The Wild West

We moved to the  Emerald Triangle four years ago this past January.  The Emerald Triangle earns it's name by the three adjoining counties (Humboldt, Trinity and Mendocino) being the biggest marijuana producing counties in California and also the USA.  That's not why we moved here.  My husband finished up his four year stint in the Coast Guard and wanted to use his GI Bill to go to school back in his home state of California. He picked out a few schools dotted about the coast and on our way we went.  Right off the bat I knew that I just wasn't cool enough for  So. Cal, birth place of 90210 and the OC.  So, when it came time to pull into one of the potential campuses I told him to keep on trucking.  We drove to the northern most end of the state and settled on the university that had a dredlocked girl blowing bubbles on the cover of the course catalog.  That's not why he choose that school. Besides the university being very serious about their students blowing bubbles, it also happens to have one of the best forestry programs in the country. 
    So we settled into town and it didn't take long to notice some differences out here.  I spent time getting myself familiar with the surrounding towns which aren't very big but all seemed to have multiple head/ glass shops in them.  Horticulture centers are quite abundant here as well.  These centers are as big as super markets and specialize in some of the best fertilizers & soil in the world, irrigation systems, fans, pots, indoor lighting, green houses...basically anything a "grower" would need to start growing marijuana outside or indoors in houses.
     On the radio they advertise automatic trimmers to help get the weed from stalk to turkey bags.  Driving down 101 I couldn't figure out why billboards were advertising great bulk rate prices on turkey bags.  Apparently, I was one of the few people who didn't know this but, turkey bags they are great way  package weed while containing the smell.  You can share that little bit of input with your grandma at Thanksgiving.
You have to be careful, as my unassuming very wholesome manager found out, when you are shopping for blueberry starter plants on Craigslist.  She made a call to inquire about $1 blue berry plants but the gal on the phone explained  that these "blue berry starts" only grew buds...not blue berries and they were not $1.
    If there ever is a herd of black SUV's driving our way, or a massive collection of police cars gathering somewhere, or a bunch of helicopters flying over the hills, the radio stations don't hesitate announcing this to their listeners that the feds are in town.
     We don't only catch the attention of the law up here but some of the biggest names in reggae music come here to play at sold out shows.  We even have two dueling reggae festivals in the summer.  Snoop Dog always makes it a point to stop in our little town to play a show.  When the show starts going off the crowd will throw buds at Snoop instead of the ever so typical pairs of underwear or bras on the stage.
If you want to get serious about Marijuana you can go to college for it at  707 Cannabis College.  They may not have a girl blowing bubbles on their website but I'm sure they get busy inhaling and exhaling something else there.  They make it real easy to suit the lifestyles of potential students by not starting classes before 10am.  You can learn about the history of pot and how it inspired writers and even leaders!  You can take a hands on lab on edible marijuana.  YOU can check it out or even enroll at  http://www.707cannabiscollege.com/.
    In case you are not feeling well, there are doctors that specialize in  "Medical Cannabis Consultation". For a few hundred bucks you can get diagnosed with anxiety, sleep deprivation, depression....whatever.... and you can get your 215 Card that allows you to buy medical marijuana from a dispensary or grow a certain amount of plants at your home.  If you don't have your 215 card but get caught growing pot or smoking it you can always hire various attorneys that specialize in Marijuana Defense Law.  You can find their phone numbers easy enough advertised in the local newspaper almost always with a pot leaf as a logo.
     So why doesn't the law squash all this pot growing that they know is going on?  I don't know.  But a huge part of our economy depending on it may have something to do with it.  We're in the middle of no where.  The lumber industry used to be king out here until it took a dive especially after the latest economic crash hit and the demand for lumber to build new homes with hit the wall.  The growers hire plumbers, carpenters, electricians, large equipment operators... They have to hire people to help them grow, harvest and trim their bounty.  People are employed at the head shops, horticulture centers, the fast food places that provide a cure for the late night munchies.  They spend tons of cash in the restaurants, specialty stores, markets, doctors, veterinary hospitals...  Last election proposition 19 was on the ballot wanting to legalize marijuana. Surprisingly growers banded together to encourage people to vote it down.  Why?  Taxes and big business.  The growers are pulling in loads of straight untaxed cash and they didn't want that to change.  And, they didn't want big business obliterating them either.  It didn't pass.  I was relieved.  It's half selfish on my part because I kind of like here the way it is in the wild west.
Copyright (c) 2011 Jacksonhillhorseygirl.com

