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Posted

@Zepol87 we’ve seen your ugly mug posted half a dozen times- no need going through the work to black yourself out. Thank you for always bringing it with the hotties though. 
Last year we set out a charcuterie board more of a novelty decoration, I guess…?  The kids fucking mowed through it. This year we did a larger board as well as sliders, baked beans, jalapeño poppers, chips and queso, and spiked apple cider. Looks like it will become an annual tradition. 

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Posted
21 hours ago, Prepuce of Doom said:

We found one potato (purple) smashed on the sidewalk in front of the neighbor's house. 

Were the potatos popular with the children bussed in by antifa? 

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Posted
52 minutes ago, seven said:

Were the potatos popular with the children bussed in by antifa? 

Alas, I did not interrogate the children about their patrons or sources of funding, but I assume that their escapades were probably subsidized by George Soros. There's no clearer explanation. 

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Posted
On 11/1/2025 at 9:56 AM, Prepuce of Doom said:

We had 14 purple (generally the largest) 25 white, and 24 red (generally the smallest) to start. This morning, final tally of the remainders are 8 purple left, 15 white left, and 20 red left. The number of white potatoes taken (10) equals the combined number of purple (6) and red (4) taken. This breaks down to kids choosing the white potato 50% of the time, purple 30%, and red 20%.

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Posted
On 11/1/2025 at 12:18 PM, Underdog said:

No issues with where the kids are from or how old they are. 

how old is too old?  are you giving me candy if I show up on your doorstep?

Posted

Yesterday was (Re)Interment Day. 

I didn't get a picture of the final state of decay for our "normal" pumpkin because at the time I realized that yesterday was the "throw away your pumpkins to be composted" collection day, I had 9 minutes to collect and contain the mess and get to the dropoff location. 

It's one of these though! 

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But I did get a picture of its leftover Buttmold™ befouling our porch:

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Final group shot of the season:

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This guy is still quite heavy and seems to be going strong. I'm guardedly optimistic that he will survive to join the permanent cast. A whole bunch of tiny flying insects came flying out of his holes when disturbed. Pretty gnarly. 

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Indoor crew in their winter/spring/summer resting spots:

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Pledge class picture prior to entombment in the Putrefication Copse. Dog was curious for a brief moment, then not curious at all. Mutant Alien and the dude in the middle seem likely to survive. Not sure what might happen with the other random gourds - we'll see. 

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To continue the voodoo momentum, I added one potato of each color and the recordkeeping to the innards of a guy that I do not expect to survive the winter. Soggy spots when lifting, animals don't seem to have decided that it's poisonous, and the hide isn't as tough as I believe it needs to be. 

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Final resting places:

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Not a moment too soon, as we got a dusting of snow overnight. 

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Posted
4 hours ago, Prepuce of Doom said:

Separately, I'm open to ideas for the remaining potatoes. 

I'm mailing a few to friends, but will have a bunch left. Might just dump them at the local park to let kids figure out a good use... 

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Potato gun.

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Posted (edited)
5 minutes ago, Prepuce of Doom said:

Oh, man. Doomlet and his idiot pals would definitely get arrested. 

We had a big one at a lake house for a bachelor party. The echo off the water brought the sheriffs. Luckily they believed a bunch of drunk ass middle aged white guys werent shooting it at boats.

We were definitely firing upon boats.

Thing had a 200 yard range.

Edited by MissingInAction
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Posted
3 minutes ago, MissingInAction said:

We had a big one at a lake house for a bachelor party. The echo off the water brought the sheriffs. Luckily they believed a bunch of drunk ass middle aged white guys werent shooting it at boats.

We were definitely firing upon boats.

Thing had a 200 yard range.

I assume that the statute of limitations has passed on this, but some buddies of mine were wreaking havoc all over campus with one for a week or two. School security saw them with it and confiscated it, even though there was no direct proof that they were the culprits of all the shenanigans. 

They followed his Ford Ranger patrol truck around all night, and when he stopped to take a leak or go into a building or something, they broke into his truck and stole it back. 

I pointed out the added risk multiplier of getting caught with it from that point onward, and their reign of terror reluctantly concluded. 

Posted (edited)
On 11/1/2025 at 9:56 AM, Prepuce of Doom said:

I offered children the option of choosing a potato again this year.  

My nephew was in charge of handing out candy and we did potatoes as an option as well. He only allowed one per group and made the kids rock paper scissors each other to see who won the potato. They got a kick out of it.

Edited by Sam Lin
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Posted

Prepuce admittedly I just found this thread this year and didn't go all the way back but don't those bad boys the you keep in the garage/shed get pretty rank and attract unwanted bugs? Regardless I bet your wife loves your experiments. Tell her you're a hero on surly, I'm sure she will understand. 

