Month: July 2025

Monument In Green

BHTM first Album

Monument In Green

By Big Head Todd and the Monsters

Well I rode the green across this country
Horses lived and died to take me
Men I killed to help me get there, further West I died to take me
Blackened face and dirty laundry. Many days since I have eaten
Found myself a family. Broke my back so I could feed them

High in the wind. Standing in the sun
We’re going to raise up the heavens
With a shovel and a gun
I was so much younger then. I would never ever listen
I am so much older now. I thought that things would end up different
Farewell, lover in green

Well, Elizabeth she is my lady
Says the prayers and does the learning
Waking up all the children
Making love in early morning
We took to building up the cities
We built the churches in our cities
Happy in the green country
And in the green they buried me

High in the wind. Standing in the sun
We’re going to raise up the heavens
With a shovel and a gun
I was so much younger then. I would never ever listen
I am so much older now. I thought that things would end up different
Farewell, lover in green

Oh, she sang hills (?) and made me cry
Oh, she died so tender when I held you in the night

Well, I’m dead now
My wife Elizabeth is at my side
I have children all around me
I have grandchildren
I have great grandchildren
I have great great great grandchildren
Too many for me to remember
Maybe one of them is you…

High in the wind. Standing in the sun
You’re going to raise up the heavens
With a shovel and a gun

You’re high in the wind. Standing in the sun
You’re going to raise up the heavens
With a shovel and a gun

I was so much younger then. I would never ever listen
I am so much older now. I thought that things would end up different
Farewell, lover in
Farewell, lover in
Farewell, lover in green

https://genius.com/Big-head-todd-and-the-monsters-monument-in-green-lyrics

The Roundup

Encounters: Overheard at a convenience store in a small town recently a man telling two other people about a baby that died and was buried by mistake in a pet cemetery. All three men men looked intent and serious, as if the story was true and not some morbid joke.

Read: My nephew loaned me The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit, By Michael Finkel. An interesting read that includes some pondering about what living alone does to humans.

Observed: A recent night storm passing over our acreage that produced some rain and little thunder. The lightning show was incredible, however, and lasted over an hour. Some of the lightning seemed to crawl in half loops under the dark clouds (sort of like this: uuuuuu).

Website: Hermitary

Recipe: Once again it it summer and that means tuna salad time in our house. If desired you can try our recipe here.

Peace With Rabbits, Tom Cat And Attacking Grackles

Tom Cat

While visiting with a local farmer during early spring he told me farmers can not start planting until April 10 for insurance reasons.

After over five years of war with rabbits on our acreage I realized there was no way for me to win. They propagate so quickly (females can go into heat the day after delivering a litter) that I can’t shoot the adults fast enough to make much of a difference in their population around here. It drops to a few rabbits, and I think I am winning, when our place is overwhelmed again. This year our flowerpots are all up off the ground and various veggies are either in raised beds or surrounded with chicken wire. The population of rabbits has seemed to have reached a pretty steady level and there is peace on the acreage, for now.

We have a feral cat living on the acreage with us currently, named Tom Cat by me. We have not seen it close enough during the day to determine if it is a male or female, and the other night I heard the crazy, loud sounds of cats mating, so if it is a Tam Cat instead there could be some kittens meowing around soon. It gets lazy if fed every night so Shelly has decided to feed it cat food only every other night, to supplement the mice and chipmunks it is killing.

We have been sprucing up the place outdoors with pottery, pinwheels, flowers, plants, chimes, old farm wheels, etc. We have had to cut back some of the milkweed for the butterflies because it was taking over our whole rock garden.

Our inventory of birds this year includes woodpeckers, mourning doves, finches, hummingbirds, robins, blue jays, orioles, sparrows, and nuthatches. Finally, there are the grackles, who will dive bomb any squirrel they find feeding on the ground around the bird feeders. They become so obsessed with attacking squirrels they forget to eat.