Unfarm updates, for lack of the writing mood

I have been trying, on and off for the last couple of hours, to come up with some kind of amusing, fascinating, witty couple of paragraphs to post but so far I've come up empty. I've managed to come up with a few sentences on one or two different topics, but I can't seem to complete my thoughts, so rather than wait for perfection and post nothing - yet again - I will instead admit defeat and post a couple random thoughts and observations tied together under the rather vague title of "Unfarm updates, " so here goes.

Updates from the Unfarm:

It's raining. I'll allow you a moment to recover from your shock. All better? Good. As I said, it's raining. And while our garden produced, over the course of the past few months, several very large zucchinis, thirty-one pounds of beans - a mixture of both wax and green beans, a number of delicious ears of white corn (my favorite), dozens and dozens of huge scarlet runner beans (which we didn't eat as they were planted mostly for the flowers to provide food for hummingbirds and bees), a few cucumbers, many delicious basil leaves, and countless flowers; it has not, unfortunately, managed to produce the bumper crop of tomatoes that we were hoping for. I should clarify. We planted several tomato plants - a mix of romas, cherries, and heirlooms - that produced tons of tomatoes, all of which are now... green. We neither eat nor particularly like green tomatoes but it appears that we are going to be stuck with pounds and pounds of them. The rather slow start to the summer and the less than hot temperatures have resulted in a glut of green tomatoes all over the northwest and put a damper on our plans for making bruschetta and margherita pizza using tomatoes from our garden. We may try out a few recipes using the green tomatoes, or we may try to ripen the tomatoes using the technique my great-grandmother used to use: place the tomatoes into boxes in a single layer and store them under our beds. I'm not entirely sure on the reasoning behind storing them under beds, but I think it had something to do with finding a cool, dark place to ripen the tomatoes combined with the lack of storage options that occurs when two families (six people total) live in a small house with only three bedrooms. Our house is considerably larger, but even so, with the amount of tomatoes we have on our plants I suspect that we'll have boxes of tomatoes under all of the beds as well as the living room couch, the computer desk, our grandmother's armchair and anything and everything that we can stuff tomatoes under.

In addition to preventing the tomatoes from ripening, the rainy weather also means that the rabbits are stuck indoors again all day. Last winter, this was hardly worth concerning myself over but the addition of a new rabbit has, predictably, complicated matters. The old routine was for the rabbits to get time out of their cages every evening: TJ would get the first hour and a half out, then he would go back in and Suki and Jojo would be given their 90 minutes of free time. TJ and Jojo remain on less than friendly terms but have at least become accustomed to one another and, for the most part, tend to ignore each other when one or the other of them are hopping around the room. The novelty with Clover, however, has yet to wear off and rather than spend their free time doing binkies they tend to spend it fighting and scrabbling at each other through the cage bars. This is problematic for two reasons: first, it reduces the chance that the rabbits will eventually bond with each other, and secondly, this territorial behavior is often accompanied by territory marking (read peeing or leaving bunny berries on the carpet.) So the addition of one new rabbit has created a huge logistical problem if I am to keep all the rabbits apart from each other while still giving them the much needed chance to stretch their legs. At the moment I have a wire gate separating TJ from Suki and Jojo, while still giving Suki and Jo access to their cage (and, more importantly, their litter box.) TJ, who is the best behaved of all my bunnies, is allowed free access to the room, including under my art table – a privilege not usually given to the rabbits as they have too much opportunity to get into trouble under there – but, because the ducks have their bedtime set-up in front of TJ's cage, he cannot get into his cage, so his litter box has been brought out into the room. Suki and Jojo, meanwhile, are hopping up and down the hall to get their exercise, but they are not allowed into the living room (too many cords attached to expensive objects to give the bunnies free range, especially as they have already demonstrated their willingness to chew through any and every electrical cord they can get their teeth on) so I have put up an old mirror at the end of the hall to block them from accessing the living room. The reason I am using a mirror and not, say, a gate, is because the gate also succumbs to bunny teeth – I have set up the gate a couple of times only to come back five minutes later and discover the bunny where he shouldn't be, and a suspiciously bunny-sized hole in the gate that wasn't there five minutes ago.

