Putting Chickens to Bed

The Opossum has been relocated—lured by peanut butter into a live trap. (I read online that someone else’s opossum ate an entire Cosco Cake and looked queezy, so they took him to the hospital.) I took our opossum to a hay field where he beat feet over to the shelter of an abandoned house.

The chickens are still traumatized and have decided roosting high is safer than that fearsome little chicken house. (There is an opening in the back.)

 

 

I’m sad they don’t put themselves to bed at night, though, and I don’t want them messing up the boxes in the open garage attached to the Wayback—their chosen roosting spot.  So nightly, I crawl up on boxes to gather them up one by one and stuff them into that front door beside the window--that's where the opossum was.)

I blogged a few days ago but decided to check in today. How is life at your abode?

I’ve been trying to refrain from politics, but it’s hard to ignore the sounds of our democracy being smashed.

And Musk wants to do what? Fire judges that disagree with him?!!! Boy, howdy, who put him in charge?

Stupid question. I know who.

I don’t want to ignore so much that I become complacent. Probably that’s what the great powers now in the White House want, for people to follow their bidding or give up.

Either way, folks, get it; keeping people traumatized or asleep makes it easy for a hostile takeover.

Don’t eat our chickens, abandon our wildlife, deport our immigrants, mess with our freedoms, or shut us up.

 

Have You Ever Gotten Caught in "Click Bait?"

 I got caught this morning wanting to know why I should put my potatoes in the dishwasher. 

Well, after clicking through about 50 other Kitchen hacks—pretty good ones, I finally found the one I wanted. You can wash your vegetables in the dishwasher. 

I knew that. Yeah, I’ve heard you can cook a turkey in the dishwasher too, but I’ve never tried that. 

I thought I would find some esoteric reason that the dishwasher would remove harmful substances from my potatoes. 

Nope. Just wash them. That’s a waste of hot water and electricity.

You see, I have a history with potatoes. 

Long-time readers may have read that I killed my two darling hens a few years ago by feeding them potato skins. (A potato peeling will never pass my current chicken’s lips.) 

It broke my heart to see my two hens, both dead, the morning after I prepared a Thanksgiving dinner, and thought I was giving them a treat to offer potato peelings. 

I’m saying this to tell people, “NEVER GIVE YOUR CHICKENS POTATO SKINS.”

I have not purchased a Russet potato since—although I probably have in a restaurant. And I do love potatoes, and I don’t want to malign them, for you know they have saved many a society. (And The Martian.). After my chicken trauma, though, I purchase only red-skinned ones. 

First, I heard that red potatoes are not sprayed, and I seek out organic. Besides, red ones taste better, and I’ve found they work well with everything I want to prepare, including mashed potatoes. Thanksgiving mashed potatoes and turkey gravy is my once-a-year indulgence.

It could have been a spray that killed my hens, for I just bought a prepared bag of commercial potatoes, and I don’t know their origin.  I suspect, though, that the Solanine tuberosum, a glycoalkaloid poison found in some species of the nightshade family, esp. abundant in potato skins, was the culprit.

Potato skins contain the same substance that poisoned Chris McCandless, the young man who went into the wilderness to live off the land and died there. (His diary stated he had eaten a poisonous plant.)

I know we have all eaten potatoes, and stuffed potato skins are delicious. If we suffered any side effects, we don’t know about them. People can tolerate larger amounts than can chickens/birds, and our potatoes are normally cooked which largely renders the poison harmless.  

Ronald Hamilton posted a paper on the Internet that brings new facts to Chris’s demise. Hamilton, it turns out, discovered evidence that closed the book on McCandless’s death.

To appreciate the brilliance of Hamilton’s investigative work, some backstory is helpful. 

McCandless’s diary indicated that beginning on June 24, 1992, the roots of the Hedysarum alpinum plant became a staple of his daily diet. On July 14, he started harvesting and eating Hedysarum alpinum seeds as well. One of his photos depicts a one-gallon Ziploc bag stuffed with these seeds. When Hamilton visited the McCandless’s home, an old school bus, in July 1993, he wrote that wild potato plants were growing everywhere. He filled a one-gallon bag with more than a pound of seeds in less than thirty minutes.

