Moonshiner's Clan - 17 JUL 62

TUES 17 JUL

N I P P O N E S E   N E W S  (A N T I)

DON’T BUY JAP!!

Fifteen years late, the Japanese are winning the war against America after all!  Cashing in on the Back-To-Nature movement here, they have been flooding the camping equipment market with horribly inferior products sold through so-called “Surplus Stores.”  Here is our tally:

   Fold-over trench shovels of Possum, Ded-Wud, Panther Track, Falcon and Burning Sand broke handles, stripped threads on tightening nuts, bent soft metal and hinge bolts coming apart. 

   Hand axes with rounded heads which slip off nails being mounded, thus causing many rare American words being uttered over smashed fingers.

   Web belts with fasteners which don’t hold and come apart on hikes.

   Big Axes with pressure wedges pounded in at right angles to the pressure slit thus splitting the wood at first whack.  (Whatsa madda?  Never had axes in Japan?  Or else devilishly clever.)

   Cloth canteen holders: Shooting Star’s tore off five minutes after he put his is foot on the mountain.

   Pack Frames of box-wood which disintegrate under a loaded hike; screw eyes coming out; straps tearing.

   Pure and simple, this junk is not worth the bamboo and paper maché it is made out of. Buy only real American Army stuff!

   Going off like a string of fire crackers, the break-downs have threatened morale – especially when a man is right in the middle of digging an emergency granite hole. Despite all, lean-tos area being constructed above and below city Park. Buckskin, Firebug and Shooting Star have dug their 3-foot deep post holes and erected their Y-Poles which were chopped down yesterday: (Rocks, dirt, water; rocks, dirt, water)  They call their site Aspen Paradise. Professor, Squirrel and Panther Track will put in their poles first thing in the morning, spending most of their time so far terracing the 30° hill and removing a 10 ton boulder from one hole. Blue prints have been drawn and approved by the Building Inspector for the “Lean-Four” up at the Hawk Flyway.  Maybe cemented rockwall will be added to this one.

                                                                MB and

                                                       Running Phantom

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SWEET BREATH OF SPRING

   There is a difference between filth and honest dirt.  Like a cook pot, a Mountain Man can be dirty outside, just so long as he is clean within.

  But Still, the fragrance does get a bit rich.

   So we scrubbed. Each man had a large pot of hot water into which he scraped some bar soap – just like Gramma.  By the numbers, we were shown how to rub out the tarnish on our diapers.  Then we learned how to grind out the sweat-cement from week old sox.  Lastly, blue jeans which can stand in a corner by themselves were folded over with a hammer and shoved under to leach.  After two blackwater rinses, we stretched a line, wrung and hung.  Then some men got into the scrub tanks and went thru the process themselves.                                              I-Jaw

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Since Quiet Deer is a student of Indian Lore, he asked permission to spend a full day at the crest alone without food and water in order to achieve a vision to help him in his rite of transition into adolescence.  Permission granted. H leaves tomorrow at blue-up time before sawn.  We will not expect him back until after sundown.  A magnificent change of spirit will doubtless take place.  Good medicine from us all, Quite Deer In Transition.

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COOKING CLASS: Each man learns step-by-step construction of Russian Soldier Soup.  Cauldron full built in afternoon. Disappears I evening.

AXING LIVE TIMBER:  All men fell living trees for lean-tos

CAMPFIRE: Reading of Justice Douglas’s book, “America Challenged”

Discussion on the viciousness of mass conformity until wee hours.