Saturday, February 10, 2018

Murder Most Fowl, Dammit

Woke up this morning to the news that Miss Lucy had been murdered and half eaten in the hen house last night by an unidentified animal. I know that she was fine when I shut them up last night- I have so few hens now that I identify each one with the flashlight before I wish them good-night and shut the door. Mr. Moon searched high and low to see how the killer could have gained access to the coop or henhouse and he could not.
I just hate that. You try as hard as you can and you still can't prevent every death of your chickens. She was the last of the Ameraucanas I bought in Crawfordville last year and she was my green-egg laying girl.
You know- sometimes all you can do is say Fuck, Fuck, Fuck, and move on.
Soon the Tractor Supply will be getting chicks and everyone else that sells them, too, and I suppose I'll raise a new batch of biddies. I'm not sure where. What we had been using as a nursery, which was Mr. Moon's bathtub, has been ripped out of the wall and taken to the dump and so I shall have to figure out another arrangement. That bathroom was such a good place. It had running water right there and plenty of room to keep the chick starter and chick probiotics and chick electrolytes and we could wrap the warming light's cord around the soap dish handle for perfect placement and now I'll have to figure it all out somewhere else.
My own bathroom is still in a state of disrepair as well. Mr. Moon wants to do some work on the vanity that the sink is in before he puts that all back together and I think it's going to take awhile. He dried out the insulation behind the sink with a fan for the past 24 or so hours but there's going to be some carpentry AND plumbing involved.
Many years ago, Mr. Moon bought me a Talavera sink that looked sort of like this:


We had planned to put it in the house in Apalachicola but he decided to surprise me and put it in my bathroom when he fixed it all up. He went in search of it, feeling certain that he'd seen it lately...somewhere. 
But he could not find it. 
He finally asked me if I knew where it was. Now the funny thing is, I, too, feel as if I've seen it somewhere. It's in a box. But damn if I can remember. And I've searched high and low in all of the places I think it could be and I cannot find it either. 
This rather pisses me off because it is such a beautiful sink and oh! how I'd love to start using it right away. I've even silently said the St. Anthony prayer twice. Do you know it? 
"St. Anthony, St. Anthony, please come down. 
There is something that's lost and must be found."
Hey! Sometimes it works! 
So far, not this time. 
Perhaps St. Anthony is too busy looking for our sanity, peace of mind, compassion, understanding, and acceptance to be bothered helping me look for a bathroom sink, even if it is an exceptionally beautiful sink. 

Well, maybe it will turn up. 

After I did all of my searching, I went out and weeded the collard greens and then I decided to trim up the Canary Island date palms, aka, kill-you-with-its-needles-palms. GOD! WHY did I ever plant those motherfuckers? No matter how careful you are, you are going to get stabbed at least once and they seem to have some sort of toxin in them and it's just a horrible proposition but I lived. The best think I can say about them is that after trimming them, trimming the Sago palms is a delightful treat, even though those fuckers will stab you too. So I did. I trimmed the Sago palms which I am sure I point out every year are not really palms at all but an otherwise ancient plant. Like the Spanish bayonet plant, they are excellent choices to cultivate under a window which thieves and criminals might want to use to break into your house! 
Just pointing out helpful landscaping and safety tips. 

After I did that, I decided to trim a rose bush. 
Do we detect a trend here? 
I managed to cut back the rose without any injury except for the one I got kneeling on what I assume is some fort of Satan-inspired nettle that grows in my yard and even through my overalls, it stung my knee and now, hours and hours after the fact, is still causing my knee to be swollen with a pins-and-needles buzzing going on in it which feels as if aliens are trying to contact me with some sort of code which I can't begin to understand. That is not too unpleasant, actually. Not like the initial itching and stinging which makes your entire body crawl with goosebumpy chills and makes YOU say things like, "Cocksucking motherfucker!" 
Etc. 
Still, I got a lot of the sharp things trimmed and I am glad for that. The burn pile is growing to mountain-like proportions. 

Okay. Change of subject. 
I know I've discussed this before but don't you love it when you read a recipe online and the comments are all like, "I tried this recipe but instead of corn meal I used flax seeds and instead of cheese I used ground walnuts and I substituted a Monster Energy drink for the buttermilk and instead of cooking it at 350 degrees for twenty minutes I cooked it at 450 degrees for ten minutes and it sucked and I would not recommend this recipe"? 
I always crack up when I read these things. 
So anyway, last night I decided to cook this soup. 


It is a kale soup with sausage and potatoes and the recipe can be found HERE. 
Now as funny as I find those comments about not following the recipe and ending up with something mostly inedible, I tend to view recipes as basic suggestions unless it's something entirely new and very different than what I am used to cooking.  
And so, instead of the type of sausage they recommended I used venison sausage. Instead of chopped plum tomatoes, I used canned diced tomatoes because I didn't have plum tomatoes. Also, I used kale and collards for the greens instead of just kale. 
Otherwise, I mostly stuck to the recipe and it was awesome and super easy to make. 
I DO recommend it. 
I accompanied it with a sort of primitive focaccia bread that I baked which I served with goat cheese and it was such a good supper, we're having it again tonight. 
I am a bit inappropriately excited about that. 