The movie, Into the Wild tells Chris’s story.

To end on a happy note: I never thought when I was growing up on a farm that chickens could be such fun. 

My dear son-in-law and grandson moved my little chicken house into the backyard. Hubby and I replaced the roof and shingled it with leftover shingles I found at Habitat for Humanity’s sales outlet. I stained the siding Cedar red and painted the trim green. Now it looks cute, and I can see it from the kitchen window. No more leaving chickens in the Wayback as fodder for the raccoon. All four chickens love being freed into the backyard. They talk to me and let me touch them. Blackie has shown them the pleasure of the shade under the lilac bush and the dust baths she has prepared. 

 

 

The first episode of my novel Song of Africa, is available on Kindle Vella#. The first three episodes are FREE. After than tokens are required for further reading.this was Kindle’s brilliant idea, for people like to read segments, and this gives a feeling for the book, and gives the reader the opportunity to keep reading or not.

Be the first to click  RAVE, or read, and please follow. I'd love it. My mom would love it, my cat would love it--the chickens would be so so.

I better get crackin’ onto Episode 2.

 https://www.amazon.com/kindle-vella/story/B09946NSS6 

 

 

A beauty from the trail.

I awakened this morning—a stupid statement. Otherwise, I’d still be sleeping. Oh, I didn’t want to get up, but something, like my bladder, compelled me. And I felt sorry for Blackie, our adult hen who was penned with the young chicks, so I walked on wet grass to release her from the little house. It was a game like keeping one plate spinning while seeing the other begin to fall, for the young chicks wanted out, and Blackie wanted out, and neither wanted to be with the other.

 

Well, now I’m awake. Blackie is out. My feet are cold and wet. Okay, let’s get to work. I’m not fixing breakfast, although I’m starving, so I take Sweetpea and we go out in the truck for coffee and a scone. (She likes the truck better than the car, for I have a blanket over the console, and she can sit beside me.) Not the best breakfast, I know, but desperate times require desperate measures.

 

While drinking my coffee with the heater jacked up to womb temperature, I listened to Marie Forleo interview Seth Godin, the premier blogger who blogs every day. He says he would blog whether anyone reads it or not. When you are forced to have something to say every day, you observe. You leave a trail of your thoughts.

 

You might be thinking, maybe your thoughts stink, but they are your thoughts, your observations, and you showed up.

 

All that was to tell you I showed up here today.

 

Seth also said that to search for our “Calling” is nonsense. This was precisely my point in writing Where Tigers Belch. In it, my young protagonist sets out on the jungle trail to find her destiny, her calling, and she figured where the tiger belches would be her spot.

 

Well, I think it is more like this: You create your calling as you go along. The Universe, the Great Spirit, whatever you want to call the Divine, is there to get with Your Program.

 

Some might take offense at that statement, thinking they should follow “God’s Will.” But consider this, what if “God’s Will” is your will. He, she, it didn’t put us here to be puppets. The Patriarchal God wants obedience. The Mother wants her children to find their own calling. Yep, sometimes you land on Park Place where your opponent has three hotels, and you go bankrupt paying the rent, but it’s only a game (Monopoly). You can play again tomorrow or in a second.

 

I revamped, edited, changed Where Tigers Belch a smidge and will publish it as a novella. Amazon sent a notice of a contest, and I decided to enter, although some say the chances of winning are slim when it isn’t a full-length book. (Where Tigers Belch is between 8,000 and 9,000 words, 49 pages. The requirement for the contest is over 25 pages)

 

I wrote Where Tigers Belch over 12 months, one episode (chapter) a month. I had two subscribers who I love dearly, and knowing they had subscribed forced me to meet my appointed deadline every month. I thank Marilyn and Meredith profusely. I didn’t know where this story was leading, so it was an adventure for me. I’m happy with the outcome and that they didn’t leave me alone stumbling through the jungle. I’m sending a Chirp book (notebook where they can write their own story) to both readers for subscribing to that newsletter at $12.99 for a book that will be for sale on Amazon for $2.99. (If I can ever get my Tiger picture at a resolution high enough for a cover.)