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Copyright(c) 2011 Jacksonhillhorseygirl.com

Another Day at the Office

I start and end my days feeding the horses on the ranch I work and live on with my husband, our horse Autumn, our dog Lilly and our two cats Kiki and Fluffy Pants (AKA...  F-to the-P-pants).  During the week I spend most of my days working at the local horse and livestock veterinary hospital.  We treat horses, cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, donkeys, mules and we deal with some pretty "special" owners.  The one thing I can say about that job is that you never know what you're in for from day to day.  Somedays, you may be stuck on the phone, doing inventory, working on the computer... Then the next day you could be staring at a wall wondering how a cow was able to shit a cow pie over a seven foot wall and have it plaster itself 10 feet away, splattering eye level on the laundry room door. 
The other afternoon, we had a horse come in that was colicing real bad.  Colic, simply defined, is like deadly constipation in horses that can kill them relatively quickly if not treated.  This poor guy was in bad shape.  He clenched his teeth and his eyes were screaming with pain.  His owners wanted us to do everything we could to save him.  He was their kids horse.  We gave him pain killers and 6 liters of intravenous fluids (think of that in terms of  liter soda bottles).  We even gave him a horsey enema.  To do this the veterinarian used a special hose that he inserted into the horse's butt, while I pumped a bucket full of an enema into the hose and into the horse.  It took about a half a bucket of fluid before he exploded it back out complete with poop into my face.  I missed my golden opportunity to ask for a raise at that moment.
The next morning I ran to his stall to find that he had passed away during the night.  I knew it had to have been a painful death.  As bummed out as I was I had to start making a plan to get him drug out of the stall before we had appointments come in.  I made arrangements with the usual rancher who did this sort of thing and had the RIGHT equipment to do the job.  But, when the owner came he said he would take care of it.  He had a backhoe show up and he told me the trailer would be there any minute.  It appeared he had it all under control.  The morning was ticking away and still no trailer.  I got busy on the phone for a bit and sort of forgot about things until I saw the medical marijuana doctor's wife outside the window holding her hand over her mouth in shear horror.  I went to see what she was looking at.  Hanging 20 feet in the air upside down from the backhoe bucket was the horse.  They were trying to heft him over the side of a gravel dump truck but his head kept knocking against the side not letting him flop in and his butt was starting to pop out.  Meanwhile, cars on the highway slowed  to a crawl, and the pot doctor's wife was looking dead at me with  judging scorn.  All I needed was a school bus of kids to pull in.  The guys made some adjustments and they were finally able to get on their way.  We made some new office policies that day.
I wasn't left with much time to dwell on what just happened before the doctor was calling me back to the barn to shave a horse's scrotum for an ultrasound.  Luckily the horse was a gentleman about it and I told his owner he'd need to buy him a pair of pants after the appointment.  He didn't get it but I thought it was pretty funny. 
As I dusted the horse's ball hair off myself the phone rang. The woman on the phone wanted to know how long goats lived.  I told her from 12-15 years.  She said "I just wanted to know how much longer I needed to live."  Huh. Before I could figure out what to say to that, she said she was 85 and didn't want to die and leave them alone.  She told me that she loved them so much and they brought her so much happiness.  I told her she was a lucky to have such great goats and that she was stuck living for at least another 7  years maybe more with those little guys. 
The day ended with a horse coming in that was sick with diarrhea.  The poor guy was plastered in it and it took an hour to get him washed up and looking dashing again.  I left the office that day, smelling like horse diarrhea with remnants of horse scrotum hair stuck to my pants wondering what I would've done if that horse's butt hole would have popped out while it was hanging in the air. 
Copyright (c) 2011 Jacksonhillhorseygirl.com