Quick Change

Some things don't change:  I still have all my old bad habits, I still wear bibbies 355 days a year, dusting remains my nemesis, and the dog and cats still take up the majority of the bed.

That said, Nature did an abrupt about-face yesterday and dropped the temperature at least twenty degrees.  I wished I'd worn more than a tee-shirt down to the barn, but I wasn't prepared.  Back at the house, the day before I'd turned on the ceiling fan.  Yesterday I put on a jacket and wore it all day.  While grateful for the break, it's hard to make a fast adjustment to such a quick change.   Now the prognosticators are saying we might get rain a couple of days this week.  I can say with a degree of certainty we will.  How do I know?  Because there is a sack of goat chow in the truck and it will have to stay there for awhile.  Given the current rat/squirrel problems, I cannot put it in the feed shed, nor can I take it down to the barn until the girls eat up much of what's in the barrel and, if I left it on the hand cart, there is the same problem there.  Sigh.

The little girls are also going through a change.  Were I not familiar with chickens, I'd be worried.  Suddenly there are flurries of feathers in the pen and coop.  They don't have some dreaded disease; the flock is moulting.  What I have never understood is why they lose their protection just at the time the weather changes and it starts to get cold.  You'd think it would be the other way around so they wouldn't be so hot in the summer.  Add it to the lengthy list of things I don't understand.

Nature will continue to throw us curve balls and it's up to us to try to keep up.  I know for sure that this morning I'm back to robe and slippers.

I Goofed

I went to the feed store yesterday without Bess because I had another stop to make and the feed store is the only place I will leave her in the truck.  I do like it when we go together, though.  The nice guy loaded a bag of sweet cob for the girls and two bags of birdseed while I went in and paid.  (I get two twenty-pound bags of birdseed instead of one forty-pounder because they're easier for me these days.)  Getting back in the truck, I thought, "Oh crum!  You don't need goat food, silly woman.  You came here for chicken scratch!"  I'm out of the habit of getting supplies for the little girls.  Ah, well, I had to go back in and admit my goof.  I kept the goat food...it won't go to waste.

Speaking of the little girls, on several occasions yesterday I saw a few brave souls out of the coop.  They still don't talk much, but at least they're out adventuring.  That's a good sign, I think.  I had asked Dave, owner of the feed store, and his helper dude if they'd ever heard of Delaware chickens.  Neither had, nor had they ever known of semi-silent chickens.  Dave had his own tale of a rooster who had bitten him recently.  It didn't have a happy ending.

I didn't bring two cookies home for Bessie.  I didn't want her to know I'd been to the feed store without her.  One goof a day is enough.

Glued

Back in the day, 1950, one of the first televised congressional hearings was chaired by Senator Estes Kefauver regarding organized crime.  Maybe it was because my mother was raised in the Chicago area and a lot of the names were familiar to her or possibly because of the uniqueness of the situation, but she sat glued to the television for days.  Other than "I take the fifth," the only thing I remember about that time (I was ten years old) is my mother's fascination and complete concentration.  The reason it is memorable to me is because I was having trouble trying to build my first box kite.  I asked Mother for help, but she just shushed me and waved me away.  The kite took a dive on its first flight and crashed.  So much for box kites.  By the time of the McCarthy hearings in 1954 and his "witch hunt" (such a much-used term today) for Communists, I'd learned not to bother Mother and, besides, I was past building kites.

I gained a much better understanding of her fascination yesterday as it was my turn to sit glued to the television to watch the Judicial Committee hearing regarding the current nominee for the Supreme Court.  There have been other televised hearings in years past on this subject; I can only assume I was working and did not watch.  Regardless of which side of the political fence one falls, this was, in so many ways, history in the making and could affect America for decades to come.  It's not like I didn't have other things to do, but nothing, but nothing got done yesterday.  Thankful for the pause button, I rushed through tending the animals and that's about all.  It was a long, long, emotionally tense day.

Early in the morning, Waldo appeared (he's on the left).  His pitiful, ragged condition is a testament to his well-loved attentions.  I keep Waldo II in reserve for Celeste, just in case.

