Stuck in the past or favoring the old ways.

[Bird]

Egon, when I was a kid, most folks called it a "slop jar" instead of a "honey bucket" even though it actually was a bucket with a lid.

We never had a cream separator; just skimmed the cream off the top of the milk with a cup, although I've used an uncle's cream separator. He had his rigged so that you hand cranked it to get it up to speed, then flipped the switch and let an electric motor take over. And of course, I had lots of experience with a butter churn.

And while I've used quite a number of hand pumps on wells, we never had one ourselves; just a bucket on a rope and a pulley.

And I never did care much for those long johns with a trap door, but I had to use them at times.

I just got back from the grocery store where I bought two of the prettiest tomatoes you ever saw . . . and they have about as much flavor as a piece of cardboard.

 

[denmansoft]

I don't regret leaving behind:
Bias ply tires that would only last 5000 miles on northern roads.
Clutches that wore out after 20,000 miles (my current truck is at 90,000 km on orig. clutch)

Although I design and build some of the latest hi-tech gadgets, I really like to spend MY time away from them.

The best thing about cell phones is that they have an OFF button. That way my cell is for my use and convenience. Not for the convenience of others to interrupt me!

 

[2manyrocks]

I still prefer a well seasoned cast iron skillet to cook with. And I like it to be American made.

I prefer our pickles made with the old family recipe.

 

[RichZ]

Some might say my wife and I are old fashioned. We had trouble with Direct and Dish TV, and got rid of each of them. We were going to get an antenna for fringe areas, and then realized that we didn't miss TV. That was 5 years ago. We still don't miss it. We don't have cell phones. We heat our house with wood. We cut and split some, and buy some. We do have a modern milking parlor for our goat farm though, and we can milk six goats at a time, with a stainless steel pipeline to our bulk tank. And we did buy a new Kubota two years ago, to go with our vintage tractors. Of course we do have a computer, or I couldn't be on TBN, but we can only get dialup in our area. We really would love fast internet!!!

 

[jinman]

Egon, when I was a kid, most folks called it a "slop jar" instead of a "honey bucket" even though it actually was a bucket with a lid.

We never had a cream separator; just skimmed the cream off the top of the milk with a cup, although I've used an uncle's cream separator. He had his rigged so that you hand cranked it to get it up to speed, then flipped the switch and let an electric motor take over. And of course, I had lots of experience with a butter churn.

Bird, I was going to say "slop jar," but I was afraid nobody else would know that term. Honey bucket seems to be a much more modern term. I think honey wagons are what they use in some RV parks without sewer connections in every space.

Our slop jar was a straight side enameled bucket with a bail and lid. You sure didn't want one without a lid.

We also just let the cream rise to the top of our fresh milk. It sat in our old gas, Servel refrigerator until the golden cream separated to the top. Then, my mother would put the cream into a clean large mouth 1/2-gal pickle jar. I'd take the jar and shake it to make butter. I've made pounds and pounds of butter that way. We never had a butter churn.

 

[scott_vt]

We heat our house with wood. We cut and split some, and buy some. We do have a modern milking parlor for our goat farm though, and we can milk six goats at a time, with a stainless steel pipeline to our bulk tank. And we did buy a new Kubota two years ago, to go with our vintage tractors.!

Good Mornin Rich,
Good to hear you on old buddy ! I think your caught somewhere inbetween the present and past ! I bet you listen to the radio without any TV !

How you makin out with your milk transportation issues and your hay ?

 

[Bird]

Jim, I've mentioned before that in the summer of 1992, my wife & I worked in an RV park in Virginia, and while there, I helped build a honey wagon with a military surplus trailer and tank, but then we left that area before it was put into use, so I don't know how well it worked out.

And yes the slop jar was an enamaled bucket with bail & lid.

When I was a kid, we had quite a number of "crocks" that I guess held a gallon and a half maybe. Even though you try to keep the milk as clean as possible while milking the cow, it's possible to get something in the bucket that you didn't want (like a fly landing in the bucket), and the milk foams, too. So we always strained the milk from the bucket into a crock through a "cup towel" stretched over the lip of the bucket. (For those who didn't know it, a cup towel was a hemmed flour sack that was used for drying dishes and straining milk.)

The crock then went in the refrigerator. We actually had an electric refrigerator from the time I was old enough to remember it. The next day, the cream was skimmed off the top with just a coffee cup and put into another crock. When the cream crock was full, it was emptied into the butter churn, left out (covered of course) at least long enough to get up to room temperature before being churned. Our churn was the plunger type (wooden plunger) and the churn itself was a crock type material.

And I know about making butter by shaking the cream in a jar. During my first few years in school, I carried my lunch to school; biscuits with scrambled egg, bacon, and/or sausage, and a pint jar of milk. We did not have refrigeration to store our lunches, so in warm weather, sometimes my milk had soured by lunch time and I didn't drink it. So on the way home, I'd be shaking that jar and have maybe a couple of tablespoons of butter made when I got home. Only a small amount of butter because it was whole milk instead of just the cream.

 

[jdbower]

All I can say is that growing up with both new-fangled indoor plumbing and high class store bought milk I'm praying that a "cream separator" isn't a euphemism related to "honey buckets"

 

[frank_f15]

Bird and Jinman are you sure we did not live in the same house? always loved waking up in the morning and not being able to see what the weather was like due to the ice on the inside of the windows.

 

[Bird]

Frank, we always figured fresh air was good for you, so we slept with a window open just a little bit even in cold weather. South central Oklahoma doesn't get a lot of snow, but I have awakened to find snow on the window sill where it snowed in a bit.

Did you change the kind of sheets you used on the bed in the Winter? In the Summer, we used ordinary cotton sheets (percale, I guess they call them), but in the Winter we changed to what we called "outing" sheets. They were flannel and double length, so you just had the one piece for both top and bottom. By it being folded back at the foot of the bed, you couldn't accidentally pull it loose or have your feet sticking out.

Bedrooms were never heated; the doors were kept closed so only the kitchen/living/dining rooms were heated during the day and even that was turned off at night. I remember getting a goldfish and a small fish bowl once and got up one morning to find the water frozen solid and my fish frozen in the ice. And that was in the living room.