Saturday the grass was green, buds were popping out on the lilac bushes, and irises and tulips peeked through the mulch in the flowerbed. The front lawn was covered in cowbirds turning over leaves looking for bugs, and blackbirds gathered up wisps of straw-colored grass. Robins and sparrows sang in the trees. All signs pointed to winter being over.
My husband Dan and I made plans to transfer the laying hens to the mobile coop and move them out on pasture the following day.
(Last year's Great Chicken Move - note the sunny day)We expected the day-old meat bird chicks to arrive early next week, and it would be much easier to make preparations if the adult birds were removed from the building. Over the course of the winter they had completely destroyed the baby bird-raising hotbox – collapsed it and eaten it, to be precise. It was constructed from thin insulated foam panels, which were unbelievably attractive to their palates. We were also squeezing in a turkey barbecue on Sunday that had been postponed from an earlier date.
That morning the cats got me up at 7:20 a.m. This seemed odd because they usually start their meowing, clawing, and toe biting around 6:20 a.m. I don’t usually sleep through it. They want feeding soon after daybreak, not necessarily to eat, they just want kibbles in the dish, and are very particular about that fact.
("Feed me now!")
("More water!")
I looked out the living room window on the way down the stairs; it was snowing! The lawn was covered in white stuff, and it seemed so completely out of place that it made me wonder if I were having a dream, and it was Christmastime, and I wasn’t ready for it.
Dan came in for breakfast after morning chores later than usual. No big deal. I figured that the barn cleaner had broken or there was a veterinary emergency, and at the very least, if one or the other had happened he’d be covered in alarming brown stains and chunky organic matter. I mentally steeled myself not to be unduly anxious about what I might encounter when the door to the house was opened; I hoped there would be no blood on his clothes. At least, none that was his.
He was relatively clean (except for the usual stains) and informed me that the ‘atomic’ alarm clock in our bedroom had switched itself to Daylight Savings Time during the night, moving us one hour ahead.
("More water!")I looked out the living room window on the way down the stairs; it was snowing! The lawn was covered in white stuff, and it seemed so completely out of place that it made me wonder if I were having a dream, and it was Christmastime, and I wasn’t ready for it.
Dan came in for breakfast after morning chores later than usual. No big deal. I figured that the barn cleaner had broken or there was a veterinary emergency, and at the very least, if one or the other had happened he’d be covered in alarming brown stains and chunky organic matter. I mentally steeled myself not to be unduly anxious about what I might encounter when the door to the house was opened; I hoped there would be no blood on his clothes. At least, none that was his.
He was relatively clean (except for the usual stains) and informed me that the ‘atomic’ alarm clock in our bedroom had switched itself to Daylight Savings Time during the night, moving us one hour ahead.
(The usual stains.)It was late to be served an April Fools, but we’d been ‘gotten’ by an electronic appliance that was not having any part of Congress’ decision to start ‘saving time’ whenever they felt like it.
In lieu of the change of weather, we decided to leave the chickens in the barn for another week. The plan for the barbecue went forward - but it was a hard push to get the front door open against the wind, and the porch was coated with thick, wet slush. I’ve grilled in worse conditions. At least, I wasn’t as behind as I thought I was.
The pictures below were worse days for grilling this winter:
