71, Sick But What Memories!

 To be honest, I never thought I'd live to this age. Between family genetics (although my mum is now 88 and has passed ages that her forebears never reached) and my "wild streak" riding motorbikes, I'd expected a much shorter life. I'm def thankful God saw fit to let me stay in this world longer, and I have lived such a life, and experienced so many things - good and bad - yet they made me who I am, and have given me so many memories to look back on.

I was born in 1955, 10 years after WWII ended, and yet - in England - rationing had only stopped the year before. I grew up with favourite foods like bread and dripping, rabbit stew, and (yuk!) wanting the Parson's Nose off the roast chicken that served the whole family, and with leftovers, on a Sunday! I remember my mum liking her pig's trotters, and how fish and chips became a favourite Friday night treat (it was payday!).

My school days began at George Tomlinson, and were absolutely smashing, didn't ever let us think that because we were East End kids it was an excuse to go nowhere. No, they taught us we could do, and be, anything we wanted to be, we just had to work hard.  That was our key out of the "poor" start we all had. No inner city "can't do" allowed back then, and our teachers and parents would tell us "there's no such word as "can't"! "

Whitsun, and Easter, I used to go on "touring" holidays with my nan and granpop, down from London and through Hampshire, Somerset, Devon and Cornwall. We explored burial barrows, museums, old tin mines, and various beaches and fishing villages. We travelled through the Doone Valley because R. D. Blackmore's "Lorna Doone" was one of my favourite books. I had various "I-Spy" books

to go through at different times, which had me identifying all sorts of things I saw as we went to dofferent places,  and Ladybird books

to help expound on some of the things I saw. "Stone Age Man in Britain" was one of my favourites back then. I credit both of them for a lot of my all-round knowledge, and they gave me the premise I used all through my daycare days - that learning should be FUN!

My first marriage was a disaster, and only lasted 5 years, and then I was on my own for 8 with my 3 children. I struggled, but somehow made it through. Then married Mark, and we've now been together 40 years.

I've now lived in places I'd never dreamed of, when I was growing up. I came to the USA and lived in Arkansas, Florida, Georgia and now (def my favourite) South Carolina - so much history here, and I love my history even now. I spent 3 years in Germany, and visited Luxembourg, and Amsterdam in Holland. I've stood where famous people have stood. I've been in the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, and finally understood the full depth of the family trying to live in that space without being discovered. I've been to places where battles were fought, and imagined the hardships of foot soldiers even attempting to get through dense forests and cane. I surprised myself being able to translate (from the French) almost all the labelling in the museum in Luxembourg (missing only maybe 4 words) some 18 years after leaving school. Not bad, I thought.

I sailed on the QEII 3 times, meeting some amazing and interesting people - an Iraqi millionaire widower with no family, who had made his money arms-running in the 60s, a gold dealer, and

(my favourite) Simon Williams, the actor. He and I sat and chatted many times on the Lido deck. I was there scribbling my poems and stuff, and he would just come and sit with me. We'd laugh and talk about everything under the sun. 

I'm so blessed to have had those experiences. Seeing the Statue of Liberty, as we sailed up the river on a grey, damp morning, made me realise how all the immigrants who'd gone through Ellis Island must have felt. It's something I'll never forget.

On one sailing, I read some of my poetry (out of my book, "Twilight") and was mobbed by about 30 people afterwards, wanting MY AUTOGRAPH. That was a trip, and (very unprofessionally) I giggled too much while chatting to them.

On my last trip, I had the help of 1960s pop group, The Mindbenders, to try to figure out a song from my childhood. Took us awhile with my off-key humming but we got it in the end.

Other memories, oh boy, my best friend, Olga, and I. We were nuts together, so many laughs (and sore feet). We hitchhiked all over, to get to dances and concerts. Some of the stuff we got into, you just couldn't make up. Yes, in one sense it's good that they didn't have cellphones back then, but in another, it'd be fun to have proof that we DID do what we say we did.

