Shake, Rattle and Roll
Aug. 25th, 2011 09:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
clarentine4.5. 3.4. 5.9. They’re all numbers, except when they relate to things falling off your shelves and dogs climbing up under your covers to shiver and shake while you fail to get back to sleep. I realized today, after I had to consciously restrain myself from saying something harsh to the Chatty Cathy who invariably sits alongside me on the bus and just will not shut up, that I am tired and stressed and have had entirely enough of talking about earthquakes.
(Please do not ask me if I felt the latest aftershock. The epicenters have varied, but they’re all less than ten miles from my house and some are much closer. We have felt every one. If you persist in asking me if I felt it, I may take your face off.)
For the record, we had minor damage to objects in the house and cosmetic damage around the foundation, but all the living creatures are fine and we have been lucky. Neighbors lost a whole lot more. These old houses around here, so many of them brick, are not engineered to take stresses like this.
And neither, clearly, am I.
***
It’s nearly egg time. I’ve been checking the nesting boxes each evening to see if the silly chickens have grown up enough to begin laying. Thus far, the only thing in there is the golf ball I tucked into the straw to give the hens ideas.
The little gold hen appears to be healing well from whatever she did to herself. She’s taken to isolating herself in the coop while her comrades poke around in the yard, so I put a chick waterer in there and have been taking her the occasional goodie and making sure some of the leftovers tossed into the yard for fowl delectation end up close to the door into the coop. The silly bird appears to have decided I’m not going to eat her after all (none of these birds were very well socialized as chicks, and they won’t let you come near them). She’ll come out into the yard when I go in there and stands nearby, looking up at me as if asking if she can come roost on my hand. Given that I’ve had to carry her outside a couple of times when she was really gimpy, I suppose her expectation is not surprising...but it is, because this is a chicken, not a pet. Silly bird.
***
The watermelons this year were awesome. We just picked the last one in anticipation of being awash in Hurricane Irene. The vines have suddenly decided they need to pop out more fruit, so we have teensy little melons on there now. I can’t imagine they’ll mature before frost, but we’ll see. If not, the chickens will be happy to have them.
I can’t wait for the seed catalogs. I already have visions of sugar plums. *g*
(Please do not ask me if I felt the latest aftershock. The epicenters have varied, but they’re all less than ten miles from my house and some are much closer. We have felt every one. If you persist in asking me if I felt it, I may take your face off.)
For the record, we had minor damage to objects in the house and cosmetic damage around the foundation, but all the living creatures are fine and we have been lucky. Neighbors lost a whole lot more. These old houses around here, so many of them brick, are not engineered to take stresses like this.
And neither, clearly, am I.
***
It’s nearly egg time. I’ve been checking the nesting boxes each evening to see if the silly chickens have grown up enough to begin laying. Thus far, the only thing in there is the golf ball I tucked into the straw to give the hens ideas.
The little gold hen appears to be healing well from whatever she did to herself. She’s taken to isolating herself in the coop while her comrades poke around in the yard, so I put a chick waterer in there and have been taking her the occasional goodie and making sure some of the leftovers tossed into the yard for fowl delectation end up close to the door into the coop. The silly bird appears to have decided I’m not going to eat her after all (none of these birds were very well socialized as chicks, and they won’t let you come near them). She’ll come out into the yard when I go in there and stands nearby, looking up at me as if asking if she can come roost on my hand. Given that I’ve had to carry her outside a couple of times when she was really gimpy, I suppose her expectation is not surprising...but it is, because this is a chicken, not a pet. Silly bird.
***
The watermelons this year were awesome. We just picked the last one in anticipation of being awash in Hurricane Irene. The vines have suddenly decided they need to pop out more fruit, so we have teensy little melons on there now. I can’t imagine they’ll mature before frost, but we’ll see. If not, the chickens will be happy to have them.
I can’t wait for the seed catalogs. I already have visions of sugar plums. *g*
no subject
Date: 2011-08-26 01:32 am (UTC)The hurricane has bad timing, really. I am not happy with when it will arrive here, either.
Best wishes.