backs, and big toes.

i doo-doo that freaky sh!t pretty dang hard these days.

i almost want to start trying to feel guilty

about breathing bacterial battle-beastliness

into their bloodstreams,

but sniffling, sniveling, and sneezing can't stop the rockin', mutha-lickzzz;

i got ills to make, i got bills to pay. i got skills to sharpen.

all at the same time, even.

gettin' whilst the gettings is good, as they say.

early mornings, late nights, leaky roofs, and leaky noses...

it's all really happening.

i'm lucky to have what i've got going on,

and for the getters i get it going on along with.

eleven.

the volume, the concentration, the whole poem, ya'll.

warriors of woodsly goodness,

loud and hard;

never quiet, never soft.....

dis-mantled

this big bad brick burner puts the man in mantle....
the man in manor home,
the man in 'man, that's a dope-ass miki-fickin' tower of terrific.'
i mean,
is that not some truly burly barbarian belvedere business?
that's four feet of firehole in the middle, ya'll.
i'm not feelin' the olive-garden-style kindling flowerpot,
it came with the house,
and i've got bigger pits to pluck, if you feel me,
but a crusty and disgusty copper basin just might do the trick....
there's a lot of house to show,
but i don't want to over your delicate city-folk sensibilities with
too much turbo-hottness;
urban waterbaby constitutions may not be able to handle this much heat.
especially not with all the Folk Life fury and rural ragnarok tornado terror
being administered to some city people.
(this means you, louderhorns)
it may be too intense.
so,
you'll just have to tune in and see what other other treats this old house has to offer.

looks like rain outside.
i've got the firewood tarped up, for now.
jess haaaaaates tarps, kids.
(too trailery)
and even though it's a brown one and not blue b!tchbaggish blanket of 'butter,
i'm kinda with her on this one....
i'd stack the orderly rows of awesome inside the garage,
but like i said,
it looks like rain outside,
and when it rains outside, up here in the woodsly goodness,
it also rains inside the garage.....still.
the pitter-patter of rustic righteous raindrops, my ninjas,
freefallin' on our heavy metal roof like grindcore double-bass;
never quiet, never soft...

you know you like it:

just like a munky-funkin' james bond movie!
what?
yeah!
an albert r., ....broccoli production
bam!
obtuse references aside,
that happened in full-effect last night!
and as usual. it rocked the collective socks off of all ingesters.
vital wheat gluten + extra yeast,
+ hot humid weather,
+ a gas oven =
best rolled up wheaty treaty loaf of lusciousness ever.
heck yeah, ya'll,
our family traditions may be a bit rusty and rustic,
but my belly and my heart are full to burstin'.

did someone say old copper kettles?

c'mon,

with a pumpkin-colored kitchen and a hefty hearth to hang 'em on,

you all already know we've got a healthy headstart on Folksy hottness.

yeah,

we definitely doo-doo that country-type sh!t.

forest-dwelling denizens of the epic woodsly goodness.
pea-sized peepers keep it poppin',

and we keep our peepers peeled so as not to pop 'em.
got it?
even the little things get the super-deluxe rural real considerate treatment.

this is where the early morning t'n't' magic goes down.
it totally looks out over the moat mountains.

yeh, i know;

that's some barbarian conquest-type business.
it's a right wet mess on the other other side of the house,

but in this section of the fortress,

it's so mutha-lickin' good-morningey i can't hardly even handle it.

food almost tastes better in a place so fresh...
i am grateful. without exception, for the good things, ya'll.

woodsly good times are abounding,

and it's ALL really happening;

never quiet, never soft...

waking up.

what's the very bestest part about 6:45a.m.?
morning wood!!!
no,
seriously,
a dumpin' truckful of hot dry logs plopped it's payload all over the front yard,
early m.f.n' shirley this mornin'.
they weren't even lincolns, and this isn't nebraska,
but i've got 20" logs all over the place.
and i've got enough axes for every-flippin'-body
to chop the barbarian kindling out of it.
hot fire?
naturally.
woooooooord.