Then there's that "you're never too late" thing. After 20 odd years of wanting to, I finally published "The Storybook Witch" and then went on to publish some other children's books as well. Who'd a thunk it?

Which brings me to today and the past few days. I've been sick, courtesy of Daniel and his buddy, Jayden, who gave me the dreaded lergy - rhinovirus - during the school runs.  Sore throat, bunged up nose, thick head, and fevers, finally resulting in a doctor visit. Thankfully, my Vick's regimen, lozenges, vitamins, mouthwash etc has all helped me make it through, as a virus just has to run its course. I'm almost there, today is much better than the last few, that's for sure.

Also, Sunshine's poop is doing much better. Goat poop is supposed to be little balls, like rabbits. The coccidia gave her diarrhea which can be fatal in goats.

Sorry for the poop pic but thankfully, our efforts before the vet (giving her probios and electrolytes) and her sassiness, helped her stay alive, and now, 5 days into her Albon regimen, we now have solid poop (albeit more like dog poop) but we can see the divisions that (hopefully) will become those little balls by the end of the next 5 days. 

Both she and Solomon are bonded to us, she even tries to get in my car with me! They follow Mark all around the yard, and browse the weeds and grasses as they go. They still both love the blackberries the best. The man I was due to get my Nubian doeling from is going to hold her an extra week or two, so that I can make sure there's no coccidia for her to catch when she comes over. I'll know after we have a fecal done on Sunshine 2 weeks after her last dose of Albon.

Today, lunch was Cava, later, we'll share carrot cake from Publix (my birthday freebie) but it's a somewhat lazy day. We may go down to the property, if the weather holds, after hubby goes gleaning, we'll decide when he gets back.

Calamities In Abundance

Dear sweet Murphy has had a field day with us these past couple of days! Exasperating and frustrating, just one thing after another going wrong. UGH! 

So, yesterday, we woke up to Rover having one of his icky tummy bouts. He has such a sensitive stomach, so he gets grain-free, pumpkin, probios, and when it gets really bad, a prescription anti-diarrhoeal that the vet gave us. I hate seeing him when he gets like that, he hunches and is obviously in pain, and he is such a good boy. We cleaned up a couple of accidents and then ...

We went to let Solomon and Sunshine out, and lo, her pen has little heaps of pudding consistency poop again. I've checked everything the online vet said and we are pretty much down to it's the new home/food/stress causing it BUT I wanted a fecal sample done to make sure nothing insidious is the underlying cause. Called 2 emergency vets, they could not even chheck a fecal sample for me as they only do dogs and cats, basically. I was so upset, I sat and sobbed. I felt so helpless.

So, this morning, I called and made an appointment with the nearest farm vet who's actually about 30 miles away. For 2pm.

I had a topsoil delivery coming between 9 and 10am, so rushed this morning to be out of the house, showered and dressed, by 8am so as to be ib Belton by 9.  The guy arrived at ten past eleven. 

Again, I was well stressed, had to drive back to try to get everything situated for Mark to take Sunshine and me to do the school run and grab Daniel. Lo and behold, dogs messing around in the car, Mark coming through the gate, slams on brakes, and Brunel smashes into the key and breaks it off in the ignition. Couldn't find the spare, the dealer needed the vehicle there to cut a new key, and the truck is stuck in the gateway.

I had to call the vet to cancel, Mark hunted for an old key that won't do anything else but will start the car, so - now that he can start/drive the truck, he's going to Batteries Plus to get a new one cut.

I've called the vet back and we now have an appointment for Sunshine in the morning at 11am. Hopefully the vet will say she's ok just a goat with an icky tummy. I'm going to have him do her CD&T while she's there tomorrow, though. Get that over and done with. 

She is such a little sweetheart. I just worry about her and I don't want anything to happen to her. 

So that's how the last couple of days have been, I am so hoping tomorrow is better.

What A Week!

 It's been a pretty awesome week. Some ups and downs, but overall, pretty decent. We've been going over to the property every day and just doing different things while we're there. Everything brings us closer to the day when we can say "ok, we're done" and move in ... although money (or the lack of it) means that the inside won't be done for at least a year, maybe two. It is what it is, and patience is a virtue as they say so I guess I need to have it.

