A chick called 9
I got home from seeing Ants and went out to feed, and commune with, the birds and whammo! Some tiny scurrying thing caught my eye – a chick! All by itself! I couldn’t believe my eyes. I sat at my picnic table watching it for awhile to see whose chick it was but, despite a lot of interest from the gang and the chooks and peafowl and the guinneas, not one of them came to the party, so I had to catch it (sounds easy but it took about 9 hours!)
So here he/she is, in Ming’s hands. We have no idea what kind of chick this is, but it might be a peachick!
And its name?
9!
We have now cosied 9 into a box with some straw, water and crumbles but 9 is already addicted to cuddles.
I wonder what 9 is!
Stalker
Prince, our only male white peacock, is now stalking the gang nonstop. At first he was just picking on poor little Daffy, but now he seems to have it in for Zaruma too. And yesterday he attacked Godfrey!
Prince: Where are they?
Me: Why are you doing this, Prince? Leave the gang alone!
Prince: But Zaruma is such fun!
Me: Leave him alone!
Zaruma: Julie, HELP!
Me: Prince, if you don’t stop this harrassment immediately I will send you off to the neighbours’ roof where you will be hosed, yelled at and get a taste of your own medicine.
Prince: Okay, sorry, Julie – just having a bit of fun while Princess 1 is sitting on those egg things.
Me: Those egg things are your children, silly.
Prince: Oh!
Zaruma: Thanks, Julie. Tapper was getting worried about my mental health.
Godfrey: Julie, I know you and I haven’t always agreed on things but this time I am absolutely on your side. That Prince has become far to arrogant and I am going to wingpunch him next time.
Me: Thanks for your support, Godrey!
‘Where is love?’
Oh no! Now it’s Zaruma singing that Oliver song, ‘Where is love?’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjJDekSculo
Zaruma: Tapper, as we are the only two Muscovy ducks here, I think we should get married.
Tapper: What?
Zaruma: Look I’ve seen the way Daffy looks at you and I know you are fond of him but, face it, Tapper, Daffy is an Indian Runner and he can’t even fly! I don’t like the way he chases you around and if I have to fight him I will. Tapper, we are meant for each other. I’m in love with you and even if you don’t feel the same about me, you soon will.
Tapper: WHAT?
Zaruma: I have tried not to overwhelm you with my feelings but I think you should really consider my proposition because I am sincere and reliable and I will never ever let you down. So, what do you say?
Tapper: ZZZ
Zaruma: (singing) Whe-e-e-e-re is love?
Comedies of errors
1. With a heart full of love and gratitude to Ming who had mowed lawns all day, then fed and put the gang away, I re-heated my chicken noodle soup made from scratch (yes, I boiled a chicken, boned it, removed the disgusting fat the next day, added noodles, vegetables and spices and voila!)
So tonight is the third night of the chicken soup. On night 1, Ming said it was like heaven; on night 2, he said it tasted even better. Alas, tonight, he said, “Mum, this dinner thing is becoming such an ordeal for me.”
Brat!
2. I rang the hospital this afternoon to confirm the booking for Anthony’s skin cancer operation tomorrow and not only was there no record of this, there was also no record of the original date. So I had to make several more phonecalls to figure out if Anthony and I were real people etc.
I just rang again and apparently we do exist so that is a great relief.
3. At 4pm I answered the phone hoping it was the peacock rescuer man but it was Ants who had asked a nurse to ring me. He was completely disorientated and kept begging me to love him again. It took a long time to reassure him about where he was, and remind him about tomorrow’s operation.
I said “I love you, Ants” so many times, until he finally believed me.
Why didn’t I think of this before?
Every Thursday morning the nursing lodge has a bus excursion and Anthony usually goes. Last Thursday I arrived at the nursing lodge at around noon to be told that Anthony was still out and that the excursion was to Dardanup (our town!) They’d gone up to the hills just past our farm. So, when the bus returned and Ants was being helped back to his room by the nurse in charge of the excursion, I asked if it would be possible for the bus to come to our place and she said yes!
