Wit, Wisdom & Wonder

Its a slow weekend here at the house. Yesterday, Josh yanked everything out from under the sink and put down vinyl shelf paper, doing the same for the glass cupboards. He's going to do the baking cupboard, possibly during the week. Then he'll do the dishes and cooking cupboard.

Deanna came over last night to learn to make the Neely Family fried chicken recipe. We ended up on an incense making spree, which was great - she made Bast incense. I'm still screwing around with a Samhain recipe for the site. Not particularly fond of most of the recipes I'm finding, which seem to be fumitory in nature. *shudder* I have found one that's nice, but it needs tweaking, which I'm currently working on.

Woke up with a fever. I take this as a good thing, as my immune system is finally taking on this stupid sinus thing head on. I'm sneezing like crazy and still feverish. Hoping this means the end of the cold is near.

Meanwhile, Martha is hanging on. Her digestive system is working again. This is a good sign, though she's still not moving much. We're feeding and watering her by hand. We'll see how she's doing tomorrow, see what the vet says, etc.

I picked up Kevin from the airport shuttle at 1:30am, even brought Doodle along for the ride through the pea soup fog and suicidal deer. By the time I got home, sometime around 3am, I fell into bed and slept through to almost noon.

The boys are out riding, while I'm essentially going through the motions of the morning hours. Flash is still moping at me, having howled (according to Josh) for an hour after Doodle and I left to pick up Kevin. He really is the *most* spoiled Basset. Speaking of, my mother sent him a double Basset Hound roll pillow for Josh's birthday, it arrived today (several weeks early). Its rather cute, a velvet back with hooked yarn. The company thoughtfully sent us the catalog so we know precisely how much it cost. *eye roll*

Marc came by and picked up his rooster, thankfully, we've been cocksitting for so long, we've forgotten how long. We'd agreed that if he didn't pick the roo up by Monday we'd take him to the livestock auction, but it wasn't a threat or anything. Marc said he just needed an incentive to make a decision either way.

I'm going to try for pictures today, as the sun has shown up!

I'm sitting around waiting for the day to begin, like usual. Lori has a prolapsed hen, who may have reversed itself overnight. I love that I get these calls at night, btw. They explain what's going on, I tell them what it most likely is and we decide if its an emergency or if its a first thing in the morning scenario. Rural Poultry Medicine on the Island. :D Update: Lori has rainchecked me (and not a cloud in the sky). I'll likely hear from her later today about her hen, meanwhile she was able to get her mother in for an eye appointment at the last minute. Much, much more important.

In a few minutes, I'm leaving to pick up a dozen Coturnix (aka Japanese) Quail. Bob has decided he's done with them, so I'm picking up "around" 12. Hopefully, more female than male. I'm having to crunch study on them. Quail are great fliers, so I'm trying to sort out how we're going to keep them here, how to properly maintain them and how to set them up for breeding purposes! And eggs! That should be a fun project for me. Those freebie rabbit cages we picked up a few months back should make for good quail cages, I'll hopefully have something ready to "go and show" later today.

This afternoon, I'm heading over to talk to the new owner of the Wind & Tide Bookstore. She wants me to come work for her! So that's marvelous. I've already set up Delightfully Deviant/Pandora with a photoshoot there yesterday, so I'm networking like crazy!

Hubby was a busy guy this weekend, thankfully managing to get quite a few projects done in beautiful weather.

The back porch and walkway has been power washed and looks great. Its a temporary condition but for now its awesome. We re-arranged the furniture and removed a few things, to make room for the new fodder system. In cleaning out the hall closet, we'd found a cute string of outdoor lights and hung them on the poor, but it still needs some additional prettying. I'll be on the lookout for more things to brighten it up like seat cushions and windsocks. With the windstorms around here cute candles and the like are generally out of the picture, they'd be dashed to the ground but there may be some other things we can do.

Josh also used some PVC tubing to make a frame for the top of the rack so the tarping hangs better and doesn't gap and bind up. The better the fit, the better chance the seeds and roots grow. Speaking of which, the roots and shoots continue to grow, slowly now that the temperatures have dropped here. We'll be lucky if we can get up to 63F here today. I'm starting to wonder if a small heater might be a way to go.

Mingled in with all that as a dump run and a farm visit to buy hay from Erin. Poor Gracie was exhausted by then. She had a delightful time sniffing dogs at Home Depot and charming people and kids. Gracie is a bit concerned because we moved the young outdoor Silkies to the Rustic Roost - the wire bottom hutch was bothering Snow's feet, so we moved all four to keep them together. We'll keep an eye on them and hopefully, he'll get better soon.

Three doctor appointments this week, and we're still dogsitting BooBoo, so busy week. We'll also be bringing an East Wing pen online, as well. I need to find 3 coops or easily convertible items, so that's a huge time sink. *cross fingers*

We're hard at work in the almost pounding rain. Derek is working his ass off burying boards with the fencing stapled to it in the hopes this will secure the bottom so the chickens cannot escape the breeding pens. Chickendom shall rise! But maybe not this weekend from the looks of it.

I started a roast this morning figuring a hot solid meal would do the boys well, though at this rate they haven't yet started working and its nearly 3. They've been running errands. *eye roll* Update: And they just pulled up!