 

I’m playing hot/cold with life. Suppose I have a desire or a thought to produce something. In that case, generally, I do it—not everything, but ideas pertaining to my work. I took two forest walks for YouTube that might embarrass me, but what the heck, it’s me. Justin Perry said it was a good idea. I agreed.

 

How have you been feeling?

 

Have you felt a little off-kilter? I have. wonder how much the past year has worn us down. I’ve heard that mental problems are up, and it’s no wonder with people stressed out, worrying, and fearful. It’s enough to trouble the most stalwart heart.

 

If I could put salve on the hurt, I would. You know, while we’re on the trail creating our life’s work, doing the job we love, finding the relationships we want, we also want to contribute to the good and to offer a helping hand to those who stumble.

 

“Was it you or I who stumbled first? It does not matter. The one of us who finds the strength to get up first must help the other.”

 ― Vera Nazarian 

 

Oh yes, it’s been an exciting week in Junction City. A house across the street burnt to the ground. Scary stuff. It was under construction, a house behind a house, and right over the back fence from our friend’s house directly across the street.

 

Daughter dear was walking her dog at 1:30 in the morning and noticed a glow, thinking someone was burning. By the time she turned around, it had become a full-fledged blazing fire. We ran, waking people. One, an elderly woman, had to be wheeled out in a wheelchair. Her daughter said she hated that house. It had dormer windows that faced directly into their back yard. House gone. 

 

Find Something Fun

I used to tease my friend Betty for saying that chickens were her favorite animal. 

I've heard of chicken on the Barbie, but this is ridiculous.

Now I understand where she was coming from.

I’m not saying chickens are my favorites. I’m not choosing. You know I have been crazy over a horse, a dog, I have loved our cats, and goats are more fun than a barrel of monkeys—most people wouldn’t know this without experiencing one or two.

Who wouldn't love that face?

I don’t know why I am talking about this. A blog is meant to inform. 

I inform you here in this lock-down depressing times, when people are plain worn-out with worry, receiving conflicting data, knowing there is an information war, and that our minds and bodies are being dinked with...

Find something you enjoy. 

I’ve recently taken a couple of trail walks, recording both the trail and my voice, and I enjoyed both. Can you believe it? I talk about the Law of Attraction and whatever else pops into my head. 

Why would I be so arrogant as to do such a thing? 

I’m not a big talker. Neither am I a big walker these days. Sorry. Justin Perry suggested I do a YouTube. If you get 1,000 “likes,” you can monetarize it, meaning have ads, but still be free for the watcher/listener. ( My internal knowingness said, “Jump in. See what happens. Be brave.”

People are interested in The Law of Attraction. I can say a few things about it, not to teach or to give any processes you ought to do, goals you ought to set, or meditations you ought to do. No ought's. Just plain talk. At least you can get a green forested trail walk out of it. And I was yearning for the trees. 

This videoing and putting the recording into the computer has been a learning curve for me. And I used to download pictures with ease. But not on my new computer., It kept locking me out until daughter dear turned off the S mode. Apparently, Microsoft wanted me to use only their software. I think I can get it now. This YouTube will be the unabridged version of walking and talking and hearing my breathing. Jewells Happy Trails #1. (No link yet.)

The first walk had no audio, so I redid it. No wonder I was puffing. I got lost on the mountain after the second walk as I was returning home. The road was clear going away from town, but coming back, there were logging roads, Y’s in the road, I didn’t see on the way down. I took the wrong Y and scraped the sides of my truck on blackberry bushes. 

Oh, back to chickens. They have given me a reprieve from the depression we had over losing my daughter’s lady. 

