Snippets

• I had to go to the bank this morning, and I used the drive-up window.  Actually, it's not the window, it's the vacuum tube thingy.  This bank has a drive up window, but they never open it, they only ever open the second lane with the vacuum tube.  Anyway, while I was waiting (forever--there is only one employee at any time) this gigantic car pulls up next to me--you guessed it--right at the CLOSED drive up window.  The light on that side is red--there's no way to make that mistake.  Closed is closed.  Anyway, I was still waiting, and so was this woman, who was sitting in the closed lane, and she was getting very impatient.  So much so, that she got her butt out of her seat to bang on the drive up window.  Of the closed lane, mind you.  I couldn't see much else, because her car was SO frikkin' big, but it's obvious the bank did not know that the Empress of America was coming in to do her banking today.  Shame on them.  I am glad to report, however, that her Highness did get service finally and was able to drive away in her monster gas-guzzler before my transaction was even done, though I was there first.  Serves me right to bank on the same day as royalty.

• I have been working like a madwoman lately to repaint the forty acres of railroad ties that we have surrounding our house.  When it was built, the front door was a good 5 feet off of the ground, causing there to be either a long stairway to it, or a large concrete pad put up to it with gradual stepping up and down.  Luckily, the people who built the house chose the latter, and we have a really nice stone-textured pad with steps that go sideways and not directly TO the front door.  But with the huge concrete pad came the problem of covering up the sides, which they chose to do with railroad ties.  It's fine, and when they are stained a dark color I think they look nice, but there are a THOUSAND of them, and a number of them have been beat all to hell in the weather.  My husband replaced quite a few, but some cannot be replaced easily.  So I have been using that Rustoleum Restore stuff on them.  It is the weirdest paint I've ever used.  It's like plastic pudding with bits of grit in it.  Though once it dries, it's rock hard and fuses to the wood and fills in all the cracks and big honking holes, of which there are quite a few.  I think it works a treat, but I swear the wood under there is smothering.  I can almost hear it gasping for breath.  Hopefully, though, it will prolong all the wood the 8-10 years as promised, so we don't have to do any of this again any time soon.

• Speaking of changing things, we also put up a bit of fence in the backyard to give it some architecture, and we changed the shutters on the house.  We went from this,

Note some of the acres of railroad ties here

which looks like the roundup at the O.K. Corral, to this:

          which is much, much, much better, even though the picture's not that great.  And I love it, despite what anyone else thinks.  Love with a capital L.  Now if we could only thatch the roof, I think that would be grand.

• My husband brought home a bunch of pallets the other day, and I've been having a ball with them.  Those things are so useful, and I have plans for all of them.  In fact, I'll be sending him out to get more soon.  I will share the results, I promise!

• The plants I ordered in the fall have been arriving in drips and drabs, so I've been planting a bit, too.  There are several raspberries coming, and some white Rosa Rugosa, which I'm going to plant up against the little fence bit in the backyard.  It'll be beautiful when it fills in.  On top of that, my husband is going to plant grass back there, which will be a nice change from the dirt we have growing currently.   Unfortunately, this means the chickens will have to be in a run from now on.  Free ranging is wonderful, and I love having my chickens around me, but they are so destructive.  Mulch goes flying, plants get eaten, and every year they have at it with my annuals, and I just can't afford that.  I want pretty flowers, so the chickens will have to learn to live in a run.  We will expand it for them, but that's it.  There'll be no more random chicken-ness here (except maybe in the winter).

• And, because I know you're all wondering, the last little bunny passed away yesterday.  What a fighter he/she was, but there was something going on he/she couldn't get away from and that was it.  Despite dragging a very unwilling Camille in for him to nurse, despite feeding him more often than I'd fed the last batch of littles, despite keeping him warm and leaving him be and trying to give him fluids and electrolytes, he just faded away.  No matter how much he ate or how long he nursed (he was at it for 10 minutes straight one time.  Boy, did Camille like that!), he never filled out and was always dehydrated.  The last little bunnies would grow before our eyes with a good meal, and when they were done, were fat as dumplings.  I could give this little guy a great meal, and it would make no difference.  He got thinner when he should have gotten fatter.  My heart still hurts from the losses.  There were just too many.

• But it does leave me with the question of what to do with Camille.  Two litters, completely dead.  She has no mothering ability.  She's hard to handle, not particularly friendly, and doesn't really like to be touched.  I love her color, but I am thinking that the yarn she can make is not enough.  Camille may be re-homed at some point, I am still thinking about it.

And because I don't want to leave you on that horribly sad note, I will leave you with this:

• I went to Tractor Supply yesterday, and walked in as a lamb in a diaper was walking out.  Well, with her owner, not by herself.  Can't have un-chaperoned lambs running about.  I laughed when I realized what was on the leash, and lady said "I know", like she was about to explain how odd she was for bringing a lamb into Tractor Supply.  Which of course prompted me to talk about how I had goats in diapers for a couple of weeks and was always tempted to bring them to the Tractor Supply, but demurred because I thought they'd climb the shelves.  So she's not so odd after all, or we're both odd.  Take your pick.  Anyway, the lamb's name is Pockets, and she is completely adorable.  And she fit a size 3 Pamper very nicely, tail hole and all.