Meanwhile, I've cleaned out the Lavender Orpington portion of the Blue Shed coop, re-organized the chicken supplies, cleaned and sanitized the feeders and waterers (yuck), done two loads of laundry, cleaned and tidied the front of the house, made Derek and I sandwiches for lunch, cleaned up the laundry room, and checked the expiration dates on all the condiments (yuck x 10).

Another windstorm is expected tonight, so we've been prepping for the blow. All the waterers are filled, the coops ready. Fudge and Hobo are napping in the master bedroom, they seem to know something is coming. Libby is out courting danger, as usual. She's having the hardest time acclimating to Hobo's presence. His good manners are making her own look miserable in comparison.

Doodle is nervous and sticking as close to Josh as possible, around 14 hours of near-constant attendance. Gracie doesn't seem as concerned and Flash is his regular Basset-ness. They're very low key today after being worn out yesterday at the dog park, so its been pretty calm around here.

Josh has made a cheery fire to warm up the house and we're expecting Kevin over this afternoon with Boo. I'm catching up on chores today.

Josh and I attended services with the fine folks of the Living Circle. We've been clued in to the calendar, so now our schedule is full of lively events - bookshops, two Solstice events, etc. I'm hopeful we can attend services next Sunday with them.

Fortunately, the Usui Reiki workshop and attunements have been scheduled for the 1st weekend of December. If you are local or willing to be so (we can put you up sleeping-bag and sofa style), there are slots available. Westley is offering these as a love gift due to the economy with the gaes that you heal those who need it, so no charge for the training. Potluck both days.

This afternoon I'm off to help Saint Lori with her poor little bantam cochin who has leg mites. Then to Tiger's to loan her our guest bedroom for her Turkey Day visitors.

I'm feeling a bit sorry for Josh, he's been hard at work to winterize the house all weekend. Given the football game yesterday, a big chunk of the day was missing but he still managed to get quite a bit done and have time to take the dogs to the dogpark for over an hour.

The laundry room exterior door knob has been replaced. I'm not quite sure how he does it, but whenever Kevin touches a doorknob it breaks. His have been broken for years, literally. Last month's housesitting turned up a suspiciously broken doorknob at our home, so we're blaming him.

The water heater tank has been drained for preventative maintenance. And while he hasn't had a chance, caulk for the windows has been purchased and the faucet caps are ready to go.

We also managed to clean out the hall coat closet. I removed everything from it, got rid of a heck of a lot of stuff that had been collecting in there and then we went through the coats. I figure we likely got rid of half of them, which I'll be dropping off at the thrift shop tomorrow. Josh has been collecting cruise jackets for a long time and looks like most of them are staying, unfortunately. I'm likely as bad with all my fleece jackets and vests. *eye roll* The closet is now beautifully organized and has room in it - I can even see the floor!

I'm getting antsy about replacing the flooring. I'm now vacuuming three times a week with the shop vac and dusting as often. Needless to say, sinuses are not happy with me and the ones on the left side of my cheek/jaw are swollen and very tender. Grr.

Woke up with the rain at 3am and its still coming down. The weather reports have hastily revised themselves - we were expecting high 70s, now we're expecting rain until 1pm. Frankly, its so chilly I'm likely going to have to build a fire.

Given the rain and cooler temps, I've canceled the painter today. There's no opportunity for the paint to dry before evening and I do not want wet paint in the house all night. We'll try again when I get back from Colorado. We'll try to get the gates painted, as the rain will hopefully taper off as it warms up this afternoon. Not sure we can get the ramp done at all today. Likely I'll get stuck doing that this weekend.

I'd called our new farm hand at 7am to cancel, having sent her an email last night without response. There's no point in trying to re-fence in the rain. Hopefully she gets these messages, I'd have to have to send her away after she drove here though I suppose I can have her bury the duck pen fencing and call it a day.

In hatching news, we're now at 3 chicks! Joining Ruth are two beautiful little Silkie chicks, both very light in color, with beautiful top knots. Picy goodness to come!

I still have no idea what this stupid congestion is from, but my ear problems have cleared up. Now I'm just tired and achy with no time for such. Rough night with lots of abdominal pain, thankfully Flash is a great heating pad and loves that duty. After an hour of curling up around him, the pain subsided and I managed to fall asleep.

I'm watching Tiger's dogs today, which is basically just driving around the block and doing things for them - in, feeding, watering, etc. Sound familiar?

The multiple clutches of ducklings and chicks are doing well. The basics are pretty simple - water and food. Food once a day, water twice, check on them multiple times a day. The duckling who was hatching yesterday afternoon didn't survive the night, sadly. So we're at 11, I think. Its a bit hard to get numbers when you have a hissing mother and scrambling ducklings every time you look.

Hoping to be feeling better by tomorrow because I absolutely have to get those pens ready and the ducks separated. I have orders for two ducks: a mix female and a Rouen drake. Pickup this weekend. Its a start, but a very slow one. I need to through some juju behind my marketing and get that selling energy moving. I have several Philippinos who are looking for meat birds, so once I can identify the drakes, we'll likely be selling off as many as possible for freezer camp.

We moved my recumbent bike over to Tiger's so she can work on her physical therapy at home. This is a bonus for me, as well, given I don't really have room for the damn thing here and I can do my time on it while I'm hanging out keeping an eye on Tiger. She's quite bossy and willing to nag me up on the bike for 45 minutes a day minimum.

And now I think I'll take a little nap.