The Final Countdown

My feelings are hurt.  Was it something I said?  Did I do something wrong?  I lost a follower over the weekend.  I had 62 on Friday, and today I am at 61 followers.  Okay, I know I haven't been posting as frequently as I should.  And certainly not as frequently as a good reader would like.  And I apologize for that.  I don't always post about chickens, but my life isn't just chickens.  I love my chickens.  I enjoy raising them.  They are a lot of fun.  In fact, two of my hens hatched out their littles broods yesterday.  And lately, I haven't had any good pics.  I, too, apologize for that.  I've been without camera for a few weeks.  I should have that remedied in another week or two.  With all that being said, I can see how my blog may have become boring.  I am sorry, and I hope you will come back.

Now, I have questions about being followed and following protocall.  Sixty-one blogs is a lot to keep up with.  I do try, however hard it may be.  No, I don't just read the chicken blogs.  Okay, I'd be lying if I said that I didn't have favs to read, but I still enjoy all of the blogs I read.  Really, truly, and honestly, I do.  I don't just read other chicken blogs.  I read plant blogs, life blogs, garden blogs, local blogs, national blogs, international blogs.  In fact, I have tried to follow every blog that follows me.  It seems like the right thing to do.  Wouldn't it be rude otherwise?  Are you required to follow everyone who follows you?  But I have seen blogs with 200, 300, or even over 1,000 followers!  Not that I expect to have that many followers, but if I did, there's no way I could keep up with all of them.  I did make a list over at dobbies.com .  I am on the list of More Chicken Keeping Blogs We Love.  Some of my followers and ones I follow are on that list, too!  I think that is sooo cool!  Congrats to you if you made the list!  But I am sorry if I cause any of you to lose interest, get bored, or just tired of my ramblings.  I hope that over the next weeks or so that may change.

Work has kept me busy, as usual.  Sure there are good days and bad days.  Anyone who never has a bad day at work is disillusioned.  Even people who land dream jobs, like pro athletes, singing and movie stars, and CEO's still have bad days at work.  You think the CEO of BP isn't having any bad days lately?  But overall, I do enjoy my job.  And I am aspiring to upper management.  Yeah, I have goals.  I'd be a fool not to have them.  But starting today, I got my first raise in three years.  Between getting bought out and facing a bad economy we just got passed by.  No, it's not like my salary doubled or anything.  But these days you take what you can get!  I'm sure most of you know what I mean!

The weather has been AWFUL!!  I do love my summertime.  Our temps have been in the upper 90's F. (98F today) And that I can deal with....at least until I get older.  But we haven't gotten any rain.  And we really need it bad.  My squash is all gone.  I'm trying to save my butternut squash, but it's an up hill battle.  So far so good with my watermelons and tomatoes.  The corn is curled and the canteloupes and cucumbers and wilted.  I try to keep water on the maters and melons, hoping I can at least have a melon or two to take to the beach next week.  My Impatiens, Zinnias, and Morning Glories are well watered, but still wilt in the day with it being so hot.  Just send me some rain.  Poor Farmer.  He's hurt his back and is laid out flat.  His grandson and wife have been working the field and taking all the veggies to market.  But Dustin says they will probably have to till in most of what's left.  RAIN!!!!

I will post later this week on the chickens!  Have a great day everyone!  I am on the final countdown till vacation! 

This and That and a GIVEAWAY

What a week last week was!  A co-worker's daughter was in a bad car accident a week ago yesterday.  She was driving when she ran off the road.  She over-corrected and rolled the Suburban 4 or 5 times.  She was the only one badly injured.  She's in a neck brace for at least 8 weeks and cannot take it off, even to shower.  She shattered a vertebrae in her neck and was inches from paralysis.  She went home from the hospital on Friday.  She was qutie lucky, to say the least.  But that put her dad out of work for all of last week.  So I was doing my best to handle my job and his.  He is our inside salesman, so I spent quite a bit of time on the phone with customers and outside salesmen.  But we got through it.  It's always rough at work when anyone is out, as we are at our limit with personnel.

I entered a giveaway this morning! Pam and Farm Man over at A Southern Farm are doing another nest box giveaway.  I didn't enter the last couple cause I thought others deserved to get it.  But I am entering this time.  I may not win, but it's still fun, nonetheless.  Maybe you are interested?!  Go check it out!
http://georgiafarmwoman.blogspot.com/2010/06/henpals-3-hole-chicken-nesting-box.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LifeOnASouthernFarm+%28Life+on+a+Southern+Farm%29

 I spent the weekend doing things around the house.  We had a couple more chicks hatch this weekend.  There were three actually, but  I think the other hens got a hold of one.  It was missing the next morning, and I found just a small tuft of downy feathers.  I gathered the two remaining ones and put them in a brooder box.  We've still got four more hens sitting on eggs.  They should all start hatching soon, I think.  I didn't really keep up when they started sitting.  And sometimes it's hard to tell when they don't sit constantly.  I had a hen hatch some out at nearly four weeks once cause she wouldn't stay on the eggs.  I almost threw them out!

My Garden is looking okay.  My corn is growing cobs now.  I have watermelons I'm hoping will be ready for my vacation in two weeks.  My crookneck squash is all dying, though.  Same thing happened last year.  These stuid little beetles eat holes in the base of the stalk, climb in, and eat my plants from the inside out!  Makes me so mad I could spit! 

