So, the chicken coop is coming along
sllllooooowwwwwlllllyyyy because it's been raining on and off every three point
seven seconds for a week.
I was gonna wait until I had pictures to tell you
about it but I'm too impatient. I changed the design of my coop to make it look
like a crooked outhouse, only I designed it too wide so I'm designating it a
handicapped outhouse instead. Under the half moon (which means it's a women's
outhouse, a star means men's) I'm gonna burn a handicapped symbol and paint it
blue. It's gonna be called " The Magical, Wonderful, Whimsical, Handicapped Poop
Coop"...or just "The Poop Coop" for short (I might have to change my chicken
names). The entire thing has cost us a grand total of 35 bucks so far because
we've used recycled materials, DeWitte keeps everything (nobody else on the
planet keeps that many hinges, "just in case".) and Nathan keeps a mad inventory
of our yard. We didn't even know there was a huge stack of shingles buried under
a foot of leaves and crap in the far back yard.
In anticipation of putting these girls outside,
I've decided to try and take care of any predators before hand. I've read awful
stories about dogs, cats, raccoons and possums tearing poor ugly teenager
chickens to shreds. That's what my chickens look like right now, teenager
chickens. Their neck feathers are coming in in a gross fashion, like a teenage
boys beard, and they've all got a mad case of acne..ok, not the acne part but
the feather part for sure..yet I still love them all
unconditionally.
We set out the live trap last night because there's
been a huge feral cat hanging around our house tormenting Nathan's cat to
pieces. She tries to act all bad ass when she sees him out the window but if she
actually managed to get out there, he'd beat her up because he's a domestic
violence cat for sure. And if he would do that to Nathan's cat, just think about
what he'd do to my poor ugly chickens!
This morning, though, instead of a cat in the trap,
there was an enormous possum! I figured it was that same bastard possum that got
into the wall a couple years ago and tormented us with it's scratching and
crawling while we were trying to watch The Office and felt no sympathy at all.
After work, DeWitte and Nathan would spend time not building my chicken coop and
take it to the woods to let it go. One more predator gone, one less thing to
worry about. Only, when I went out this morning to run to 7-11 because we're out
of coffee and we need that winning lottery ticket for Monday, I took a closer
look and that bastard possum just had babies..I mean just had babies.
That's when everything changed.
It went from bastard possum who's gonna tear the
heads off my chickens just for the fun of it to New Mother! She doesn't have
food, she doesn't have water..it's gonna rain buckets today and the cage is in a
part of the yard that floods! What am I gonna do! I did what I always do, I
called DeWitte in a panic.
He said I should put the cage up on bricks and
cover the top. And he said this while he was safe and sound in his cozy office
chair at work. He wasn't the one that had to move the bastard, ferocious, face
eating, New Mother possum. He might as well have asked me to move a bear.
Well, I had to do something, I couldn't just let
her sit there...which is funny because if it were just a regular old bastard,
ferocious, face eating, not New Mother possum it'd be a non-issue, so I
found some bricks and the longest handled yard tool we own...literally, a 10
foot pole. Only I'm a huge weakling and that possum must weight about three
hundred pounds, I couldn't get it more than a couple of inches off the ground.
After struggling with it for a while, while the
bastard, ferocious, face eating, New Mother possum hissed and spit at me (have I
mentioned how much face eating possums stink? A little Febreze wouldn't hurt
that thing at all!), I decided to use Nathan's favorite science lesson
from school and use a lever. Worked like a charm. I even managed to get the guts
to get close enough to the cage to cover it.
Now I've gotta figure out how to get the bastard,
ferocious, face eating, New Mother possum some food and water. We won't be able
to let her go until after 6 tonight and that's a long time for a New Mother
anything to go without.
The Sally Struthers Natural beauty book
You'd think I'd be offended because I'm fat, too. But nope, just highly amused. While you're there, check out his other reviews. The one for 101 Dalmatians is pretty funny.
So, a few years ago, I was visiting my parents. My mom came home from a garage sale with a bag of vintage aprons she purchased for my little sisters to play with. I fell head over heels in love with them, so she let me have them instead. Since then, I've picked up a few here and there but never had a place to put them. Finally, I found a place..Why not display them on my kitchen wall?
The ones on the right are vintage..I've got more, I just need to remember where I "stored" them.