Speaking of Clover, after having lived here for over a month now he is proving to clean up quite nicely. He has put on weight and his coat is 100% better than it was when I first found him struggling to survive starvation and coyotes in the small patch of woods at the end of the street. He is becoming quite a handsome rabbit, sleek and healthy. I will have to try to get a good picture of him to add to the blog now that he has become a permanent resident of the Unfarm.

Life has not been as smooth for another Unfarm resident. My brother has come down with a case of digestive upset. It could be giardia from drinking stream water while backpacking, but on the other hand, it could also be a particularly nasty case of Karma. The same brother that is recovering from a bout of explosive ---------- (illness specifics will be withheld to protect some of my brother's dignity, not that he ever actually reads this blog – supportive fellow that he is) promised me that we would go camping this summer but never seemed to be able to find the time to actually go. It is now mid September, mere days away from the official start of Autumn, and I have given up on us going camping this year. The karmic retribution comes in because just last week my brother was able to find the time to go off backpacking with some friends of his. He was to leave on Wednesday and return four days later on Sunday. “But,” he said, “maybe we could go camping next Tuesday and Wednesday, if I don't have too much work to do.” Come Sunday evening I received a text from him stating that he was going to stay out longer with his friends and that he would be home on Wednesday. While my brother never can seem to find time to go camping with me, as soon as his friends want to do something his schedule miraculously clears up. Amazing how that works. Needless to say, I do not feel the least bit sorry for him.

I can, however, sympathize with our chicken, Penny. It rained all day today and the sun never could manage to break through the heavy cloud bank that blanketed the sky from one horizon to the other. And while the ducks can't understand why anyone would ever want any weather than this – I mean, water actually falling from the sky, and it's everywhere! – the chickens are miserable. They spent a large part of their day standing around under the redwood trying to stay dry, hoping that perhaps, if they were lucky and Maggie wasn't around, the squirrels would drop some of their food down on the ground for them to break up the monotony of the day with. But by 6:30 Penny was already settled into the coop for the night, a good hour before dark. I don't blame her. She probably decided that it had been terrible weather all day and it wasn't going to change any time soon so she might as well go to sleep until morning... or May... whenever the weather improves. I'm tempted to follow suit and head off to bed to hibernate until spring. Unfortunately, school begins – for yet another year – for me on Tuesday. Microbiology and Deciduous Plant Materials, so hibernation isn't really an option at this point. Although, with five hours of Deciduous Plant Materials, from 8am to 1pm every Wednesday, it is a very good possibility that there will yet be some napping in my future.

Rain

It is raining out. Scratch that, it's pouring. This is the first time in a few weeks, possibly even a couple of months, that we've had such heavy rains. Normally rain at the very beginning of September would distress me, reminding me that fall, with it's near constant rain and clouds, is just around the corner. Today, however, the rain and gray skies match my mood and so it seems only natural that everything should be getting soaked. I am in a funk. A depression. All I want to do is sleep and sleep and sleep. I tried doing some artwork earlier but in this kind of a mood everything I try to do seems inferior to all the other artist's work out there, and I eventually abandoned my efforts. I know what it is I should do: I should take a shower, I should do my workout, I should ride my bike to work - for that matter I should go to work. And I will - eventually - but for now I'm too busy wallowing in my depression. Unfortunately, a funk also makes for lousy writing - for me anyway - so I don't feel up to posting stories from the Unfarm at the moment, but hopefully I will be able to shake this depression shortly and life will soon return to normal. Well, what passes for normal around here anyway.

Of cats and haircuts

Disclaimer: we would never, ever intentionally hurt any of our animals.

We are torturing our cat. We are drugging him and holding him down and threatening him with sharp implements. And yet, with all of that, we are still no match for an angry cat with flexibility, teeth, and claws on his side.