Hubby's bees are doing good, although the one hive is quite aggressive. He has to suit up to even do their water tray. They fly around him and chase him, even after he's used the smoker to calm them. This evening one got inside his glove and stung him. The other hive is far more placid and lets him get on and do whatever he needs to.

Our site gleanings are going extremely well (and he's building up quite a stock of wood and boards for future projects) as is his pallet collecting. The latter is re-inforcing the current wire fencing around what will eventually be the goat field. Once it's done, I'm going to paint it black to make it match the barn and bring everything together.

The goats are crazy and smart, and fit in with us well. Little Miss Sunshine just loves to frolic, and kicks her little legs out sideways as she dances around. Solomon is more sedate and just struts around. He, like our darlin' long-gone-but-never-forgotten Rammy before him, has two different cries, one for Mark that sounds like "Daaad" and the other "Maa-ma". Sunshine and Solomon discovered the blackberry bushes and those little munchers are clearing them really well. It seems a lot longer than 2 weeks ago that we brought them home.  In another 3 weeks we'll be picking up another little girl, a Nubian, who my great-grandson is calling Maxie. She and Sunshine will be companions, and I'm looking for a Nigerian Dwarf buckling to be Solomon's companion. I'm hoping to find one that has a white band between 2 black ones, so that I can call him Oreo. We shall have to wait and see how successful I am in that search.

The wild roses are in bloom, out along the hedgerows, so we've taken some cuttings that I hope will root so that we can then plant them over some of our perimeter fencing eventually.

We have 2 pairs of geese with babies, 1 pair appears to have 4 and the other has 3. Sadly, they are not people friendly, they waddle back down to the creek when they see us drive on the property,

The stray mama dog that we've been feeding is also very shy BUT she's sneaky.  The other day she was trying to drag the bag of dog food out of the barn whilst our backs were turned, and then today, while we were down with the bees, she took the pan we had put wet food in, and absconded with the whole pan! Sneaky little madam.  She is very timid though.  Even when I'm talking to her gently, and her knowing we put the food there for her, she runs off.

Hubby's been trying to catch up on mowing - there's just so much space to mow that by the time he finishes it all, the bit that was done first is already a couple of inches high again.

Today I re-mopped in the barn where we had already cleared the dried mud, and mopped, before. Just trying to keep the dust down on that bit until I get the rest scraped, swept and mopped.

Tomorrow, I have a young lad coming to help Mark with the pallet fencing, and then Sunday I'm supposed to have another helper coming. It's just too much for one person to do, and I'm physically not capable of doing so much. Sweeping and mopping, I do sitting and rolling around on my desk chair. I water my outdoor plants sitting on the porch with a hose, and I have to use my upright walker to get from the car to the chair. Moving from one side of the porch to the other, I hook the hose over the brakes to drag it to the chair on the other side. Where there's a will, there's a way, but some things are definitely beyond me physically - hence getting hubby some outside help for a lot of things.

I had a bone scan on Wednesday, and despite more pain and less mobility, apparently my osteoporosis has not worsened and I have not had any further bone loss in the past 5 years or so. That was a relief, to be sure.

Another good week though, such a blessing, for which I am extremely thankful.

Slowly Coming Together

 It's been a really nice day but, boy, did it get hot! We took Brunel and Lightning over to the property today, as Mark was reinforcing the wire fencing around the "field" that we are going to use for the goats.

The reinforcement of choice (FREE!) is pallets and they are perfect. My goal, eventually, is to paint them black (I'm planning on black iron railings and gate for the front and just want everything to match). I think that will make my "farm" look more cohesive, rather than a hotch potch of different colours and styles. I'm even wanting my red shed repainted black and white, before we take it over there for me to get my train layout set up in.

We had a pleasant surprise yesterday, when we found that the geese had 4 babies.

Unfortunately, when I parked about 50 feet from them, they decided to take the babies into the creek and around the bend, so that I couldn't see them. Trying to take a pic from afar, the babies are well camouflaged in the grass, but are just behind the goose on the left.

The privacy trees are growing well, probably 2" taller than when we planted them back in February. This pic makes them look much closer to the barn than they really are.

What's funny is that from a different angle, the row of trees looks so much closer to each other. They are actually spaced 3 feet apart. I was parked by these when I was taking the picture of the geese.

But everything is coming together nicely, slowly but surely. We go over every day to feed our chickens and the stray mama, and do the stuff that needs doing with my plants, the bees, fixing the tractor and mower or whatever, and - now - the fencing around the "field". It has the wire fence 

all the way down to the neighbour's house and barn (seen at the back in this pic, which is actually down by the road). My mate, Kwacha, mowed this last weekend and you can see the difference between what's in the field and where she mowed. Mowing is going to be a many day "thing", as we have about 6 acres of what was, once, horse pasture, and it just keeps on growing! Eventually, once we have a full herd of goats, we're hoping they will keep most of it down.

Another Busy Day

Today was another one of those days where we didn't do much but actually did a lot. 

The goats spent their first full day outside in their new pen, and it was a hit! They loved it. 

We had 2 trips, the first was to run errands. First stop - Tractor Supply in Mauldin, to get the feed for the goats, and the stray mama dog. I had a $58 balance with Rakuten, so used that for a TSC gift card and that worked out nicely to cut what cash we needed.

We decided to grab Zaxby's for lunch, I am a House Zalad addict, and I always eat half and put half in the fridge for another meal. Plus, I save calories, fat and salt by not having the bread/toast. After that, we hit up one bank to deposit 2 checks for my book sales, and then the credit union to withdraw some cash. Then it was home for a break before trek 2, and to let the dogs out for a run while we were there.

AFter resting for a bit, my blood pressure was AMAZING! Actually low! 106/58 ... a big wow for me! Excellent! 

My Temu order of Sloth bird feeders (my great-grandson is a sloth fan) arrived so I set up one here so that Daniel could see it every day, and put one in my car to take with me down to Belton.

Next - trip 2 - down to the property, hubby drove his truck with a bed full of gleaned wood from one of the local building sites and the chicken's hutch from their old run. He's been getting very lucky the past few days with raiding the site bins. 

In my car, I had the dog food for the mama dog, a bag of sugar for the bees sugar water, a sloth bird feeder and a bird seed block, chicken feed, cold water and another bowl for the mama dog as another bowl had disappeared, and some stuff for the compost pile.

Hubby got there before me. I almost had an accident where somebody pulled out in front of me. I was on a main road, keeping up with traffic at 45mph, and with maybe 3 car lengths between me and the car in front, a car at a stop sign on the right just decided to pull out in front of me. They didn't even try to whip out either, just pulled out slowly, I had to slam on brakes and swerve so as not to t-bone them. Everything I was carrying shot forward in my car, and my heartrate went crazy for about 20 minutes as my body decided not to calm down immediately the incident was over. UGH!

Once there, he got the chicken hutch inside their new pen and set it up on a pallet just in case it rains real heavy, and maybe puddles in there, at some point. They'll be able to be dry.

Then he unloaded all the bits of wood and put them in the barn.

Mama dog was wandering around so we put out food and water for her, and she snuck in and ate while we were busy doing other stuff. She watches us, and feels safe on our property but is not people friendly, she's very timid. She ate so well that we refilled the pans again before we left! With feeding her puppies somewhere (we've not seen them) she eats more than our 3 dogs combined (and ours aren't starved by any means).

Hubby washed out and refilled the bees water trays, after I made up their gallons of sugar water. Both hives are doing very well. 

While he was at the hives he watered the dormant hummingbird vines that we planted last week. I can hardly wait for them to start growing, I so want the bees to have their beautiful flowers close by, and for the hummingbirds to come.

I got the Sloth bird feeder set up with a birdseed block in it and hubby hooked it up on a post near the side of the building. When I sit on the front porch, we have a few birds flying around, so I figured that would be somewhere they'd easily find the seed.

