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you can take the girl out of west virginia, but you can't take the west virginia out of the girl

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

WV, I ♥ YOU

my brother's dog doesn't have  a water bowl. he drinks from the toilet. only.

hot spots are all over the place. i asked my brother what they were. he said "5 poker machines & an ashtray" so video poker = hot spot. and the limit is 5 machines.

the view out of my brother's kitchen window is a 1983 jet ski & a kitchen sink laying in the yard.

rather than pay for trash service, my brother takes his trash to his buddy's work shop & dumps it
 which is where the mud slut is

have you had "Choco Vino?  it's, and i quote, "the taste of dutch chocolate and fine red wine". it tastes like Yoo-hoo, but is 14% alcohol. delicious. honestly. and even better when everyone just passes the bottle around.



fun facts:
i was in WV for 3 weeks
times i ate a meal from a gas station: 5
times i've done that otherwise this past year: 0
times i ate chicken wings for dinner: 6
times i've done that this past year: 0
# of candy bars i ate: 7ish
# eaten the rest of this WHOLE past year: 7ish
gallons of beer drank: unchanged
exercise level has declined from an 8 to like a 1.5

which is probably why when i said i should try to make some money by being a stripper, my brother responded with "you're going have to wear a bra on your ass, and learn to walk on your hands" and said i needed to get some anti-monkey butt powder, which is for large butts, that struggle with friction issues. you can buy it at the tractor supply store, along with chicken poop, which made it into the previous blog entry.

there's a new strip bar in town called the parrot somethingorother, & apparently they didn't secure their pole very well because (according to my brother's friend) the pole broke & the stripper flew about 15 feet off the stage. i wonder what the terminal velocity would be off of a stripper pole? this is the same place & same friend that had a stripper (tho clearly she has another profession) say she'd do whatever he wanted for $200. he responded "for $200, you'll paint my kitchen!!" 

my brother made a big announcement. it started with "you guys! bad news!" long pause. "i got a job". it is in our genetic code to be adverse to employment.


would you expect the guy that has his own bio-diesel making facility to say things like "the solution to pollution is dilution"?  you see, in WV people are not really what you'd call "green". they are, however, very thrifty & innovative. so every single thing in this bio-diesel shed (yes, shed) is home-made. these guys are making 10's of 1,000's of gallons of fuel. in a shed! giant 1,000 gallon propane tanks have to be relieved of their remaining propane. you just open the valve, when the hissing slows down, you take the welding torch, and throw a spark into the tank. it'll burn for quite awhile, like enough propane to supply a house for 4 days. usually one of 2 things is said during these moments:
1. hold my beer while i get the camera
2. PUT IT OUT!!! PUT IT OUT!!!
does it sound dangerous? because it is. very. dangerous. one day a state trooper was driving by while they were heating up the vegetable oil to get the water out of it. imagine a flame about 12 feet high & 4 feet in diameter that was visible to the trooper. they knew he'd come back around, so when he made a 2nd pass, they hooked a shop vac up in reverse so it'd blow air & funneled it into the flame to get a significantly larger flame. as the trooper was staring at them, he managed to drive off the road, into a field. that now required a 3rd pass by the trooper who had to come back to ask some questions, like "what are you guys making here?" answer "maple syrup". trooper thought they were making moonshine, but realized it was bio-diesel, and didn't care. technically, they're making soap (glycerine) but you have to get rid of that bio-diesel "waste" some how. might as well put it in your trucks, bob cats, back hoes, & excavators. about 20 feet away from the shed (full of not just flammable liquids, but also explosive liquids) is the "burn pile". you know, where you throw all the trash to burn it. now, i have several more photos of this operation, but i like these guys too much to publish them. i don't want them to be identifiable. but there's the welder, inside the shed, about 6 feet from stuff that blows up.
there's the burn pile. its much bigger than it looks.



who builds a house around trailer? is it still considered a trailer? i don't think it's a "trouse", which is a trailer you put on top of a basement, but i guess it could be. 


this is not the first time my brother convinced every one to drink beer out of the dog's bowl. nor is it the first time he pulled his pants down while standing in the middle of this bar. apparently his behavior is not shocking enough to get kicked out. so we passed the dog bowl around the same way we passed the Choco-Vino around.