What we are actually doing is trying to cut the mats out of Aspen's hair, hence the sharp implements (although the razor we are using is actually a pet grooming tool and there is no danger of cutting Aspen with it.) The drugging is a veterinarian prescribed sedative designed to calm him down, and the holding him down is largely ineffectual. We were attempting to save Aspen the stress of traveling in the car and going to the vet's office to be groomed – and us the $150 (minimum) expense – by grooming him ourselves at home. When our vet gave us the sedative, we were told to give Aspen half of a pill and then wait for thirty minutes or so for the drug to take effect. If he was not drowsy enough after that time, we could give him the other half of the pill, but no more than that in one day. After both halves of the pill and one hour, there was no noticeable effect on Aspen. It was only once we called the vet for advice that we learned that the medication does not always have the desired effect on every cat. In fact, some cats actually have the opposite reaction and become more hyper with the medication. Just our luck, Aspen seems to fall into the second category. We tried two different medications and several different times to get rid of Aspen's mats but were eventually forced to give up and take him in to be groomed. (His belly area, where many of the mats were located, was thoroughly protected by eighteen razor sharp claws which he had no qualms about using against the hands that feed him.) We knew that he would not be happy about being groomed but we hoped that he would come to see the necessity of it and at least accept it. Knowing Aspen, we should have known better. The first thing Aspen did when I looked in his carrier at him and told him how cute he looked with his new haircut was to let out a loud noise that was some combination of a growl/hiss/high pitched yowl. Once home he promptly ran downstairs and hid under my brothers bed, refusing to come out for the next five hours. It did not help, I suspect, that when my mom saw him as he slunk out of his carrier she burst out laughing and exclaimed, “he looks so scrawny!” Granted, he did look much smaller than his usual self which is bulked up considerably by his thick coat, but I wouldn't say he looked scrawny, exactly. He was given a lion cut, which means that his body was shaved down but the hair was left on his head, tail, and arms from the elbow down.

He has had a few weeks now to recover from his ordeal and I think that, while he would prefer to have his normal hair, he has gotten used to his new look and it doesn't bother him much anymore. This change in attitude is due partly, I think, to the fact that we have been telling him over and over again how much he looks like a lion. A “big, fearsome, gorgeous lion,” and “aren't we lucky to get to live with such a handsome lion?” The copious amounts of half & half and tuna we gave him didn't hurt either. All the same, I think that everyone involved - humans and cats alike - would rather not have to go through this again any time soon.

Chocolate Chip Cookies Mini Batch

I have decided that it is time I share my absolute most favorite cookie recipe. It is actually a quarter batch of a regular recipe batch, hence the "mini." It makes around 7-9 cookies depending on the size you make the cookies, which is perfect for when you want a few cookies but don't want to make an entire batch because you just know you'll end up eating at least 25 cookies. (Or maybe that's just me - I have disgustingly weak will power when it comes to sweets.) The other reason I love this recipe is because the cookies come out a little bit crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside - yum. I should note that my mom never liked these cookies when I started making them but because she can't resist a cookie any better than I can, she would eat a couple anyway and she says now that they've started to grow on her. I made a batch a couple of weeks ago and Mom asked, as usual, if she could have one. When I mentioned that she sure eats a lot of these cookies she doesn't like she replied that "they're addicting." At any rate, try it for yourself and see if you like it. If you don't like them, at least you only have to throw out 7 or 8 cookies instead of 50. So here you go, but pay attention to the notes at the end:

Mini-batch Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup shortening (I use either Earth Balance vegetable shortening or Crisco sticks)*
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 egg *
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Stir together sugar, brown sugar, butter, egg, and vanilla. Mix well. Stir in flour, salt, and baking soda until everything is well mixed. Add in the chocolate chips at the very end. The dough will be very loose and crumbly. Scoop up a handful of dough and pack it into a ball, then flatten gently between your hands before placing on a greased cookie sheet. Bake in the oven for 5-8 minutes, or until the cookies begin to turn golden and develop cracks. Take them out of the oven and let them sit on the sheet until cooled off. Leaving the cookies on the sheet until cool lets them finish baking.

