Hello, my friends!

Look! I'm posting again! I always feel so virtuous when I put up a post. It's like having my vitamins, or shaving my legs, or getting the last stray sock off the laundry chair.  Let's see- what's going on around here? Thanksgiving is coming soon and there's apparently been some interfamilial debate over whether squirrel is appropriate  holiday fare or not.  I come down pretty firmly on the 'not' side, having once eaten squirrel.  I know I've written about squirrel eating before but the truth is I only did it once, a really long time ago. And I didn't inhale, I swear!  Anyway, I'm not sure how that's going to play out but I'll eat anything if I have enough wine, that's my motto!  The weather has gotten very chilly lately, it is definitely boot weather.  I have recently discovered that it's also the season for purchasing larger than normal sized stretchy cords.  I found this out the hard way and I don't want to talk about it anymore, thank you very much.  I might have to travel to an even colder place for work sometime soon, too. To a place where I hear that people routinely wear cleats to keep from slipping on the ice. I'm not sure how well that's going to work out for me. Cleats, really? I mean, sure, those are great for clawing your way to the top of the heap, if you have a pile of coworkers in your way all the time like I do and you don't want blood on your good boots. But just for walking down the street? I don't think so.

Thanksgiving, boring! Work, boring! Let's talk about my most brilliant recent discovery! It's only the most awesome zombie/vampire repellant ever!  Like all brilliant discoveries it happened totally by accident. See, I had to clean out the cat box, so I scooped the cat poop into a bag, then I tied the bag shut and put it outside the front door. I kept 'forgetting' to take it to the garbage, which was super annoying, until it got to be about the fourth day and I realized that the entire time that bag had been by the front door was undead-predator free! Not a single vampire or zombie! It worked for about ten days and would probably still be effective, only someone got sick of having a bag of cat poop on the front porch and threw it away. Someone who doesn't realize how valuable it was, no doubt. So now I have to just wait until I can get another bag full. In the meantime, I make the cat sleep with me with his butt pointed towards the bedroom door.  With that problem solved, I need to figure out a way to keep the raccoons away from the chickens.  So far they have gotten three of our chickens. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure they are regular raccoons, not the undead kind, so the cat poop doesn't work.  Let me know if you have any ideas! And Happy Thanksgiving! I'll be sure to keep you posted on the squirrels.

Let there be lemmings

Hey, y’all!  I bet you thought you would NEVER hear from me again. No such luck, sucks to be you!!  I sort of wondered if you would ever hear from me again too; it has been a while since I had any ideas to write about at all. Well, I mean, I had a FEW ideas.  Just piddly little things, really, like the one where I was thinking I could stuff footballs with wine to take to work, because people there like sports and they might not notice someone drinking from a football. Not very practical, because those things taste terrible on the outside, plus I can’t even take full credit- it was a collaboration with some of my more twisted coworkers.  But now I think I might be getting my mojo back for real! See, I took this remote vacation BY MYSELF! There was not even any internet, can you believe such a crazy thing? I couldn’t even text! I know, I wasn’t sure I would survive either, but not only did I not shrivel up into a teeny tiny dried up husk of skin and die, I had at least a jillion brand new ideas! I would go running on the beach and the notions would just cascade into my brain like little suicidal lemmings.  I had to hurry back to my room and write them down before they crushed each other into a big squishy heap of brilliance!

It sounds pretty easy, doesn’t it? This taking a vacation by myself thing. And it would have been, too, if it hadn’t been for those darn meddling chickens. Oh, you didn’t know about the chickens? Right, I guess not, because I haven’t written anything for what feels like a million years.  We have chickens! We started with five, and are sadly down to three, because RACCOONS. So, until we figure out a chicken sleeping solution that is raccoon-proof, they have to be locked in at night and left out in the morning. EVERY night, and EVERY morning. This, as you might suspect, completely negates the advantages to having chickens, and there are many: delicious fresh eggs, high quality poop/compost, and peaceful clucking. Not being willing to abandon the girls to take their chances with prowling predators, I scooped them up into cat carriers and transported them with their accoutrements to Grandpa’s house to get chickensat.  That sounds pretty easy, doesn’t it? HA! You might not know this, but chickens are quite wily. And fast. Really, you have to hold them with both hands.  Which is fine, and not problematic at all, unless you are laying on the mud and chicken poop covered ground because you fell trying to catch one, and now you caught one only you are laying on the ground holding a chicken with both hands. I think I invented a new yoga move; I call it ‘chicken up’. I hope there’s not already one called that. I wouldn’t know because I don’t do yoga. It’s boring. Also, it hurts. If I need exercise I can just go collect chickens.

Finally with chickens satisfactorily collected, we set off for Grandpa’s house.  I mean satisfactorily to me, of course; I’m not sure the chickens would agree. I would ask them but they aren’t talking to me.  My car smelled like a barn for a while, but it aired out in time, and I was off to collect lemmings. The chickens are definitely easier, but the lemmings smell better. To me, I mean; I’m not sure the raccoons would agree.