Chicken Lips

Bob was 11 when he discovered that chickens don’t have lips, but you can kiss them anyway.

His Dominique had just won some big-time awards at a show in Bakersfield, and he was a happy 4-Her.

For you readers who are from the chicken world, yes, we still have some Dominiques. The trio below is the last of Bob’s successful show line. They aren’t great, but they’re easy to have around, and a great reminder of some really happy times.


I’ve been thinking about all those miles I spent with kids and chickens in the car lately. Sacramento County is trying to pass an ordinance that would require us to get a permit to raise chickens. This, they say, is for health and safety reasons. It really seems to be to eliminate fighting cocks, and the county regulators don’t seem to be able to discern them from other chickens. (Something every first-year 4-H poultry kid can figure out.)

So all of us who like to have a few chickens in our backyards are going to have to traipse downtown and explain to the ‘slicks (cityslickers) that chickens don’t pose a health or safety problem. Some people actually think chicken pox comes from chickens. And that wild geese should be banned from golf courses (as if they could read signs) because some old geezer might get goose poop on his golf ball and contract a terminal case of goose bumps.

Pleeeeease! People! Can we stop trying to turn America into a vast, sterile suburbia with yards so small you can’t even grow a decent tomato plant, and you can’t keep an animal bigger than a Chihuahua or a gerbil? In this county, we already have plenty of those “developments” for people who want them — wall-to-wall 2-story monster houses in an assortment of dung colors.

Some of us prefer dirt, with a few weeds and a plop or two of real dung here and there. It’s not a health hazard. The boy who kisses chickens hasn’t been sick a day in his life. He may not get a date after this, though.

Waiting for Dirt

I got the soil in the garden spot prepared during our sunny period a week ago. In the last 2 hours of sunlight, I went and bought flowers to plant the next day. It rained ever since, so these guys were just waiting for some good weather to get their roots in the soil.

In the meantime, the wind (first of the season) blew every single seed pod from the silk tree onto the garden spot, right on top of the super-duper grow-anything soil. Fooey. Now I gotta kick out the freeloaders before the nice folks can move in.

The silk trees are messy, but I keep a couple because they’re also pretty when they bloom and the hummingbirds like them. Usually the seed pods blow out into the horse pasture or stay in the backyard. Also Rudy and Trudy live in the backyard silk tree (Albizzia julibrissin).

I guess Mother Nature has her own ideas, but if I wanted trees in the flower bed, I would have left the lovely little Dogwoods there.

There was a relatively clear day today, so I got out and picked up the seed pods and planted everything. Let it rain! Stuff is going to grow and bloom and be beautiful.

I spent the rest of the day inside, sewing. When was the last time you sewed anything other than a Halloween costume? It’s been ages for me. I wasn’t sure I could even remember how to thread the machine. As it turns out, it’s like riding a bicycle, you never forget.

I did have some problems, however. My eyes don’t see as well, threading the needle was a bitch. And it was tricky using the foot pedal with a foot that has neuropathy. But I sewed not one, but THREE blouses, and finished them all!!!

Why did I decide to sew? Because I really don’t like the 4 color choices that are available this season. Here is the material for one of the blouses I made:


Gwynessa came by while I was sewing and said, “that’s sort of tie-dyed and hippie-looking.” I suppose so, but I was thinking Delphiniums and Tiger Lilies (color-wise). I like bright colors.

Bob also stayed busy yesterday. His truck needed some work, so he called Jon first. That would be Jon who can fix anything from computers to motor homes. (Good job raising that fellow, Kathy and David.)


See the license plate on the truck? That’s where my truck has been for three years.

See Bob’s bright yellow underwear? I think those might have been a gift from Cousin Bev.

See the other stuff in the background that doesn't work? You'd think with such a well-equipped garage that everything around here would work.

Here's Looking at You

Rudy’s new feathers are in, and he’s gorgeous.



I love those cascading feathers on the sides, you couldn’t design a prettier bird if you tried.

Great Backyard Bird Count

I read on another blog site (a truly wonderful one - foodiefarmgirl.blogspot.com) that Feb. 13-16 is when volunteers count birds in their backyards. I counted them. There are 16 large chickens, 10 bantams, 3 pigeons, Trudy and Rudy, and a lot of sparrows in the backyard. There's one hummingbird and a phoebe in the front yard.

Here are some of my backyard birds.


