Dear Committee Members

My book club read Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher a couple months ago.  I love my book club and I love reading.  But I am also a tightwad.  Why buy a book when you can borrow it from the library for free?  Well, it's hard when 23 other people are ahead of you in line to read this book. So I look to Amazon for the Kindle version.  Am I willing to pay $12 for an electronic book of only 193 pages?  No, I am not.  I am a book lover and a tightwad. This time the tightwad won the battle and for the first time, I faked it in book club.  I went to the discussion.  I listened to the comments.  I smiled.  I nodded.  I had no idea what they were talking about but, as far as I know, no one but me knew that.  When questions were asked and opinions solicited I raised my eyebrows and looked up as if I was formulating my thoughts but I didn't have any because I didn't read the book yet.  Now, the book was available so I read it in a couple of hours this weekend.  I remember quite a bit of the discussion and things make more sense to me now.  This book is a series of emails and letters written by a very angry, possibly pathologically angry, English professor at the University of Minnesota.  If you enjoy sarcasm and sincerely passive aggressive shenanigans, you will enjoy Dear Committee Members. 

The Corn Was As High As An Elephant's Eye!

How would you describe a perfect summer day?  Wake up without an alarm clock?  Check.  Chores you can put off until later in the week?  Check.   High about 80 degrees with low humidity? Check.  Puffy white clouds lined up in shapes?  Check.  Minnesota weather can be great once in awhile.  Family gathering in Harris, Minnesota?  Check.  Cousins, cousins, cousins, I got a million of them. Good looking, successful cousins, too!  What is really good is that I am not the only one who can't remember their names.  As I have aged, I am less self-conscious about my lack of memory and that is good because I'm not the only one.  I think about my Grandmother and my Grandfather.  I loved them so much. We all miss them. Descendants of Leona and Edward, here we are, all gathered together for one of their son's 80th birthday party.  I learned much today.  For one thing, when my uncle was 18 I came into the world.  I guess I thought he was older. I teased him about the Navy flag and the Marine flag in his patio area.  Turns out he was is the Army and stationed in  Stuttgart, Germany in the 1950's -another thing I didn't know.  When I arrive my aunt tells me she has tabbouleh! She seems proud of tabbouleh to complement the sloppy joes and pulled pork sandwiches.  I am pleased to the core to know she remembers I don't eat meat. She is so cool.  I gobble up the tabbouleh and am happy to do so.  I watch the potato sack races and laugh as the older folks try hard to win and jump too far and fall to the ground.  The egg toss goes on and on.  A 4 year old princess gets yolk on her toes and she's upset but she lives. We sit in the shade of a willow tree and talk about our heart stents and hip replacements.  And butter - is it good or is it bad? We pose for a photo next to the tall corn.  A shirtless toddler runs away from the group. He's about 13 months old.  I don't know his name.  We all call him back. He comes back but leaves again - it seems he likes a crowd of people beckonging him to come back.   Relationships - it is what life is all about.  In the photo I am in the left third wearing a red shirt in the second row of people celebrating my Uncle George's 80th birthday party.

This Project Took A Lot Longer Than I Anticipated

My chicks were ready to move out of the blue box in the garage to the great outdoors.  Some things needed to be done in preparation of their arrival.  The hinges on the coop door had rusted solid so I needed to replace those.

Chickenson Caruso seemed lethargic.  She hasn't been moving around much lately.  Was she depressed?  Ill?  I didn't know.  But when she didn't move as I replaced the hinge on her door, I picked her up and moved her outside. I come to sincerely regret that decision. She clucked and clucked in a panic for about 5 minutes.  Then she took a dust bath in the sun.

Once I had the coop door secure and the new run attached, it was time for these 9 chicks to journey east to Zion.  Ok, maybe not Zion (and Zion was west, not east), but I'm reading a book about the Mormon Church of the Latter Day Saints called the Nineteenth Wife.  I don't know how many of these chicks are male so there may be some polygamy in the future for these chickens.