Dang I wish I didn't love to eat so much. But I do. 

Speaking of, Vergil's mama is in town for a visit and the plan is for them to all come over for pancakes in the morning. 
Are you surprised?

One more thing- here is the Trillium in my yard. 


Blooming.

Just about to bloom. 

Spring is definitely on its way and I have mixed feelings about that. The thought of the coming heat fills me with dread. I am getting old, I guess. But it is always such a beautiful thing to watch the plants in my yard swell with their knobby-knuckled buds and sometimes, like the Trillium, just appearing suddenly as if by the magical impulse of the goddesses of green. 

And on we go. Lend a thought to dear Lucy who provided us with such huge, beautifully colored eggs. We will certainly miss her. 
Rest in peace, sweet hen.

Love...Ms. Moon









16 comments:

  1. So sorry to hear about Miss Lucy, may she RIP. Varmints are so wiley...... sometimes you just can't figure out what happened. She was a good hen, bless her. that Talavera sink is gorgeous! I hope you can use it soon...... your soup, as always, looks and sounds wonderful. Soup is best made on a whim......what you have on hand and what seems good...... will usually BE good! throw in some homemade bread and how can you possibly go wrong?
    Susan M

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    1. That is definitely my soup philosophy. Once in awhile though, I just want to try someone else's take on things.

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  2. This is so sad that Miss Lucy is gone. Good luck finding the sink. We live in a 40 foot RV and we routinely loose stuff. You would think that in such a small space we'd know where everything is.

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    1. Well, I've noticed that it's often harder to find things in a small purse than in a big one so that makes sense to me.

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  3. RIP dear Miss Lucy. I am so sorry to hear of her being taken. I would love to raise chickens but as we seem to be constantly surrounded by varmints and also in the winter months, have snow up to our armpits, it's a big no for me. I do have a local small farmer and egg supplier who provides us with splendid eggs, large and small and of lovely colors...bless his heart. It's a treat to open that new carton every week and see the twelve gems he's packed for me. Those I cherish every morning as I poach them gently and eat with gusto.

    That beautiful sink is worth tearing the house apart to find. How lovely It will look installed. I don't comment often enough Ms. Moon, but I so love your blog. X

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    1. Sounds like you have the best alternative to not having your own chickens! And trust me- no matter what your eggs cost, they're cheaper than what we end up paying for ours.
      I am about to go search some more for that sink. It's got to be here somewhere!

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  4. Raising chickens bring a lot of joy but damn they break your heart too. This is nature I suppose. And that is an absolutely beautiful sink. I do hope it turns up.

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    1. I have had to become more sanguine about losing chickens. I mean- it's going to happen. This is nature, you are right, and as we know- it can be bloody. Everything has to eat.
      Me too on the sink!

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  5. Damn it about lucy. I call on St Anthony all the time and it frequently works. I also never travel without St Christopher. Even a lapsed Catholic knows a good thing when she sees it. I'm all about the patron saints!

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    1. I have more Mary's in my house than I can even count. I suppose I just need a mother.

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  6. of course you will find that sink but maybe not til you move. that is a gorgeous sink. I'd like to have a sink like that. and poor Miss Lucy. Where was the rooster! I was going to prune the roses yesterday but it drizzled all day which is not really rain but if you stay our in it you are just as wet.

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    1. Predators have such an easy time of it when they go after chickens on the roost. All of them, the rooster included, are in a sort of coma. And I'm pretty sure they can't see in the dark at all.

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  7. Poor Miss Lucy.

    I hate prickly things so no roses or thorns in my garden which incidentally is still covered in snow and will be for quite awhile. I can't imagine spring in February.

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    1. Well, you are smart as to not having prickling things in your garden. I find that if I move really slowly and deliberately and take my time with it, I do better at the pruning. It's not a contest for speed!
      Still covered in snow? Gosh. I sweated my ass off yesterday in the yard.

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  8. It is sad to lose a chicken, I'm sorry.

    I hope you find your sink, how gorgeous! My mother always advocated promising a charitable donation in St Anthony's name to be given after finding the lost object.
    I once said that in a school I worked in, and a puritanically Cathlolic (as it were), mean, unsmiling middle aged colleague snapped that you can't *negotiate* with the Saint. Ugh. Bitch.
    Anyway, it mostly works.

    Your yard sounds like a paradise and a torture garden all in one place. I hate nettle stings!

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  9. That trillium is so impressive! I always love seeing your photos of it every year. And I'm so glad you found your sink! (As you revealed in a later post.)

    So sorry about Ms. Lucy. I wonder what got her, and how? What's your theory? Thank goodness, if it got into the hen house, it didn't kill more of the hens.

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