* The shortening is important in keeping the cookies from spreading out too much and becoming little pancakes. To get the half egg I use EnerG Egg Replacer powder (found in stores like Whole Foods or New Seasons around here, in the vegan food section) and simply cut in half the recipe for the one egg equivalent. It ends up being 3/4 teaspoon powder mixed with 1 tablespoon water, if memory serves. I know that it would be easier to make the cookies if the dough wasn't so crumbly, but these are good enough that I don't mind the little extra time it takes.

Lemon-Lavender Cupcakes

It's been a while since I've tested any recipes but I have finally gotten around to trying out this one, and it was pretty good. I found this recipe in Shape magazine, another one of my favorites that I've been reading for years. So here you go, enjoy - my notes are included in italics and at the bottom of the recipes in the cryptically named "NOTES" section.

Lemon-Lavender Cupcakes
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons dried lavender buds, roughly chopped
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cubed and brought to room temperature (I just used whatever butter I had on hand, I have no clue if it was salted or unsalted, and I was too impatient to wait for it to get to room temperature and it seemed to turn out fine)
3/4 cup sugar
1 large egg, beaten
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1/2 cup lowfat buttermilk (or whatever buttermilk you have on hand)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place cupcake liners in a 12-cup muffin pan. To make the batter, whisk together flour, lavender, baking powder, and salt; set aside.

In a separate bowl, beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer on medium speed for 3 minutes or until light and fluffy. Beat in egg, lemon juice, and zest. Beat in one-third of the flour mixture until just combined. Beat in half the buttermilk, followed by another third of the flour, then the remaining buttermilk and flour.

Fill cupcake liners about two-thirds full and bake for 24-26 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then remove and cool completely on a wire rack.

Thanks again to Shape magazine for the recipe, from the August 2009 issue

Lemon Butter Cream Frosting
1/2 cup solid vegetable shortening (I just used Crisco sticks)
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 teaspoon lemon extract
4 cups sifted powdered sugar (approximately a 1 pound bag... and I never bothered with sifting it)
2 tablespoons milk
Few drops yellow food coloring, if desired
1-2 tablespoons of lemon zest, if desired

In a large bowl, cream shortening and butter with an electric mixer. Add lemon extract. Gradually add sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating well on medium speed. Scrape the bowl often. When all the sugar has been mixed in the icing will look dry. Add milk and beat at medium speed until light and fluffy.

If you have left over frosting after topping your cupcakes, you can store it in the fridge in an airtight container for 2 weeks. Rewhip before using.

NOTES: These cupcakes were pretty good, but if I make it again I think I'll leave out the lavender or else put less in, even though I generally like the smell of lavender. But then maybe I'm just not an eating lavender type of person so use your own judgement. And for the frosting, if you have extra left over you could either use it on some other frosting friendly baked good (cookies or cake or more cupcakes, something like that) or you could try sandwiching it between two graham crackers as a snacky thing - that's one way we typically use up extra frosting.

Another new addition

The Unfarm has another new resident. A rabbit, this time. And, coincidentally, this newcomer arrived while my parents were camping on the coast and thus out of town. Somehow I always seem to get into trouble when left to my own devices, and this time I didn't even set out to get into trouble. Admittedly, most of the trouble I get into is my own fault and, more to the point, planned specifically for a time when I am left unsupervised. This time, however, I had nothing up my sleeve. No painting the kitchen, ripping out the basement carpet, or creating murals on the laundry room walls - just a regular, uneventful weekend. (Besides, I've already done all those things.)