and,
drumroll please;
rdrdrdrdrdrddrdrdrrdrddrdrdrum,
our bed finally arrived this morning, too.
yep.
a bed, in a house, for sleeping in,
only a short set of weeks after we've moved in...
what's twenty days of floor campin' between friends, anyway?
well,
how about a few more days of bag-snoozin'?
it's a concious choice, kids,
to share a few more evenings in our indoor campground,
but it almost wasn't any kind of choice at all:
the bed didn't fit up the stairs, ya'll.
old and busted house hottness strikes back!
no way, no how was that mama-jama scooching up the stairway,
instead, the burly delivery dropouts had to hump it up the outdoor spiral staircase,
and up and over the doo-doo buttery sieve of a deck,
and then through the whole rest of the mutha-uckin' joint.
(the life lesson?: stay in school, my ninjas, OR measure your hallways)
we haven't hit up the bedframe assembly yet,
so it's a new day dawning,
but only from the exact same vantage point as last night.
and that's a low low one for sure.
i've got high humidity,
high hopes,
and high temperatures over here.
actually,
high temperatures seem to be stickin' around.
feelin' on my forehead,
i've got a feverish flame-broiled frontispiece.
in fact, all of us do, now-
the kids have been kind enough to lend us some upper esophageal 'itis.
i'm tellin' you, yo,
i'm allergic to my home state.
it would sort of seem that connecticut,
in conjunction with the illicit infectious incongruences of this old house,
is tryin' to take me down and out.
summer sickness?
c'mon;
i'm fightin' it loud and hard to the bitter end;
never quiet never soft.....

eats and treats

grampa tom and his better half, ms. betty
hung out with us and our whole damn fam today....
we munched up on hook-up lunchable pizzas,
hung out at the Folk Life Fortress,
aaaaand, we got haircuts!
jess got a drastic headchop of epic slice-it-off proportions,
and she is looking lava-magma-turbo ultimate hottness supreme.
the girlie-girls, harvest and maple, got trim-uppity touch-ups,
cucch got a new and improved regular boy's hairchop,
and i even got a hedgeclip on my bushy shrubbery of a facepiece.
elsah, our very own active participatin' personal stylist,
brought all her muthaflippin' expertise to bear
on ALL the collagen compounds freeform flowing from our follicles....
vanity is possibly my favorite deadly sin;
actually,
i never met one i didn't like.
still and all,
maybe gluttony is actually my bestest buddy,
because we went out to gnosh up twice today,
after tasty panniecakes this morning,
and my bloated bellyhole is a hurtin' organ grinder for sure.
the hairstyling however means that i look a little baby bit less like i feel.
we stay sharp because we look sharp.
carts and horses, my ninjas....

we got a little sumthin' sumthin' today at the country furniture/lifestyle store.
it's called a dry sink, because it has no plumbing in it,
among other reasons;
and i'm calling it some ultra-fresh bathroom cabinetry.
berserker barbarian battle-beasts need a place
to rest their scrunchies before a shower is all i'm tryin' to say....
never quiet, never soft....

ground control to grampa tom....

big happenings in the woodsly goodness, ya'll;
for the first time in several years,
jess's dad, big ol' badass bass fishin' Tom, is comin' on up.
to check in on his little lovely firstborn baby girl,
and his other other 'bionic baby bizzle,
and to scope out the new digs we're diggin' on.
hopefully we're makin' papa proud with our loud, hard lives up here.

in completely unrelated news,
more weiner guy happens today,
which is always pretty good times,
for a few hours of gloved-up man-on-man an' all that.
the weather is scorching, finally,
after a damp and dreary summer of cold dark doo-doo butter,
i'm all for more sunshiney bright, beautiful days,
and more hot, heavy, humidity, too.
and once the gang is all here,
it's all super-fancy eats and treats at the yankee magazine rave-reviewed
local yum4tum deliciousness of the thompson house eatery,
a.k.a. the t.h.e....
little kids don't misbehave at my table, ninjas.
believe it.
which is why we're all able to go out to munch up at the cloth napkin spot.

good times, hot weather, extended family;
never quiet, never soft...

