...how it is when Mother Nature is CEO, you roll with the punches. Clocked out from work at 9:30 on Saturday night and my workday on Sunday fired up at 5 AM.
Folks urge me to get an office job. "It will be easier on you". It would be death.
There's a set routine on a farm, but even in that routine, it's never the same day.
Where else do you get to be a mechanic in the morning and a beaver eradicator in the afternoon?
Then there's my hunting blind for those who don't heed the warnings:
If I worked in an office could I skip home for lunch to take care of my chickens? I think not!
The juvenile hens have been enjoying their heated coop with large yard, but a single heat lamp can't offset incoming 25'F temps.
Bad news girls, it's moving day!
"What!?!"
No frostbitten combs or toes allowed under my watch. They're scheduled to start laying eggs by mid-March and I don't want any developmental setbacks because of intense cold.
Flynn comes in on his day off, to make what would've been an ordeal crawling into the coop for a single hen at a time, a mere 30 minute job.
He's heavily invested in this venture (half the chickens belong to him)!
For about a week, they'll have to do without their big yard, but I think they'll understand!
Meanwhile, the Sunday marathon continues. So many jobs wanting completion.
These daily logs are my drug of choice. I love to keep the pedal to the metal. I back off occasionally to placate worried friends and family, then when their backs are turned, I go right back to doing what I love best.
So, when there's an injured animal hiding in the swamp, you get your two best trackers to find it in order to dispatch it. Chester was tracking off leash, when he alerted me he'd located it across open water. I had pulled my phone out to see if I had time to go 1/4 mi. up the trails for a kayak because I still had to blanket 10 horses Sunday evening...this is the accidental picture I took before Dax, tethered to my waist, decided we were swimming across to the little island Chester was beckoning us from. Winter jacket and all, I swam with my phone held over my head.
Once on the island, I asked my two fellow hunters which one of them was hauling our prize back the way we came. I pulled it across underwater with the dog leashes. I take my job and my food very seriously!
Chester wins 3 gold stars for tracking and his least favorite event: swimming!
Dax gets merit points for getting me to the island, and back.
My large gnarly hands once embarrassed me. Now, I look at them with a sort of reverence, these tough mitts allow me the privilege of pursuing my crazy fun 15 hour days.
Once a day has elapsed it's gone forever. I savor every day without regrets.
What a productive and adventuresome Sunday it has been, now if I can just coax myself to butcher the body in my bathtub before calling it a night.