So, how then did I come to acquire another rabbit? It started a few days ago when I was late walking the dogs. I set out too late and ended up at the end of the street after it was dark already, which is when I saw a rabbit bolt across the street in front of us, and while we do have wildlife in the area, we do not have rabbits. Two days later, with a live trap borrowed from the Rabbit Advocates (a great group that rescues domestic rabbits, check them out at: http://www.adoptarabbit.com/) I had caught my very first rabbit in a live trap. It was a boy, as yet unnamed, he's white and orange with a scruffy coat, a bit beat up, thin, and pretty hungry. He was probably abandoned by his previous "owners" and had been fending for himself for a couple of weeks. He's lucky to have survived so long with limited food and more or less unlimited danger from coyotes, cars, and dogs.

Fortunately for him, his luck held out and he ran into me. He is, at the moment, sitting in an extra cage here in the bunny room. (I have found that, given my propensity to attract animals, it is always a good idea to keep extra cages, bowls, leashes, collars, crates and beds for when I find strays following me home.) He's been given fresh hay, food, water and a bath. He was, however, considerably less than enthusiastic about the bath but he tolerated it well and his coat seems much better now that the dirt and gunk has been washed out. He seems to like being held and petted and I have great hope that he will recover from his ordeal and flourish here. If the weeds are anything to judge by, things seem to have a habit of flourishing here on the Unfarm.

A series of unfortunate events

Where to start? To begin with, I stink. I reek, actually. I was working in my garden earlier - which, by the way, I am beginning to doubt I will ever finish - digging a hole for the rosemary plant that has been languishing on the deck ever since I bought it approximately thirty seven weeks ago. (I may be exaggerating a bit - perhaps it was only thirty three weeks ago.) At any rate, as I was widening the sides of the hole I noticed a smallish rock lodged in the dirt near where I was digging. Not wanting to hit it with my shovel, I reached in to take it out. It was upon touching the rock that I came to the sudden - and rather unpleasant - realization that what I had thought was a rock was actually an egg. Or, to be more specific a rotten egg. It must have been one of Minna's eggs - in addition to the eggs that she's laid in various places all over the yard, I've also buried some of them (they are fertilized so we don't eat them.) I came to the conclusion that this was a rotten egg and not a rock when touching the object caused it to explode a foul smelling fluid all over me. My previous experience with rocks tells me that they neither explode nor contain fluid, that's how I knew it was an egg. And this was no normal rotten egg, this was a rotten rotten egg. Needless to say, having rotten egg fluid sprayed all over you is a less than agreeable situation.

Speaking of disagreeable situations, I experienced another one a couple weeks ago when I was awakened at two in the morning by an entirely disheartening sound when Maia's poor choice in diet finally caught up to her. A day or two prior to my early morning awakening, Maia and the other two dogs, Kita and Buddy, had managed to rip their way into a bag of chicken food and gorge themselves on a diet better suited to feathered creatures who lay eggs, both of which the dogs are not. So I was disappointed but not surprised when I discovered, at 2am, that Maia had had explosive diarrhea all over the wall and carpet in my bedroom. After spending a good twenty minutes vacuuming up Maia's mess in my bedroom, we then spent a week cleaning up after Maia all over the dog run. While Kita and Buddy showed no ill effects from their change in diet, Maia developed Clostridium and had to be put on antibiotics for a week. She has, however, finally recovered and we are now both able to sleep through the night uninterrupted.

And, finally, the grape arbor. The grape arbor is, at long last, finished. And, as is usually the case, it took three times longer than I figured it would, and was ten times more difficult. For the last several weeks I have spent every spare minute I could out in my garden, trying to keep everything (except, of course, the weeds) alive and salvage what I could of my grapes. What I thought would be a fairly straight forward project was immensely more difficult than I had planned. Why I seem incapable of learning from my past experiences (or, some would say, mistakes) I am not sure, but it seems to be a chronic problem with me. Here is a summary of what I had planned on happening, and what actually transpired.