Twilight Zone

There are times I feel I've slipped into an alternate reality or The Twilight Zone.  How is it that I can have something in my hand, put it down, not leave the room, and not be able to find it again?  I keep a panic button ready for such occasions.  While rooting around for something else yesterday, I realized my checkbook was not in my purse.  (Push the button!)  Okay, calm down, woman.  When did you see it last?  Where did you use it last?  I knew I'd written a check (I'm old school and prefer a paper trail) the last time I was in town.  Oh, please don't tell me I'd left it in the store!  (Push the button!)  Bessie got her exercise as she followed me from room to room, back and forth up and down the hall, probably wondering if the old gal had slipped a cog.  She wasn't the only one.  I checked every flat surface where the dadratted checkbook might be.  I had to put the brakes on my mind that was spinning like a hamster wheel, so turned to the computer and played a few hands of brain-numbing solitaire.  Calm again, as I was leaving the room I lifted a piece of out-of-place paper and ta da! there was the checkbook.  Now I'm wondering what it was I was looking for in the first place.  Cue the music for The Twilight Zone.

If nothing else (and there's a lot of "else"), Farview is a peaceful place.  Standing last evening before putting the kids to bed, I watched the shifting colors of the sunset and let that peace wash over me.  Thanks, I needed that.

Duddy Birds

I hate to admit it, but this flock of little girls is a bit of a disappointment.  Oh, they'll plop out an egg now and then to earn their keep, and are very well mannered, but their entertainment factor is nearly nil.  They still spend most of their time in the coop and show no interest in making friends.  How can I discover their personalities and get them to tell me their names if I only see them clumped together in the coop?  Stanley is the only standout in the bunch, for obvious reasons.  The girls are, I'm sorry to say, conversational duds.

They had a flurry of excitement yesterday when I gave them some very stale hotdog buns for breakfast.  There was a lot of eating, but not much talking.  They also like alfalfa.  I'm not above bribery to get them outside for a while.  It's also a good way to use some of the alfalfa from bales destroyed by the vandals.

I wonder if these hens have taken a vow of silence, or perhaps Stanley is a tyrant who demands quiet.

Aha!  I may have to revise my prior opinions.  Through the wonders of the internet I just discovered that Delaware chickens are naturally one of the quietest of breeds.  I was wrong.  They are not duddy birds, it's just their nature.  I'm still disappointed.

What Were You Thinking?

Sometimes (most of the time) I wish I had Dr. Doolittle's capability to talk to the animals.  Well, I do talk to them, but they don't talk back in a way I can understand and I wish I could.  Bess likes to lie on the deck with her head resting on the lower rail and just stare off into space.  Is she watching birds, the horses next door, what?  If she's daydreaming, what about?  The other morning she stopped for a drink from the wild things' water and would lift her head and just stand there woolgathering before taking another sip, or, in her case, slurp.  It wasn't that she'd heard something; she doesn't hear much if anything anymore.  I "talk" to her now using hand signals and touch.

I understand Ralph's rough-and-tumble play with toys.  He stalks and pounces while playing "lion in the wild."  But what is Celeste thinking when she carries piglets back and forth in the hall, crooning all the while?  She's never had kittens.  It might be some instinctual thing, but cats I've had in the past who have had a litter have never sung to the babies like she does.

I'd like to know what the girls are thinking when they sometimes get so crabby with each other.  What did the other one say or do?  I tell them to play nice, but they either don't mind or don't care.  They certainly don't understand.  Nobody can give you a blank stare like a goat.

What do chickens gossip about?  Do they have best friends and share secrets, and what might those secrets be?  Are they jealous because Stanley shares his affection?  How is the pecking order determined?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Straight And Narrow

What is the difference between a constant companion and a warden?  Sometimes I wonder if Bessie Anne, Ralph, and Celeste want to be with me or if they're monitoring my activities and trying to keep me on the straight and narrow.  Unless I drive away in the truck, I go nowhere alone.  Three sets of eyes follow my every move in the house, and Bess takes the duty if I walk outside.  Bessie Anne can be sound asleep (she snores) behind Stove, but if I quietly leave the room, almost immediately she's there with me.  Privacy in the bathroom is impossible.  "As long as you're just sitting there, you might as well pet me," say the cats.  Bess waits and watches from the doorway.  Sometimes I try to fake them out by ducking into the guest bathroom instead of "my" bathroom.  It doesn't work.  Close the door, you say?  I find the scratching and whining disconcerting.  What do they think I might do without supervision?  I'm hardly likely to run amok and tear off more toilet tissue than allotted.  Everywhere I go, we're a parade of four.  It's gotten so I try to get as many things done as possible in one trip down the hall or to the kitchen so as not to tire them out.  There are times I'll think about doing something and put it off (it's my story and I'm sticking to it) because they're all sleeping so nicely.  The cats are indoor cats, but if I go outside, I guarantee they'll be watching from behind the screen door.  Whatever the reason, all these critters take their job seriously.  The one thing they cannot do is make me meet deadlines.  It's my one act of rebellion.  Maybe I do need a warden.