The chicks are ready to meet their foster mother.  Is she interested?  No, she is not interested. She has no intention of assuming motherly duties. In fact, she eludes me.  She hides under the bridal veil shrub.  I go around one way and she goes the other.  I tell her, "I'm not a monkey and you're not a weasel and this is not a mullberry bush," but does she listen?  No, she does not.  Instead she hides out in the big blue stem. I can see you!

She enjoys her sun bath and running away from me.  I am not the chicken catcher I used to be.  How frustrating is it to catch a chicken who does not want to be caught?  VERY!

There she is, just behind the coop with the new run attached and the chicks still peeping in the blue box. She is not ready to assume her duties as foster mother.  I give up and go in the house to drink a glass of wine.

About 7 o'clock I hear the winged rustle of a chicken climbing to the railing of my deck.  The chicken has come home to roost.  I got you, B___h!

Once Chicken Caruso is in the pen I can add the other chicks.  For some reason I thought it was important that she be in there first.  Look at the beautiful cuckoo Maran.  Those black and white variegated wings are so handsome.

Nine chicks move out of the blue box existence into the great outdoors.  I know I have to get them inside the coop and shut the door for the first night at least.  I grab one and put it in the coop.  Before I can grab a second one the first one flies out.  I do that five times. Exercise is futility. I'm glad no one is here to see this.  I use the blue box to herd them all into the coop.   Chickenson Caruso is tired and doesn't even stir. I was really worried there would be turmoil.  I wanted to be there to, I don't know, provide crisis intervention or family counseling.  But since it took all freaking evening to catch Mrs. Caruso, all is well, at least until morning. What would family counseling be like anyway?  What I hear you saying is, "Peep peep peep peep."  

My Neighbor Brought Me A Bag Of Weed

Dried nettle, she said, is good for me. Use it like spinach or in tea.  I'm grateful.

What Am I Missing?

I come home from work. As I pull up to the garage I see 4 turkey polts and at least 6 adults moving through the yard away from the driveway. I must have disturbed them from sitting in the sunshine by the garage door.  I didn't know turkeys nested around here and I wonder where the nest was.  I go to check on my chicken and I see someone has dug a big hole in the grass near the bird feeder. The hole is 5 inches in diameter and 4 inches deep.  The sandy soil was flung to the west side of the hole. Why was this hole dug?  Who dug it?  Squirrels dig holes that are usually smaller but about that deep.  Was it a feral cat?  I've seen holes they dig in the sand under my bedroom window to cover their droppings but they're not as deep as this and they dig sand; not sod.  Was it a stray dog after a vole?  I don't know. I see the level of nuts in the peanut feeder is down three inches.  The blue jays, wood peckers and nuthatches were here today.  The black sun flower seed feeder is down two inches.  Black capped chickadees had a field day.  I missed a lot being away from home and working for a living. Comedy.  Tragedy. Why do I see four holes dug in the yard instead of one?I know what happened at work (and that was plenty!) but what happened at home?  

Every Picture Tells A Story, Don't It?

A friend of mine from work is going to Vegas today. On Sunday he and his wife have plans to see Rod Stewart perform.  Their tickets are in the sixth row.  The sixth row!  It is entirely possible that a beat of sweat of Rodney's forehead could land on them.  You can ask anyone, I am a huge Rod Stewart fan. Since my college days Rodney, with his skinny pants, his "stick up in every direction" hairdo, his "Whoo!"  have done it for me.  Oh, Rodney!  Closer to 70 than 30, Rodney, you still got what it takes.  Would it be wrong for me to ask them to mention my name during the show?  Just in case we meet in the afterlife I mean?

Once Upon A Time

Once upon a time there was a fairy.  She lived all alone in an underground cave with a round red door. She likes to give nectar to the hummingbirds. Was she a sturdy Hobbit shaped fairy or a slender Tinkerbell type fairy?  We don't know. She has never been seen.  But we suspect that either her red chair is too big for her or her red door is too small for her.

On this fairy's property is a spruce tree, some thyme, and lots of moss for her farm animals to graze.  She keeps goats, rabbits and chickens.

The fairy's cave has a sturdy pink granite ledge. Sometimes the baby chicks sit on the fairy's lawn chair.



If my sibling has half as much fun with this fairy garden as I did making it, I know I gave a great gift.