Plan: Dig five holes, put in 4x4s, add cement. Reality: Move ten plants out of the way, work around three other large (read: immovable) bushes. Get out post hole digger and begin digging a hole only to discover that the arms of the tool run into the old grape arbor. Recruit brother to dig holes while I push the old arbor out of the way and hold back approximately 23 grape vines. Dig the two holes on the southern side, then start on the three northern holes only to discover that the arbor is leaning too far over for me to push it out of the way on my own. Search the less-than-organized garage for rope, then set up a system of three ropes tied around the arbor and fence to pull the arbor upright enough that it can be held out of the way of the arms of the tool. Finish digging holes, put in 4x4s, add cement. Add support beams. Find out I didn't buy enough 2x4s, then scrounge the aforementioned garage for enough wood to finish the support beams. Dismantle old arbor. Discover that in dismantling the old arbor the grape vines have collapsed into one another in a giant tangled mess of vines. Lose half of my grape vines - and thus, half of my grape harvest - in the process of untangling the plants, but finally finish the project, three weeks behind schedule.

Here's hoping the next few weeks are blissfully uneventful. I'll take boring over rotten eggs and diarrhea any day.

Of coyotes and weeds and grapes, oh my

Summer has finally - it seems - arrived. We have had sun and blue skies for the last few days so that we can, at long last, open the windows without first putting on coats. The peacock was calling a few days ago and at the moment the bunny room window is open and I can hear the coyotes calling over in the forest. I love to hear the peacock and don't even mind the coyotes, really, as long as they aren't eating my cats. Or anyone else's, for that matter. They generally aren't a problem during the day - or even during the night, as long as the cats are brought in. And the fact that we have three big dogs patrolling the yard probably tends to discourage the coyotes from coming too close at any time, day or night.

At any rate - coyotes or no - there is other news on the Unfarm. The garden, which is usually the picture of health, is suffering. The roses have developed powdery mildew and black spot, my honeysuckle is looking less than perfect, my anemone is falling over, the columbine are half their usual size, and my hostas are in the worst shape I've ever seen them in, with wilted, beaten up leaves. I can only hope that this strange affliction of my garden is due to the extremely cold, wet spring we've had, and that there will be no lasting damage. Sure, I could replace them, but any of the plants dying off sends me into a fit of anxiety that eats at me for days. So I am doing the only thing I know to do, and running around the yard frantically spraying the plants with compost tea and watering them with organic fertilizer when they seem to need it.

The only thing not suffering in the yard is the weeds. Some kind of plantain weed has sprouted up all over my garden, wild daisies are appearing in every corner of the yard - although I let them stay because I can't bear to take out anything with flowers, the thistles are three feet high, and the horseradish is getting so big that I think next week I will be able to build a tree house in them. On the plus side, I have always wanted a tree house - I just never thought I would build it in a stand of horseradish.

On top of all the other problems in the garden, the grape arbor is falling down. I thought I had built a fairly sturdy support for the four grape vines that surround the rabbit run, but apparently I underestimated the exuberance of the grapes. They've grown so much and so fast that the once upright arbor is now leaning at a 45 degree angle. I think the only reason it hasn't already fallen down is that the rabbit run is in the way. This failure of the grape arbor means that I will have to now perform the worrisome procedure of building a new, stronger (read 4x4's and 80 pound bags of cement) arbor around the original structure, and then carefully dismantle the old structure while simultaneously moving the grapes from the original support to the new arbor. All this is made even more complicated by the fact that each grape plant has approximately ten thousand new vines sprouting from each of it's branches. It will not be a pleasant experience, but I am looking forward to the day when the project is finished and I no longer have to worry about thirty tons of grape plants coming crashing down into my garden. So that is the goal for this weekend, and I have been doing the painstaking prep work of digging out all of the plants that are in the way and moving them to an area out of the way, where they will - I hope and pray - be safe until I can put them back in the ground later this weekend. And if I am to have any hope of completing this massive project by the end of the weekend, I should probably get off the computer and go to bed so I'm not waking up at noon... wish me luck.