Our baby pigeon is out and about now.  He's still a bit ugly with his oversized beak, but I'm sure he will grow into it.  The white pair keep laying eggs, but none ever hatch.  She sits for maybe two weeks, then abandons the egg.  I put a pigeon egg under a chicken yesterday, but I'm not sure how that will work.  She may crush the poor thing. 

Sorry I haven't posted much lately.  It just seems I always have more to do than I really have time for!  I'm going on vacation in a couple of weeks.  My family is driving up from Beeville, Texas.  They have rented a large house out at Rodanthe (Yes, the same place as the movie Nights in Rodanthe) for a week.  So I will probably be out there with them.  They rented the house a couple of years ago, but I didn't go then.  I couldn't get off work.  I hear it has a private in-ground pool, and is only a block from the beach!  It will just be nice to see them all again.

What Do You Say?

My birthday came and went.  And another week is gone.  Nothing special is happening.  My dad had an appointment at the VA clinic this morning about his leg.  Mike was supposed to watch my nephews and nieces, as they were staying with Grandma and Buddy.  I haven't talked to any of them yet.  I'm sure the kids went straight for the pool when they got there.  William, our inside sales guy, and a friend, helped me process vendor invoices yesterday.  We processed over $46,000.00 total.  I'm hoping that's a good sign that we're having a good fiscal month. 

The garden is coming along.  I've already been picking squash, bush green beans, and cucumbers.  I've got a few watermelons that are about baseball sized right now.  Some of my corn is just starting to tassel out.  I'm hoping to get some canteloupes, and I've got butternut squash growing this year.  I've never grown that before.  My okra all died, except 3 plants, and they are still only about 6 inches tall.  My sweet potatoes are vining like crazy, but I've never grown them before, either. 

I'v visited a few other blogs, and it seems all are busy.  Some are going away, some need to go away (as in a trip, I mean).  Some are like me, with bloggers block. What do you say, when you don't know what to say? 

Mike's picking my up in a couple of hours, and we're going to my parent's again for the weekend.  It seems to be the gathering spot for family.  So, with that being said, I'll leave you with a good ENDING for the week while I spend the weekend searching for new blog ideas.  Have a good weekend!!

A Mix of Stuff

First things first.  Now that all of you have thought less of me for what I posted Friday, I must say that it isn't what you were thinking.  That guy in the pic with me is Mustafa (we just called him Steve).  He was an Iraqi that worked as a translator for us.  He also got us "things" from outside the walls.  That is a hookah we are smoking....remember the caterpillar in Alice and Wonderland?  We were NOT smoking weed, green, trees, mary jane, hashish, or anything of the sort.  It was flavored tobacco.  Strawberry if my memory serves me correctly.  I wanted to bring one home, but they said customs wouldn't allow it.  Then, when we were in Kuwait they said we could...it was too late, then.  But we had fun on occasions while we were over there. 

We had quite a busy weekend.  We didn't go to the aution Saturday.  There was just too much going on.  I did meet my mom and sister with kids in tow for lunch at Zaxby's.  Then Mom came back to the house for me to wash her car.  She was gonna have it done professionally, but I offered it for free.  Mike was working on our kitchen cabinets, stripping the paint.  They are birch wood, so we decided to strip the white paint and lacquer the wood.  Looks pretty nice. 

We also had a successful rescue attempt on Saturday.  We used to have Becky, a Quaker Parrot.  She was quite noisy and drove Mike insane.  So he gave her to our neighbor.  However, our neighbor doesn't have the best track record for taking care of animals.  And sure enough, he grew bored with Becky and let her go outside about a week ago.  Since then we have either heard her talking and squawking, or seen her high in the trees.  Saturday she landed in a tree in the back yard, then the top of the chicken coop, then back to the tree, then on top of the other neighbor's shed right up next to the fence between our yards.  So I put a chair up by the fence and, wearing leather gloves cause she always would bite me, I called her.  She hopped onto my finger, and I grabbed her little talons with my thumb.  We put her in a 2nd stage brooder pen and I put in some water and chicken feed.  A week without those and she was ready for them.  She's okay now.  My dad is gonna get her now.  I just gotta find her a new cage.  She's doing good right now, though. 

Sunday was busier. I went shopping. And I did just what I complained about my mom doing. Though she was looking at clothes and shoes...ugh! I was shopping at Lowes! I was looking at the things I can't afford right now. And I was looking at the things I could afford, but had to choose this or the other. I almost bought a fig tree. I'd love to have a fig tree. Probably not this year, though. But I did buy seeds for the garden, plus a few started plants. I also bought some flower seeds to plant around the house, and some solar garden lights for the front of the house. Then I spent most the rest of Sunday afternoon planting the garden. I've got squash, watermelons, canteloupes, okra, bell peppers, egg plants, corn, jalapenos, mixed hot peppers, and Zinnias to sell as cut flowers. There's probably more, but I can't think of it all now.

Here's that motor cycle from Orange County Choppers that kept me so busy in March. (Don't know why blogger is squishing my pics all of a sudden.  They don't look good that way)

I was looking for some papers in an old shoe box, and I didn't put it away.  Stripey Cat decided to make a

bed out of the box!

Our Easter visitors.   Not sure if they were wild or not, but I'm guessing half wild. 

Here's our little chicks.  They're actually about a month old now, with feathers and all.  I don't have a recent pic.  The four on the right are RI Red (pea comb rooster) and black sex link hen.  The one on the left is full Black Australorp.

I got an award from Tracey last week (SEE I DIDN'T FORGET)  I haven't had a chance to post on it yet.  I gotta try to come up with things you don't know about me first!  I'll try later today or tomorrow.