It started out going to the butcher to get a deer. Now, I'm a vegetarian, so I wouldn't kill a deer to eat it, but my roommate hit it with her car. Another compatriot with experience in such matters claimed he could field dress the deceased. This involved four of us on the side of I-94 at ten o'clock at night, wearing aprons, holding knives and flashlights. No one stopped to help us. We got the poor fellow back to the house and hung it up in the garage to drain the blood. The reason I was interested is that I want to tan the hide. I don't buy leather, but it is useful, so I thought an accidentally killed animal shouldn't go to waste. We thought we would skin and butcher the deer ourselves, but after watching a few videos on the Internet, we became convinced it was too difficult, and required a few specialized tools. We therefore resolved to take it to a animal processor. Later, a friend of ours from the Soo claimed she's been skinning and butchering deer since she was 10, and that it isn't too hard. But the die had been cast.
And Saturday is when we got the meat and hide back from the processor. I was tempted to eat some, but I had a dream that I ordered some chicken wings at a bar and felt really guilty. Further, a vegetarian friend also had a dream that he and I steamed baby turtles alive. Clearly a sign that I shouldn't eat roadkill deer.
After we got the deer back, Smith and I worked on our windmill project. We are currently building a scale model of a wind turbine, in order to build a full scale wind turbine. On Saturday, we partially skinned the skeleton of the blade. Our idea was to build the blades like old airplane wings, with a wooden skeleton and canvas skin. See pictures.
After we glued the muslin on the wings (muslin serving as canvas in the model), we painted the muslin with watered-down glue. This caused the fabric to shrink and make the skin very tight. While we were waiting for the glue to dry, we made a strawberry cobbler with dumpster-dived strawberries. It turned out pretty well, as you can see in the pictures.
Our research shows it is best with chocolate chip ice cream.
After the cobbler, the muslin needed another coat. While this was drying, I was noodling on the piano, and discovered a housemate's set of Lord of the Rings soundtrack scores. We resolved to record the Elvish hymn "Fourth Eorlingas," in eight-part harmony. Using open-source audio program Audacity, and the microphone that comes with the Xbox game "Rock Band," (it turns out Rock Band uses a regular USB microphone.) we recording all eight vocal lines from "Fourth Eorlingas." Listen to it here. (Does anybody know a better .mp3 hosting service?)
To end the evening, those interested began cooking venison kebabs over the fire. Smith and I made cheese toast over the fire.
Poor kebab design: items with different cook times on the same stick.
Cheese toast, post-fire.
Overall, I'd say it was a day well spent.
1 comment:
That...sounds like a REALLY awesome day. I'm envious!
Where are you living these days, by the way?
Post a Comment