I bought three baby chicks on March 19, then three days old. They lived in a box under a heat lamp in the laundry room until recently when I moved the box outside. Next came a little movable yard on our green lawn. A freed animal is such fun; they run (It’s only a 4 x 4 sq. foot enclosure) and could fly over the three-foot-high fence if I didn’t cover it. Now part of their diet is mowing the lawn. 

Husband Dear and I had spent a week off and on flipping a tiny chicken house that I bought when we lived at an earlier home. Amazing that it survived the weather, and only the roof was rotted. My son-in-law and grandson carried it from where it had been stored including lifting it over the fence as it couldn't get through the gate, I freshly stained the sides, and repainted the trim. Home Depot cut the roof plywood for me, and I found asphalt shingles at Habitat for Humanity. Husband dear screwed the plywood in place and we shingled the roof.  It’s cute enough to live in the backyard. 

This property already had a chicken house and a coop attached to the backside of the Wayback (Our auxiliary building.) We had a secure (we thought) dog kennel attached to the coop for the two chickens who survived an earlier massacre. Sadly, about four nights ago, something got Red, one of the two hens. She must have been lying next to the fence, and something (a raccoon ??) killed her right through the fence.

Well, Blackie became free-range. The neat thing is, this somewhat standoffish street-smart chicken (she adopted us) has come into our back yard, visits the young chickens through their fence, lets me pet her, and has become the elegant lady she was meant to be. 

The picture above is of Blackie.

Although we had the house in our workspace for replacing the roof, Blackie climbed inside and laid two eggs. She is a resourceful chicken. Now I see why Betty was so attached to chickens. 

Here’s a quick change of subject:

Want a FREE blank book?

It won’t be completely blank. It has lined pages and quotes scattered throughout like seeds.

The quotes are not meant to stop your creative flow, but to give you a moment to pause and reflect or argue with, I don’t care.  

I like little booklets for my computer data, for I change passwords more often than Katy Perry changes clothes. The booklets with pretty covers are more fun than the simple spiral notebooks where I put junk stuff. 

Of course, you can write the great American novel there on those pages if you want.

I ordered two booklets about a week ago, for I wanted to know how they looked and make sure every page was lined. They have a matt finish cover. Glossy might be better. 

Here is a bird with an attitude.

Quote on the back cover:

"Once upon a time,

when women were birds,

there was the simple understanding

that to sing at dawn, and to sing at dusk

was to heal the world through joy.

The birds still remember what we have forgotten,

that the world is meant to be celebrated."

--Terry Tempest William

One person can have my extra booklet if they are willing to give me their email address and/or name and physical address so I can UPSP the book. If you win, I will need it for mailing.  

The young chicks will choose the winner. The first address pecked will be it.

The Judges

This is Saturday. I will do the drawing next Saturday, May 22, 2021

Contact: jewellshappytrails@gmail.com

To Infinity and Beyond

 

Have you noticed that some days pert along, things are working, and you’re on a roll, and then there are other days… 

 

The odd thing is, on up days, you keep rolling along like a bike on a slight incline. On a down day, you roll like a marble in one of those funnels where it spirals down until it disappears into a hole at the bottom of the funnel.

 

The Law of Momentum.

 

We have another “Law,” The Law of Attraction, which is a term I hesitate to use. You know how you find something, and you get excited like you’re the first person to notice. Then another person sees it, and you’re happy to have company. Yet, sometimes it becomes so well-known that it gets shot at, diluted, misunderstood, or ridiculed.

 

And then you feel like someone told you your baby is ugly.

 

Ronda Byrne shared what she had found regarding this Law of Attraction with her movie, The Secret.  Many people have benefitted from applying what they learned from the film, but I believe while it was a wonderful hors d’oeuve, it was not not the entire meal. 

 

However, it introduced to the world an old concept that successful people through the ages have used, and that sages tried to tell us about.

 

The ingredients have been whispered to us since the beginning of time. “In the beginning was the word, and the word was made flesh and dwelt among us…” Think about it. (Whoever wrote Genesis didn’t know about a man named Jesus.)