So tomorrow, they are coming here and I am so excited. The nurse said they might make it a semi-regular thing and I wanted to kiss her feet! This would be a stress-free way of getting Anthony home for a few hours and I am sure the other residents will enjoy it too. They always bring their own morning tea and there are enough staff for any toilet emergencies, so I am definitely in yeeha mode! Anthony seems to think it is a great idea too.
I have told the birds that they will have an audience tomorrow between 9.30 and 11.30am, so they are all practising for Godfrey’s contortionist competition.
Another contortionist
A competing peahen
Woodroffe thinks he will win the competition
Pearl will be performing in the pond
A problem is a problem
I can’t call a problem a challenge because, to me, a challenge implies something zingily positive whereas a problem is something devoid of zing. It seems more useful to see some of the problems I am facing, with Anthony in the nursing lodge, as problems. I guess I’m not very ‘new age’ – sorry but no matter how many daisies surround a cowpat, it is still a cowpat and it stinks.
So, as most of my ideas of how to cheer Anthony up have fallen fairly flat (reading/showing him the blog, taking old photographs in, buying him the gramophone, going out to lunch, bringing him home etc.), I have decided to establish a strict routine every week and write it down for him, and me, and stick to it. This will be good for both of us because, my own personal turmoil, grief, loss of job, and Ming challenges (yes, I can call these challenges), has caused me to lose all semblance of a routine.
Maybe a whiteboard would be a good idea. I could put it on Anthony’s wall in the nursing lodge and write down exactly what day and time I am coming in, and other plans. I could also write our home phone number (which he mostly can’t remember) so he can ring me for a change. Actually I could also write down the phone numbers of his favourite friends and family on the whiteboard. These are in a notebook in one of his drawers but he keeps losing this, or not understanding it.
Perhaps the daisies will grown into the cowpat and give it a new odour. You never know! Nevertheless, a cowpat is a cowpat and problems are problems, not challenges.
Godfrey has a challenge in teaching the gang ‘Gangnam’ dance moves.
Daffy has a problem with loneliness because he is the only Indian runner duck left.
Who let the dogs out?
Remember this song? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He82NBjJqf8&noredirect=1
For some time now we have had a dogs versus birds dilemma and this has been a source of contention between Ming and me. I have tended to lock the dogs in their yard and let the birds free range and Ming has wanted this arrangement reversed, so we have now come to a compromise. The dogs get to run free all morning, then get put back into their yard, then the poultry get to free range all afternoon until we put them away, then the dogs get another run. So far this is working very well.
The reason we can’t let them all frolic together is because the dogs want to kill everything. Blaze is a miniature dachschund and Jack is an Irish terrier so, despite our attempts to train them not to kill (using electric collar things briefly which I didn’t like, and a dog trainer) both breeds have been bred to hunt and kill.
Luckily the guinnea fowl and peafowl can fly up and away from dog danger, but none of the poultry can – not even Godfrey – so now we have a new system and everyone seems very happy – the gang, the dogs and Ming and me.
They look so innocent don’t they!
Don’t be fooled by their sweet demeanours; Ming let them out a bit early the other afternoon, before the roosters were roosting, and they killed Noname and Tina Turner almost instantaneously. Poor Ming tried to stop it but had to come and tell me. I cried my eyes out even though Tina and I had such a love/hate relationship. Noname was always a bit vulnerable and an easy target so I guess, for me, this was another lesson learned.
I’m not sure if getting accustomed to loss is a good or a bad thing.
Whose egg is this?
The chooks lay all of their eggs in the same place – in the chook house – and Tapper, the duck, lays hers there too. The geese, on the other hand lay them anywhere and everywhere. There aren’t that many goose eggs but every now and then I see one in the middle of the lawn and I wonder whose egg it is. Then, the other day, I was sitting at my little picnic table near the bird yards and Ola just popped one out right in front of me (it’s the same one I put into Ming’s scrambled eggs the other night).
I have now asked Ola if she wouldn’t mind laying her eggs in the yard. She has agreed.
jmgoyder 