A purebred Ancona cock. He’s not showable, the white tail feather came in last year. I wouldn’t show him anyway, Anconas are nutcases. They’re hard to catch, nasty to wash, and if you don’t hang on tight they’ll get away and be even harder to catch the second time. Great egg layers though! Bob is still living off his egg money from State Fair several years ago.


These are mutt chickens. We have 5 of them. The large cock is a mix of: Silkie, Dark Brahma, Light Brahma, Cornish-cross meat bird escapee from the county fair and Dominique. The hen in the background is his sister. The smaller cockerel is his son. Its mother is the little brown fluff in the front. She's ancient and she's Silkie, Dark Brahma, and White Old English.

And this, of course, is Trudy, queen of the backyard.

Another Plan Hit the Dust

I discovered a new hair lady, right in downtown Sloughhouse!

I stopped going to the place in Gold River. The turnover was so high, I never got to see the same hairdresser twice. I stopped even trying to remember their names.

So my first new appointment was Friday at 9 a.m. The shop is small and since my appointment was early, I planned to be thoughtful and take the right amount of cash. But I only had a $100 bill. So I left a half hour early to go to the ATM at the bank in Rancho Murieta. When I got to the machine, there was a notice that the ATM was closed for service, “Please visit one of our other friendly sites.” the sign said. Right, the closest would be in Folsom, not exactly on my way. There were people in the bank, though, so I knocked on the door. They wouldn’t even look up at me, the bank didn't open for half an hour. This is a friendly site?

I didn’t want to go to the grocery store. I don’t think it’s polite to buy gum and ask for cash. So I went to the mini-mart instead. I was pretty sure they also had an ATM.

Yep, they did. It was out of service too. The friendly clerk saw my frown, though, and asked if he could help. I told him I needed $100 cash. He said he could handle that at the register, so we did the ATM card thing and he handed me...a $100 bill. Well, I didn’t want to be impolite so I took it. And went back to the grocery store and bought some gum and paid for it with the $100 bill and got change in smaller bills.

This happens every time I make a plan. Things work out, but never the way I plan them.

The haircut was great, the new hairlady was great. She went to the local elementary school a year behind Bob. Note to Bob: someone younger than you already has a REAL job.

What Did YOU Do on V Day?

One of my friends met a new potential beau. That has to be a good omen.

Another friend made soup for her elderly dog.

I stayed home, built a crackling fire in the stove, and treated myself to a can of olives and half a square of unsweetened baking chocolate.

Love Y'all

My grandniece Lexy already has her first job. She’s playing Cupid this Valentine’s Day. I’ve hired her to fly around and shoot you all in the butt with her little bow and arrow.

So when you have a pain in the butt, you’ll know it’s me. Sending you love, that is.

I’d like to send some special hearts and flowers to some folks who have had some health challenges.

Cousin Vic was in the hospital getting his heart tuned up for Valentine’s Day and was released just in time to celebrate at home.

Sis-in-law Tina has completed all her chemo and radiation and still has a smile on her face.

Two of our chicken show friends, Bob and Jerry, have had us all concerned and I’m sending them lots of hugs.

John had an accident at work and mashed the end of his finger. It wasn’t life threatening, but when you hate going to the doctor it seems like it.

Everybody hang in there. Spring is coming, life will be better again. In the meantime, I love you all.

The Dirt is Almost Ready

I only have a few feet of flower bed left to prepare. Worked like a maniac out there today, weeds and dirt flying. I have tomorrow off and I want to spend it planting flowers. It looks like rain, though. Oh well, we need it. This time of year the soil should be too wet to dig in. It isn’t, it’s just right.

I found a few sweet peas coming up (yay!) a few more bulbs I planted in the fall. I didn’t hack these up, their tops were peeking through the dirt. They must have heard their cousins screaming last week.

I just heard that there have been some robberies around here. We may have been passed up because Bob is up all night with the lights on in the house. Or maybe because there’s nothing worth stealing. I hope they stay away from here, I’d hate to have to maim someone with my cane.

On the other hand, maybe if I paid them they’d take all the junk out there. Hmm. I’ll have to think about that.

Trying to Move Ahead

Some days, no matter how hard you work, you end up worse off than when you started. I seem to have a talent for this.

First, I don’t really like to clean house. It doesn’t stay cleaned, it just gets dirty again. Second, it’s hard for me to do. So I have 2 nice ladies who come twice a month and do the cleaning. But some things I need to do myself. Like clean out the closets.