sunday in the park,

so who else knows about stained glass?
i mean,
i could ask shawn 'take forever why don'tcha?' hebrank,
but it seems he's got his own transatlantic hot-leaded glazery to deal with.
so, anyone else?
i'm just sayin',
i've got a holy helluva lot of thin-paned mullioned hottness over here.
seriously.
well over fifty panes of pain, in fact,
and it ALL needs a little churchin' up;
mostly with the glass;
the stained part is already taken care of....

i tattooed about a billion little words of wisdom,
inspirational and otherwise,
on ian the hippie's upper thigh today.
what a nice guy, ya'll.
it seems as if the secret universal plan has already scheduled a slew
of good peoples to boost up my positive mental attitude of gratitude.
it's workin', too.
after i zapped his ass into novel novels of grandfatherly adages,
i headed back to the homestead.
and let me just add,
the fortress of Folk Life & Liberty was full of big action big fun...
we smoked up on some stumplestiltskins,
cohibas, even,
and grilled the mess out of a whole garden's worth of veggies.
the cucch rode a bus from waterbaby weak sauce wallingford to be here,
and our other other buddy jim showed up, too.
did we skewer up on some epic kabobs?
oh, hell yeah we did,
and asparagus, and oyster mushrooms,
and pasta flippin' salad,
and new pretend meaty vegan fake chicken burgers as well.
we topped it all off with super screamin' soycream sundaes.
with 'nilla 'nola, and grilled peachy fruit slices,
and sprinkles, too.
i can strongly opine that today was the day.
active participation at it's most active;
summer felt good today, mutha 'uckas.
worthy.
grateful.
good.
surrounded by goodness,
surrounded by woodsliness,
surrounded by a fresh, developing well-conceived plotline,
alongside amazing characters,
in a series of fortunate events.
pure protagonism, no secondaries, subplots, or static.
we doo-dooed that august august, ya'll.

summer is waning,
and the impending wacky waxing of woodsly goods
is poppin' off like wet gremlin backbottom baby blops.
this time, right here, however,
is just right.
spanning, kids.
all wrenched up, with nowhere else to turn;
never quiet, never soft....

picked apart.

the great thing about little kids?
they say some mean-ass sh!t without realizing it.
i've got a litany of lameness listed off without any self-conciousness,
or pangs of conscience or consequence, every day.
dissed and dismissed in discourse throughout the course of my daily dadly duties;
it's great!
gettin' taken down untold notches,
lower and lower,
by my own flesh-and-bones baby girls.
they must've inherited that kind of scathing observational commentary
from somewhere...
of course, i can't for the life of me figure out from whom.
wherever it comes from,
according to my small and delightfuls,
i'm large, in charge, and generally dreadful.
nice.
add in a mix of shazamrock irish prideful tattoos,
throughout the day,
five total, all accounted for,
and i'm winning, ya'll.
nothing goes better with a dressing down
than a whole day of dressed-up mess-ups.
sparkle magical three- and four-leafy goodness.
i'm sayin',
that's a whole lotta luck o',
if you feel me......

we read the tale of 'smith of wootton major' tonight,
and it was awesome.
j.r.r. could certainly spin a yarn, my ninjas.
sittin' by the hearth,
without a television set to be found in the house,
spending quality time together.
what's better'n' that?
nothin';
never quiet, never soft...

wired.

all's well that ends well,
well nice an' that, even,
and all well after the predicted program, too.
what?
the long and the short of it is:
our phone works.
and that's good news.

i tatzapped my friends dan and gina today.
incredibly different styles,
butterflies, black and gray,squirrels and barbarian hot fire spitting,
...and darn good company, to boot.
it was a back-to-back blastoff marathon of technical challenges
during an incredibly long day.
they both rocked it.
hard.
and hopefully,
they're both psyched with the results.
i know i am.
thanks, guys!

if you live in the sh!tty city,
which is pretty much every city,
then i feel bad for you son;
i got 99 problems,
but beautiful star-filled crystal clear light pollutionless skies ain't one.
me and all my sweetest baby bizzles, two- and four-legged,
did some serious gazing up at the heavens this evening.
a perfect ending, ya'll.
better than storybook prince-smooching, for sure.
there is only ever this moment.
and this one is a damn good one.

it all ufolds the way it's supposed to,
according to plan.
hell, if it was obvious,
it wouldn't be the secret universal stratagem schematic,
would it?
i'm a little bit van gogh-ing crazy over these starry nights, ninjas;
never quiet, never soft....

