There is so much to say. Guerrilla Camping is currently going through the proofing process with two very amazing editors. Patiently patiently waiting. We might yet see a book!

Changes changes changes. Work work work.

Thanks for all of you who have continued to keep up with this blog and send me letters of encouragement and thanks. I am very happy to know I keep finding readers. I have gone back and reedited most of Guerrilla Camping and am working on laying it out to either self publish or pimp out.

The blackpacker persona exists today only as a spark in my soul, the foundation of who I have become. I've settled in Mendocino county, married my fiance, and had a son. I still work at the farm supply, and have started doing all the marketing for them.

I've got to be one of the only people in the world who could decide it was time to grow up and get serious with life and go back into graphics design. Well, marketing.

Those of you who followed my blogs on GNN when I was posting as hagcel will understand this immediately, as most of the issues I covered revolved around media literacy, culture jamming and memetic engineering. For those of you who tuned in as I started writing about my lifelong hobby as a vagabond, it might seem a bit confusing.

The primary reason I am doing this is because my community needs me. Seriously. Small businesses are buried in search engines even in local results. It seems that unless you make wine and use a Napa, SF or New York ad firm, you don't exists around here.

It took me less than one week to fix that at the farm supply, and over six months, I have nailed down every relevant search result for our business and was able to build some markets that are particularly favorable to my ethics (organic nutrients, sustainable micro-farms, and self-sufficiency), so I can still sleep at night even though I'm paying taxes and being a legitimate member of society.

So, I've restarted the marketing and design firm from SF, and am going to try and make enough money to give my son the ability to go to college without going to war.

Urban Merit is a full service Ukiah marketing and design firm that works to build our local economy by supporting local businesses and entrepreneurs. We specialize in search engine management, brand development and outreach and print and web design. Our team has been assembled from many parts of the state to create a dynamic and fully featured marketing firm.

Our website, www.urbanmerit.com is currently in stasis and will launch sometime this weekend. Once my book is finished, you will be able to buy it there or find out where to buy it form there.

Thanks for sticking around.

Hey! I'm over here!

You know, I'm a lifestyle migrant; Offline and on. That said, you can keep up with my current projects at work over at REDACTED. There you will find info on our gardens, grow rooms, chicken coops, and helpful tips on everything from erosion control to treating mite infestations in chickens.

Guerrilla Camping is still going, but since it's been a few years since I had internet with anything but that dumb phone, posts are still going to be intermittent. Big news coming up soon though, so stay posted.

For all of you who followed my stuff on GNN, drop me a line! I miss you!

Funny customer inspired thought...

I'm going to sell organic cyanide from organic apple seeds so at least
our rats won't die of cancer...
I think my sense of humor is intact.

Quick Update. Coming up for air again.

Well guys, once again, long time, no blog. As I have mentioned previously, blogging via the iPhone is obnoxious at best, impossible at worst. At last, however, I got a computer. Just the cheapest little netbook I could find. I don’t need the distraction of trying to see what a machine can do. A word processor, a few MP3s and the ability to work online is enough for me.

I’m still quite off the grid, however, I can upload stuff at work, so am working on getting that set up right now.

It has been a wild and convoluted year. The rise and gradual fall of our daily victories, right? They finally got me working full time at the Farm Supply, and it is possibly the best job description I have ever had… “Just wander around and do what you do.”

That’s right. No looking over the shoulder, no second guessing, just the support and assistance of my co-workers and manager. Without question. Open accounts at all the best shops in town, and working for a store that instantly gets me handshakes and warm welcomes at all of them. I must be a running joke at the local welding shop, as I have the most experience with a welder at the shop, and before I got promoted, I had about 14 inches of wire-feed welding under my belt. But they are helpful, and certainly don’t make me feel like an idiot.

About two months ago, we finally got DOGS. Yes. Big DOGS. Well, giant puppies at least. A mix of Great Dane and Cane Corso (an impressive Italian mastiff and, according to legend, descended from the same dogs that fought the lions in ancient Rome). Jack and Liberty are amazing dogs, already able to come, sit and stay with hand commands from a distance, and comfortable in lots of unusual situations, such as parked next to the machine gun booth at the 4^th of July carnival in town.

The cabin is… well, the cabin. Things are strange, and we are looking for property to own ourselves.

Well, I’ve got more pressing things to write, so that is all for now.

 

Homestead blacksmithing

The newest addition to the abilities pile. Forged a little coal
scraper before work today... The wife loves it. More later...

As always, when there is silence on the blog, you can rest assured that there is a lot going on. Lets see, since the last blog, our garden has grown, but most surprising, the garden at the farm supply has exploded. A few days after publishing blog, I was told to go ahead and plant a garden out in the warehouse yard, something I had given up on, aside from a few onions and garlic, due to a lack of interest from other workers.

In a wild chain of events, we went from “lets plant some stuff and make raised beds” to “lets buy a skip loader and sell bulk soil.” Then on to, “Hey Spicer, go buy a tractor, build a soil bin, license a few of the guys in back, and think about a trailer so we can take the tractor out to our own houses, and rent you out to customers.”

Then, last Monday, this article his to front page of the local paper. The article prompted a few new customers to come in and ask me questions like, “why doesn’t my garden grow?” Wednesday, I got a phone call from the boss, who asked me if I’d be in on Monday because the head of the ag department at the college wants to meet with me, and that we’d also be working out a plan for a community plot for the local senior center.

Our wonderful neighbors, The Donners, are moving back to England again, and I spent last week working with the patriarch of the family helping him finish off projects before his departure. I spent the week mostly holding things and minding the fire on a small forge as I picked up a bit more practical experience in blacksmithing. Upon their departure, we’ll be moving their forge and anvil down here to my place to keep a blacksmith on the hill.

Yet another neighbor moved, but this time he moved his whole house. Having spent nearly two decades in a tipi, he was able to move the house and have it set up in one day, a mile deeper into the hills, finally getting him out of the dust channel of living beside our road. After helping him move a 1000 gallon water tank down a half mile foot path, he asked if I wanted his old tipi, which he had replaced a few months back. So, now we’ve got a 20 foot tipi that will be residing in the west side of the garden.

He also threw in an old box stove, some chairs and planters, and anything else he didn’t want to drag down to his new place. If anybody wants one of those dangerous folding plastic chaise lounges, he’s got one for you cheap. And a little cooler.

Finally, the fourteen month odyssey into experimental wind power resulted in a 30 foot erection as our new slavonius turbine went vertical, producing a whopping 20 watts before choking out and getting set back down.

Our neighborhood watch program got kicked into high gear with the arrival of trespass growers on the timber parcel beside our place, with a neighbor and I tracking them down the river road far enough to make sure they weren’t out in our backyard. A few days later, the security manager of the parcel arrived and we spent about an hour going over the tracks, and being shown the survey markers that mark the limits of our property.

A few days after the trespass growers went driving down our road, I ran into a guy in our driveway with no good business and a downright bad attitude. Being unable to encourage him to leave on my own, the neighbors got called into action and we managed to run him off the hill. Later that day, he enjoyed a 60mph high speed chase down a road I have trouble going more than 20 mph on, flipped his 4runner, and proceeded to defy police as he sat in the wreck. He was found to have a switch blade, tear gas and an empty flashlight containing just over a pound of meth. One of my buddies up here on the hill described him as a spunion, a word I will be using as frequently as possible when encountering tweakers.

Just a normal everyday hillbilly life.