This morning I decided to work on the hall closet. I needed to get to the box of chicken material I collected over the 4-H years. It was at the far end of the 6 x 10 closet. With tons of stuff stacked in front of it. This is not stuff I can toss, it’s the “good” stuff that was left after Bob and I tossed all the junk a couple of years ago. So it had to be moved out of the way and then moved back. This closet is like one of those puzzles with squares that you move around until the picture is right. Know what I mean? I hate those puzzles.

It took me an hour to get the two big boxes out that I wanted. Bob actually got out of bed for a while and moved them to the living room for me.

It was really fun looking at all that material again. Everyone I know says they have a box of material that they bought, planning to sew it into some marvelous creation. Well, I never really planned to do anything with this material. I just bought it because it had chickens on it. Sort of like a material collection, a yard here, half a yard there. I did make one pillow several years ago. It’s still in my living room.

So now I’m passing this material on to Marta. Marta who can make anything out of nothing. With all this lovely material, she’ll probably be able to make a car. If you see a strange car on the road that looks like it was quilted out of chicken material, that will be Marta’s.

I was enjoying my trip down memory lane with the material. At the bottom of the box was an old plastic bag with the first piece I ever bought. Did you know that plastic bags rot? I didn’t. When I touched this one, it dissolved into a dozen pieces onto the carpet the 2 nice ladies had just cleaned.

It was all downhill from there. When I tried to pick up the pieces, each one broke into a dozen more. I tried to brush them up with the cat brush. They became magnetically charged and stuck to the furniture, my hands, and my clothes. And like cells in a reproducing frenzy, they split into twice as many pieces.

I went back to the hall closet to dig out the vacuum cleaner. I hate it as much as I hate those puzzles. It does what all vacuum cleaners do. It sucks. I don’t mean it sucks up dirt, I mean it’s just a pain. It suckers you into thinking you’re going to accomplish something, then it makes a bigger mess than you started with.

But I dragged it out anyway. I pushed it through the plastic twice, spreading it around even more, before the vacuum cleaner quit. The bag was full. Well foo. The new bags are kept in the basement. I still can’t get down the stairs into the basement. I haven’t cared about this because the 2 nice ladies have their own vacuum cleaner, and because I wasn’t strong enough to push a vacuum for a long time anyway.

So, after 3 hours of work, I managed to take a perfectly clean living room and mess it up. There are little pieces of plastic all over the carpet, still multiplying as we speak. And there is a dead, dusty vacuum cleaner in their midst.

I guess I’ll go on to the next task I set for myself today: answering Caltrans’ request to come onto the property to survey. I don’t have anymore use for Caltrans than I do for vacuum cleaners, they both suck. So of course the answer is “no.” It will just take me a while to compose the letter because I want it to be special.

Happy BD, Jon!

Last night was Game Night. The group hadn’t been here long before they realized they had missed Jonathan’s birthday by a couple of weeks. So they decided to bake him a cake.

First they assembled the equipment and the ingredients. This ended up being almost everything in the kitchen. (“Mom, where is the double-boiler? Do we have one? What is it?) Then they found the most difficult recipe in the book. A chocolate, heart-shaped cake (to celebrate Valentine’s Day at the same time) filled with chocolate pudding and topped with chocolate frosting. They’re fearless, of course, because they took cooking in 4-H. (I think they missed Alex, though.)

Gwynessa, Brent, Jon the Birthday Boy, and Bob. Travis was here but left early so he could get up for class the next morning. And no, the recipe did not call for beer.


John wisely stands far away from the Mad Chefs and their mixer. Brent the math major monitors measurements.


While the masterpiece was baking, an absorbing game of Jenga was played.


Ta-da! The birthday boy and his heart cake - Happy BD and Happy VD at the same time.


It was a heart-warming evening.

Only a Dozen to Go

Pills for George, that is.

Yesterday we came to an understanding. When I get up in the morning, all 4 cats are sitting by the bed, asking to be fed. George, especially. In the kitchen I spread the towel on the counter and said, "George, pill first, THEN food." He jumped up on the counter and sat on the towel. Wow!

So I proceeded to give him the pill and he still bit me.

Last night I put the towel on the counter again, put the cat on the towel, put the pill in a Pill Pocket, and said, "George, eat this, please, so I don't have to stick my finger down your throat." He did. And he did again this morning and this evening.

Cousin Nancy said a dog trainer had told her to just tell her new puppies what to do and they would. Well, but dogs like to please people. My cats mostly please themselves. Velcro does listen, but mostly for the sound of a can opener. Maybe George is different. Whatever. I didn't get bit this a.m. and that pleases me.