T'n'T'...

Tea and Toast.
every mornin', my ninjas.
with a spot of faux buttery fattie-boombattitude,
and a doo-doo dollop of jammie jam.
all british isles an' that.
it's well nice, yeah?
TnT, y'all.
it's a dyn-o-mite kickstart to every day.
and i use the broiler, b!tches.
because toaster ovens are waaaay too trailery,
and i don't eat hot pockets.
...recognize.
Tea and Toast;
that's the woodsly goodness equivalent
of gin and juice...
laaaaaaaaaaaiiiid back.
with my mind on my ladies stayin' up here,
havin' big fun and plannin' on even more...
what other other TnT is on the schedule today?
how about Thor and Thunder?!
i can't see why not, kids.
especially after we all woke up late from our floor-model
sleepytime showroom,
all folk-punk squatter-type snoozie and whatnot.
two kids, two grownish-ass adults,
and a dirty dog,
snug as dustmites in a pillowcase.
yep.
we've got the goods, comin' and goin',
and it's all so good.
lucky ducks and ducklings is what we are,
even if swanhood seems an unlikely reward for our ugly old selves.
alas,
i can spruce up an old wall,
but i'll probably still look just as butt-nasty standing next to it.
like an oyster and the pearl within,
in complete opposite and inverse proportions.
more like a turd in the taj mahal, maybe....
however it equates,
in the meandering meantime,
the just-be-dopeness of little bitty kiddies is pretty inspiring.
no foolin'.
they don't even see the random peeling poop-sprinkles
spead throughout the house.
they're either too young,
or maybe just a touch too rad,
to know anything about old bustedness at all.
they only see the epic hottness.
and that's word....
i'm trying on a pair of younger eyes today.
i need them jawns.
rose-colored irises or otherwise,
i've got my peepers a-peepin'
on that all-the-way-past-eleven kind of flavor.
that's some good-lookin' out.
thanks, girlie-girls,
i'm on the mutha-ucka;
never quiet, never soft.....

WOTAN's fury.

so the barbarian weather gods are angry, i guess.
i actually watched a pitch-black barrier of thunderheads roll over the mountains,
all orcs from lord of the rings style,
and buffet the battens, and hatches,
all over the mutha-uckin' valley.
our hilltop nook, nestled behind the mighty mighty maples and oaks
wasn't spared by a damn sight.
(yeah, i took a swim in the garage this morning)
and it wasn't just the homestead that took a lumpin' either;
one incredible thing about inclined dirt roads
is that if it rains hard enough or long enough,
most of that road does something pretty great:
it washes away.
that's correct.
the incredible disappearing road trick.
that's what's good in the 'hood today.
instant cliffs and ravines;
just add water.
nice.
fortunately our ancient neighbors are cranky complainers!
in two weeks of weak-sauce washouts,
the town has rebuilt and repaired and regraded the road a couple times.
thanks, old non-friendlies.
if i had to pick between a sweet road and a close-knit friendship
with buick skylark owners,
it's an easy choice every time.

harvest and maple are here!
and they totally love our woodsly goodness manor home.
they're rockin' storyland with auntie mary today,
and then i'm tatblastin' the heck outta my sister's ribs.
should be a full day of workin' hard,
and playin' hard,
and living.
hard.
there's a whole holy helluva lot of ladies up here.
estrogen is oozing like b!tch-sap out of the woodwork,
(or maybe that's just another leak somewhere.)
i'm outnumbered seven to one,
but despite the logistics of balls-to-hoops ratios,
i'm pretty sure i've got 'em outgunned,
and surrounded.
real life is unfolding right in front of me.
it's happening, ya'll;
never quiet, never soft....