 

All along, philosophers, writers, sages, and mystics had a piece of this mystery of space, time, brain, magnetism, and chemistry. “Ask, and you shall receive. Seek, and you shall find.” “Think and Grow Rich.” “As a man thinkith.” “He who has ears let him hear.” “If you can see it in your mind, you can hold it in your hand.” And Albert Einstein chimed in with, “Imagination is a preview of coming attractions.”

 

The principles are all over the place when you become attuned to them. It’s like the drawing, “Find 100 hidden birds.” You look and find one, and then, low and behold, there is one drawn in the clouds, one in the limbs of the tree, another in the roof shingles. Pretty soon, you find all 100 birds. Ta-Da!

 

“It’s what I ask for,” says one. “It’s my attitude,” says another. “My emotional state creates,” someone contributes. “It’s my subconscious giving me what I want.” some say. “It’s a bad hair day,” someone else says. “Life happens.”

 

Don’t you feel your energy spiraling down?

 

Sort of like now with this damn Corona19 virus thing. Sometimes the world gets thrown into chaos, and we must dig our way out. 

 

Yet, we wonder, “Are we magnets walking around in a sea of other magnets, attracting this, repelling that, wondering what in the heck is happening?” And don’t you hate it when someone says, “What did you do to attract that?” Well, if I was in control of my Attracting, I wouldn’t attract you to ask me that.”

 

Yet you hear the whisper, don’t you? You feel it reverberate in your bones. There is something to it. You know something exists but you don’t know how to implement it.

 

The interviewees in The Secret introduced the concept to the masses—or tried to.

 

What if the Secret works all the time? What if we are always attracting, repelling, asking, for, and railing against. We create without effort or thinking, That’s the reason we get crap sometimes.

 

 “I want a new Alexis,” you say. “Ha, says another part of your conscious, you can’t afford an Alexis.” Bam, there goes your Alexis.

 

One fellow who is into this Law of Attraction says to keep all negativity out of your house. And to be careful with your speech. Speech is even more potent than thought.

 

I better stop swearing.

 

“Create your own Universe as you go along.” said Winston Churchill.

 

Some people think this Law of Attraction is magic. You ask, you receive, that’s it. If you don’t get what you want, you think it’s not working. Sometimes it does work like magic. Other times it comes in little spirits. You have a thought about something you would like to fix or manifest. Then another creative idea joins it, and another, until Viola! You get it.

 

I need to take some action.

.  

Notice that the last part of Attraction is action. Musicians know this, they practice, then aim for the gig.

 

How do you describe a state of mind? What are the thoughts rattling around in our brain? Sunshine and light? Being positive all the time?  “That’s not being realistic,” say some.   

 

That’s the reason it doesn’t work.

 

I think the attraction genie loves exuberance and happy thoughts, and decides to jump in and contribute. You know how we are attracted to the group having fun.

 

Here’s to happy thoughts,

Jo

 

Hey, maybe it’s ok to swear sometimes. It clears the pipes.

 

 

 

In Our Back Yard:

Some critter is stacking in the winter groceries—my chickens. I lost two. I loved having them free-range, and we had a nice strip of grass behind the Wayback, our auxiliary building. However, the fence there is chain-link and not secure for climbing or burrowing chicken-eating critters. At night the chickens liked to roost on the fence. I guess they looked like sitting ducks, uh, luscious hens. Two of my hens became dinner.

Husband dear and I spent this evening shoring up the chicken yard for the remaining three hens. One is of my original three I’ve had since babies. The other two are my adoptees Blackie, and Red, who showed up and stayed. Last night before I locked them in their little chicken house, Blackie jumped up on the top rail of the eight-foot chicken yard fence and made it through an opening in the bird netting.

From the 2 x 4 boarded top of the yard, she jumped onto the Wayback’s roof and over to the Tiny house. She spent the night roosting on the roof’s ridge.

 

That girl has self-preservation.

 

Tonight, all three are locked in their house.