The ones on the left are new but two in particular, I favor. The John Deere was lovingly made for Nathan by our very own Claudia after I mentioned it was hard finding boys aprons. He wears it to his cooking classes.
I saw the mens tie apron on Etsy right before Christmas a couple years ago and had to have it!..but it was right before Christmas, you don't buy yourself things right before Christmas, it's against the law. So imagine my joy when I opened the box from DeWitte to find my apron snuggled inside.
And the best part about my display..there's room for more!
Back story...Squash died. Thank goodness, it was hard watching her not grow and not be a thriving chick like the rest of them. I put her in a plastic turkey deli container in the freezer till we get a chance to have a funeral.
Nathan looks into Squashes brooder and notices she's not there..."What happened to Squash?"
Me.."Oh, I'm sorry, she didn't make it."
Nathan, teary, "Well, what did you do with her?"
Me.. "I put her in the freezer till we can have a funeral"
Nathan, opens freezer door and sees Squash in the turkey container.."We can't bury her in a turkey container, we should get one from KFC!"
I love my kid.
Gross!
A chicken tractor is a portable chicken coop...I crack myself up.
I managed to sell all the extra chickies. I have to hold 6 for some guy for two weeks. I don't mind, we're having a lot of fun with them.
Squash is still holding on but she's about half the size of the other chicks and lacks their crazy chicken energy, so we'll see.
And I leave you with a chicken in ever pot....these pictures are what got these girls sold..I'm sure of it!
I managed to sell all the extra chickies. I have to hold 6 for some guy for two weeks. I don't mind, we're having a lot of fun with them.
Squash is still holding on but she's about half the size of the other chicks and lacks their crazy chicken energy, so we'll see.
And I leave you with a chicken in ever pot....these pictures are what got these girls sold..I'm sure of it!
These guys are doing great (it looks weird because they're under a red heat lamp) and Squash is still hanging in there. I took the splint off of her legs because it didn't seem to be getting any better so now she hops around on one leg..it's pretty funny. I think she's gonna be a house chicken.
It's a good thing DeWitte didn't sell that
wheelchair..we might need it after all.
So, I took the chicks out of the box, all 29 of
them (That's a lot of chickens! They send extra in case some die). 28 ran around like I was trying to set them on
fire but one little dudette just kind of sat there. I thought maybe she was
about to die or something (I was mentally prepared) but on closer inspection, I
saw that something was wrong with her legs.
I went to the almighty Google and discovered she
had something called "Spraddle Legs". What that means is that on the trip to my
house, she got sat on by other chickens, so she couldn't stand up enough. I
figured it must have been the mean chickens, that I'm not getting emotionally
attached to because I have to sell them. My nice chickens that I'm keeping would
never do something like that.
To treat this "Spraddle Legs", I had to splint her
legs with a band aid so she has to keep them under her body, instead of splayed out
to the sides, which is what always happens to me when I go ice skating. I have
some bacon band aids and some crime scene band aids but, while they look cool as
hell, they don't stick on very well, so I had to use my Sponge Bob band aids on her
legs.
I put her back in the brooder with the rest of the
chicks and it turns out that chickens HATE Sponge Bob! The other chicks started
trying to peck her to death (The mean chickens, of course, not my nice ones)!
Well, I do appreciate their disdain for Sponge Bob, but I couldn't have them punish
that poor chick because of my lack of cool band aids that stick, so I put her in a brooder
by herself.
I put some marbles in her water dish, so she
wouldn't drown (Finally a good use for marbles other than unblocking my vacuum
hose!) and we hand fed her last night because she kept falling face first into
her food, like a drunk college kid at three am at Denny's. But as of this
morning, she's wobbling around and eating and drinking on her own. And now that
we're emotionally invested, of course we have to keep her...she'll be chicken
number 6 (as long as the other chickens stop pecking her, not sure what to do if
they keep it up.).
So, we've got Noodle, Tomato, Chowder, French
Onion, Minestrone and ?.
I wonder if there's a soup name that means gimpy.
I wonder if there's a soup name that means gimpy.
Look what I got in the mail today...
Now I just have to decide which five to keep...that's not gonna be easy.
Ok..back to my babies..I wonder if you can pinch their cheeks?
Ok..back to my babies..I wonder if you can pinch their cheeks?