Death of a diaper

There are several things a duck diaper must have: snaps, velcro, reinforced flannel, straps and elastic. A giant gaping hole is not one of those things but upon taking the diapers out of the dryer today I discovered that, alas, one of Minna's diapers has suffered a fatal wound and will have to be retired. It will first be stripped for usable parts - the snaps and velcro can be salvaged and put to use on another diaper - and then given a proper burial, or perhaps a cremation. The loss of this diaper means, of course, that I must now get to work again on making more diapers - a somewhat tedious process that I had been hoping to put off for a little while longer, having just recently finished another rather long sewing project. But apparently the diaper waits for no man - or duck mother - as the case may be.

More updates from the Unfarm:
This spring we had a robin family build a nest under our back deck and the mother laid, and hatched, two little babies. For the last couple of weeks we have been watching both parents fly around the yard gathering worms for the little ones and today, finally, the nest is empty. Judging from the size of the babies a couple days ago (the nest could barely hold both of them) I figured that they would have to leave the nest soon, either that or the parents would be looking at adding a room or two onto the nest. Apparently they went with the more economical option of kicking out the kids.

Kita is finally sporting his new summer haircut. It took several days of cutting, and it looks far from professional, but I managed to get his hair to a more comfortable length for the summer. As a malamute mix he has a thick undercoat that tends to make him overheat a bit in the hotter weather (not that we've seen any so far), so a shorter cut lets him get more air flow through his fur, and makes it easier for me to get his medicated shampoo down to his skin when he starts itching.

Minna is still sitting on her nest of eggs - four of them, hidden in the daylily - and refuses to get off the nest for anything less than a chicken wandering too close. Because she is considerably smaller than Maggie, and is still walking with a limp, she is quite wary of the chickens proximity. And with Minna on her nest, Maggie is left to wander the yard on her own. Whenever I go out into the garden Maggie comes running up behind me, as fast as her little duck legs can go - which is surprisingly fast, I almost can't outrun her - and, after she greets me, she mostly just wants me to sit nearby while she nibbles on plants and digs around in the dirt.

The grass I planted in the rabbit run has finally come in - not quite as thick as I would have liked it, but that is my fault for not putting down a thick enough layer of seeds to begin with. But nevertheless, the grass came in thick enough to suffice for now and the rabbits have had a couple of days to enjoy it between downpours. I thought that they would spend all their time grazing and would have the grass clipped down to nothing in no time but so far they haven't so much eaten the grass as sat on it and mashed it into the ground...

Weather wise there is little change - I am beginning to doubt that summer will ever arrive. No, seriously - I am actually worried that it will never warm up. On the plus side, if this is global warming I don't think we have much to worry about.

It's beginning to feel a lot like... winter

I am considering going into hibernation as it is apparently still winter, and it will remain so until... who knows - forever? It has rained every day, or nearly every day, for the last few weeks. There are gray clouds from here to the end of the sky, and at this point I doubt that the ground will ever dry out. There is probably water seeping out of the ground at the other side of the planet from all the rain we've gotten here. It is the beginning of June but the air smells like woodsmoke from the chimneys that are still going. It feels like we should be out gathering pumpkins instead of strawberries. Spring? I wish.

On the plus side, however, I am finally done with my ethics class. Add another check to the endless list of classes I need to take to finish my degree - one more down, somewhere around one hundred left to go. And we have had some more newcomers here on the Unfarm, as well. A pair of robins have made a nest under the back deck and their eggs have recently hatched. I haven't actually seen the baby birds, as I do not want to disturb the parents by going so close to the nest, but both robins have been busily flying around the yard gathering worms to take back to the nest. So the rain is, I suppose, beneficial in that it has been keeping the worms near the surface and the parents are easily able to keep their little ones fed.

The dogs, however, are a bit out of sorts as all this rain has had me in such a mood to hibernate that I have tended to neglect their walks. I am aware that this makes me a somewhat terrible mother, but all I've felt like doing lately is sleeping. Perhaps I'll take the dogs up to our family's cabin on Puget Sound for a couple of days to make it up to them. If it ever stops raining - I find that the beach is little fun when you're as wet out of the water as you would be in it.