Posted
7 hours ago, Baboontyme said:

Prepuce admittedly I just found this thread this year and didn't go all the way back but don't those bad boys the you keep in the garage/shed get pretty rank and attract unwanted bugs? Regardless I bet your wife loves your experiments. Tell her you're a hero on surly, I'm sure she will understand. 

They sit outside for a year before they get indoor privileges. At that point, those that survive are very hard and dry, and I expect all the good parts have been eaten. 

Mrs. Doom was skeptical at first, but she's now a true believer. 

Posted (edited)
17 minutes ago, thunderlounge said:

Just curious, have you thought about dehydrating them before putting them out to pasture?

Maybe adding some cayenne pepper to deter the rodents?

Nope. I'm comfortable with the current level of involvement and effort. A friend of mine is constantly trying to get me to begin making these at scale and selling them for exorbitant amounts of money to people who don't know any better, but the time commitment, unpredictability, and the significant difficulty packaging and shipping (he doesn't understand this at all...) are all dealbreakers for me. 

Some don't turn out to need anything of the sort, but I am still having difficulty evaluating the relative likelihood of survival during the selection phase. I've found that the hardest rinds seem to be the most reliable indicator, but it's not exact by any stretch of the imagination. 

I would love to talk to a botanist with a specialty in gourdology to learn more about what factors I should be looking for in order to separate the survivors from the appealing food sources. 

Edited by Prepuce of Doom
Posted
7 minutes ago, Prepuce of Doom said:

Nope. I'm comfortable with the current level of involvement and effort. A friend of mine is constantly trying to get me to begin making these at scale and selling them for exorbitant amounts of money to people who don't know any better, but the time commitment, unpredictability, and the significant difficulty packaging and shipping (he doesn't understand this at all...) are all dealbreakers for me. 

Some don't turn out to need anything of the sort, but I am still having difficulty evaluating the relative likelihood of survival during the selection phase. I've found that the hardest rinds seem to be the most reliable indicator, but it's not exact by any stretch of the imagination. 

I would love to talk to a botanist with a specialty in gourdology to learn more about what factors I should be looking for in order to separate the survivors from the appealing food sources. 

 

Interesting. Yeah, that would be an absolute bitch to have to ship somewhere. It's been a fun ride to watch these through the years, that's for sure. Almost as entertaining as Doomlet. Almost.

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Posted

I can't emphasize just how lightweight and delicate the survivors are. It's like a reasonably thick and sturdy papier mache. Shipping would require an individualized sort of "crate within a crate" system along the lines of the "design something to protect an egg from breaking when we drop it off the roof of the middle school" project that we all probably did. 

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Posted

I still can’t help but wonder of there is another step or something you could add to your process that would decrease your mortality rate.

Dunno why my mind keeps going there. Starved for a problem to solve, I guess.

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Posted (edited)
5 minutes ago, thunderlounge said:

I still can’t help but wonder of there is another step or something you could add to your process that would decrease your mortality rate.

Dunno why my mind keeps going there. Starved for a problem to solve, I guess.

I've given it a lot of thought too. The best I can come up with is some kind of lacquer treatment, but I don't have very high expectations, it's extra work, and it's a little contrary to the "trial by ordeal" process that sees some succeed where others fail. 

Also, I suspect that perhaps the die is genetically cast. Not all appear to be appealing to rodents, and not all rot into mush. Some have only one of the two known weaknesses and those still fail to survive, so it's a more complex and multivariate situation than I think any of us fully understand. Again, I need to speak with an accredited Gourdologist. 

Edited by Prepuce of Doom
Posted
16 minutes ago, Prepuce of Doom said:

I've given it a lot of thought too. The best I can come up with is some kind of lacquer treatment, but I don't have very high expectations, it's extra work, and it's a little contrary to the "trial by ordeal" process that sees some succeed where others fail. 

Also, I suspect that perhaps the die is genetically cast. Not all appear to be appealing to rodents, and not all rot into mush. Some have only one of the two known weaknesses and those still fail to survive, so it's a more complex and multivariate situation than I think any of us fully understand. Again, I need to speak with an accredited Gourdologist. 

 

I would be interested to hear what one would have to say, absolutely.

I've thought about some of those "glue sealants" or similar. Considering, as you say, that they turn into a paper mache like structure, then that becomes a whole different ball of wax. I would have thought they would end up more leathery of a texture, similar to dehydrated fruit/meat.

Of course that leads me into the rabbit hole. lol

 

I do think the cayenne would be an easy, non-lethal fix against critters. Just a shake from the bottle over/around/in them should do it, and take maybe 30 seconds.

The rest of it, dunno. I may go pluck a few gourds and play around, if I can find anything good. Why? Just for the hell of it. lol

 

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