It was all good.

When we got home, we took a quick rest, and then I set about cleaning the goat pens indoors. Their bedding went in a black trash bag to be taken over to the compost heap, over at the property, tomorrow.

Hubby took the base trays outside and hosed them off, and then swept and mopped the floor under the pens. Once the floor (and trays) were dry, he put the trays back into the pens, and then I re-bedded them with fresh hay, and we put fresh water in each pen, and their evening feed. 

When he went out to get them, he carried Sunshine in, and then went to get Solomon. He decided to run off, leash trailing, but Mark managed to catch him and lead him in. He doesn't walk well on a leash at the moment, he's not used to it so it's a learning process. 

Tonight, we have 2 tired and happy goats. And 2 tired people!

Such A Lovely Day

 Today has been a really nice day. Absolutely lovely, and we achieved a lot. 

We decided to move our 2 remaining chickens over to the property into the new pen, with their automatic feeder and waterer. Hubby loaded them up in a pet carrier to transport them, and they were very happy with their new home. The cover protects them from any stray hawks, and hubby put blocks and other barrier items around the outside just in case the stray dogs decided to give them a look-see. 

The feeding mama (the new one, not the original who we've not caught on camera in a couple of weeks now) showed up today while we were there. She stayed wary of us and retreated every time I attempted to talk to her, even from a distance, but I guess hunger was her reason as she polished off food from both the front and back pans that we put out for her. We refilled them before we left, and the camera shows she came back again for more. UNfortunately, the screenshot is unclear so I can't show how sad she looks.

My mate, Kwacha, came over for the peace and ended up mowing some of the grass. She said she wanted to catch some sun.

I transplanted Cilantro, and watered all my plants, and gave one of the Cilantro plants to Kwacha as she likes using it in cooking. The 2 Plumeria plants that have struggled over here are flourishing inside over there.

A previous grab of pallets is becoming a second fence around the field that is eventually going to be the goats' home over there. We still need a lot more but we're happy with the folks that let us glean them when they throw them out. They're saving us beaucuop bucks!

On his way home, Mark hit up one of the building sites that we have permission to glean from the trash at, and got some awesome scrap wood pieces that will be useful for quite a few of our ongoing projects.

When he got home, Mark moved and re-erected the chicken's old enclosure for the goats to hang out in during the day. Jel helped him a bit as I was useless.  I changed the waters in their crates, and fed them. Sunshine is very loud when she wants attention, but Solomon nickers so gently.  Methinks he is going to be a sweetheart once he gets used to being leashed to walk in and out. With 2 acres, we can't risk him running off, Mark would never manage to catch him and I wouldn't even be in the game. I need Solomon to learn to love me so much that he just wants to be near me, that way I won't need to leash him to move him.

So, we all had a great day and I'm thankful for all of them.

Our New Little Man

 He has no name yet, but today we went and got a little man to be a companion to Sunshine.

He snuggled under my arm on the way home (he was on Mark's lap). We knew he was bigger than her, because of them being different breeds, but when we put them together, wow, he looked huge.

He was very nervous of her at first. It was funny, she would attempt to go nuzzle against him and he would flinch like she was some monster. He kept backing away and trying to get away from her. He settled pretty quickly, I was talking to him the whole while and she's not nervous of us at all now, so I think that helped.

Then he met the dogs and he's never been around dogs, so that gave him the jitters again for a few.

He ended up with the pink collar on as it was too big for her (it still is on him) but, because he's skittish, we needed to be able to walk him between the pen and the crate in the house. Even as young and small as he is, he is strong ... he pulled Mark all over the front yard. 

We've set up the 2 crates next to each other, and fresh hay and water for now, and a handful of feed. This way, they have each other's company, but they also have their own space.

I just have to ponder the correct name for him. It will come. I liked Ozy for Ozymandias but when I re-read the poem, it was more or less aobservation that things do not last so I kind of decided that was a no.Mark suggested Bucky (because he's a boy) but that's a local BBQ chain so I don't feel right about that either.