Helloooooo...

...anybody still here?

We've been busy with all manner of illness, a heavy school schedule, an early spring (it was 75 degrees F. here today-insane!), dentistry (oh god, have I been dealing with dentistry), a bit of a fly problem here on the farm (see, "an early spring"), automobile issues, and...and...and...well you get the idea. I could go on though...I just like you guys enough to keep it short and sweet. See? See how I suffer to please you? No, Never mind, I don't need to talk about it. Can I get you a cup of coffee or something to eat? (hey, how's my Jewish mother guilt coming along? I'm getting better at it, aren't I? I've been working on it-I'll bet you could tell).

When life is doing all the stuff that life knows how to do best (because it never seems to do the, "You just won the lottery, woke up tall and thin, world peace has broken out, and whatever else never happens) I do what any rational person would do at the beginning of March in Nebraska-I took my seven year old son to the farm store to look at baby chicks.

Baby chicks are inarguably the cutest thing on the planet. No, ducks aren't nearly as cute, and puppies just look like rats when they're born, so stop arguing with me (I said it was inarguable, aren't you paying attention?) but little yellow birds? Awwww factor of a thousand. Since I was already at the farm store, I bought a red currant bush. Yes, that was an impulse buy, thanks for noticing. The packaging claims it will bear fruit the first year, but I don't think two or three berries will count. We'll see. Mr. ETB will be delighted to know he has yet another hole to dig through our heavy, clay soil. He's lucky I didn't come home with a chicken coop and chicks. I told Danny I'd consider it next year if he's still being responsible and doesn't run off and try to join the merchant marine or something. Right now he's pretty focused on rabbits, but he won't breed them because he knows I'll cook them. He wants a bunny as a pet. I can't cook it once he names it, that would be wrong.

I picked up a book called, "Outwitting Squirrels" at the library sale last weekend. I still haven't outwitted the squirrel. I did catch a small cat in the humane trap. She was really pissed off about it too. I mean, that was a really pissed off cat. Really. No one got bit freeing her though, so I guess that's OK. I'm glad we didn't catch a skunk. The squirrels are sitting on the roof laughing at us. Hear that? Hear that? That's squirrel laughter.

OK, screw this, I'm going back to the farm store for another dose of relaxing fluffy yellow chicks. Danny noted that their peeping in unison is rather a pleasant sound-maybe I'll go make myself a recording as an audio tranquiliser.

Peep. Peep. Peep.