Posts Tagged ‘humor’
Brilliant Chickens
Our chicks are growing up almost as fast as the days of the week that fly by in a blink. Ever since that first day when Cyndie taught them how to find a drink of water in our brooder, they have piled on one new accomplishment after another. Sometimes it is a result of them copying each other, and sometimes it is through our gentle instruction.
In order to raise them to be comfortable with our presence and willing to have us handle them, we spent some extended time picking them up and whispering sweet nothings in their direction yesterday. Cyndie spent much of that visit searching for unique markings that will help identify individuals for naming purposes.
I think we should get to know their personalities better, so they can show us what names they deserve. My idea for using favorite chicken recipes was summarily denied, but I still may succeed in getting one of the yellow ones named Parmesan.
We think that the classical music we have on all night long for them is working well to feed their rapidly growing brains with intricacies and emotional depth. They have demonstrated such quick ability to grasp everything we introduce that we are confident we have the makings of brilliance in this flock.
It’s almost like they knew to perch on that stick I put in the brooder before I even finished setting it in place. Now I am working on finding just the right gnarly branches from our brush piles that I can use to carve little chess pieces. With 10 chicks, I’m debating with myself over the need for more than one board. They obviously learn well enough by observing each other, I think they can get the game down by watching a match played by their brood-mates.
Cyndie is busy creating flash cards with images of ticks, flies, and bugs, as well as piles of manure to be scratched apart in a “green means go” motif. The back sides will have a red theme and include threats like the hawks and eagles overhead, fox, raccoon, coyote, the neighbor’s dogs, and yes, even Delilah.
Our chickens are going to be brilliant.
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Windy Monday
Is it because it was a Monday? That’s my excuse. Hassles at work. Discombobulation at home. It felt like what Mondays are always being accused of feeling like.
I felt an unexplainable urge to walk round and round, circling in place like Delilah before she lays down, before flopping down myself like a rag doll on our couch, beneath a blanket, in front of the fire Cyndie had burning in the fireplace when I got home.
I suppose it could have been the wind. Blowing snow around at 20-mph, with gusts into the 30s. Driving the commute home was an adventure of wavering vehicles, wobbling back and forth in their lanes.
In a fateful calm, I found myself mentally preparing for the sound of scraping metal that never came, as an eighteen wheel tractor-trailer rig worked its way past me in the fast lane, moving ridiculously close in my peripheral view, several times, as it eased by in the wind.
Who knows what inspired me to decide to dig into documents I knew Cyndie would need to begin the process of preparing information to give to our accountant for our 2015 tax returns. Maybe it was my way of avoiding looking for the card I stowed almost 6 months ago that would tell me what day my next dentist appointment is supposed to be.
I’m growing tired of the insidious plaque on the inside of my bottom front teeth that I can’t stay ahead of cleaning. I think I need floss with a coarser grit. The magical kind that shreds plaque, but stops short of eroding enamel or gums. Yeah. That kind.
Thank goodness I had no allegiance to the teams involved in the Superbowl game Sunday night. I imagine the fans of the Panthers had a pretty gloomy Monday. The fans of the Broncos were probably too delirious to recognize what day it was, let alone whether it was a hassle or not. I watched the game, but the outcome had no bearing on my mental balance, one way or the other.
We finished the evening by deciding to register our online presence with our new healthcare provider for 2016. Cyndie wanted to verify some details of our coverage. She went round and round through loops of links that looked promising, but all fell mercilessly short of the information she was curious about. We were trying to be conscientious, well-informed health plan participants, but the struggle and stress of the online search process began to feel unhealthy.
We decided to take a break and have an ice cream dessert nightcap. I was all too willing to disregard my day’s sugar tally.
The type of day I had yesterday was solely a function of it being a Monday. Or it was the wind.
It might have been the wind.
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Relative Something 