Mystery of the attack on Blackie the chicken solved—yesterday, I saw a big grayish coon cat exit out the manger side of the barn as I came in through the gate. It looked like it would make three of our barn cat, Angel. I think it’s a tom that belongs to one of our neighbors. Now to figure out how to make our place unpopular for it. First, we need to ONLY put the amount of cat food out that Angel can eat within an hour or so. “I think we should call her Two Shoes,” DJ said the other day of our granddaughter, Sara. Little Miss Two Shoes is at the stage where she wants to pick out her own clothes for the day, but she doesn’t want to be stuck with just a boring old pair of shoes. She delights in choosing one of each—one brown boot, one tap shoe, or perhaps a ballet slipper with a pink gym shoe, or a pink rubber boot with a white sandal. It makes me think of someone picking at a salad bar—a little of this, a little of that, with endless possibilities of combinations. Every day, Sara would point to the birdhouse and say, “Baby boo birds” and I would lift her up to peek in. Then she would say, “Mama- daddy” looking over toward the electric wires from which the parents often kept watch. “Soon,” I told Sara, “They’ll be big enough to fly away and they won’t be in here anymore.” Friday, after storms had come and gone once more, there were only two babies left. “See,” I told Sara, “One flew away!” By Saturday the nest was empty except for one tiny blue egg that had never hatched. “All gone!” I looked discreetly around; no feathers or sad little corpses. Hopefully they had gotten clean away without attracting the cat’s attention. One day last week Sara helped me gather 35 eggs, AFTER leaving two in each nest. Later during her nap, I found another half dozen or so. That gave us some for family, plus a dozen for friends PLUS a dozen each as a thank you for the workers who delivered hay. The hay guys used to drive a truck carrying six big bales to unload near our barn, but now they use a trailer that carries eight bales as well as a tractor. They park it on the road near our gate, drive the tractor down the ramp, then use a spear attachment on the tractor which pokes through the center of one bale at a time. One man directs from the ground while the other shuttles back and forth. Even though they have delivered hay to us for years, they are still bemused by our set-up. Last time no one was here when they delivered. Trying to be kind and get the hay close to where we needed, they started lining up bales too near the wall of the barn. We had to push away bales to make room to put down the ramp before we could roll one up into the feeder. This time I ran out of the house just as the tractor came back with the second bale. I showed the ramp to the guy directing the operation, and explained that we needed to keep enough room for it near the hay entrance. He kindly moved back the row of pallets. If the hay is set on pallets, air can circulate and the bales are less apt to mold. Then he had the tractor guy shift the bales back from the barn. After that he went above and beyond. After helping me arrange the ramp, he had the man use the tractor to go ahead and push one into the empty feeder before unloading the rest. The horses were so eager for the fresh new hay, Arrow started reaching over the gate to tear at the bale before we rolled it in. I had to scold him to back up or he would have bent the top rail on yet another corral panel. As soon as the bale was in, the horses jockeyed for a spot to reach it and started munching. The test of hay each time—will the horses want to eat it? This time, not only will they eat it, they love it! A few days later DJ joked that we were going to have to tell Mr. H that we could only pay him half price for the hay this time, the horses were refusing to eat their clover grass and it was all his fault; all they wanted was to eat his hay. Each time I turned away to do something else, something went wrong with the hay. The tractor guy started putting some of the bales facing one way, some another. I explained to the guy on the ground that they needed to all face so we could roll them toward the barn. Also, they needed to form a smooth line so we could cover them in a row. Not to worry, I said, DJ can probably move them later. No, no, the director guy said, and with much difficulty got the guy to push the bales the other direction. In the process, he drove over and broke off the corner of one of the heavy-duty plastic pallets. When he finished, the row of bales was still so topsy-turvy Dave had to shove them the best he could into place to be able to cover them before the rains came that night. Talking about difficulties in communicating and getting the helping guys to do things the right way reminds me of a couple of recent visits to one of the farm stores. The family-run store gives work to one guy, I’ll call him Stan, who is “as honest as the day is long” and “as hard a worker as you could ask for”. He also comes out with some of the most unfortunate statements. Our daughter refused to return after he told her she looked like she was about to have a litter; she was coming up on the due date of their second child. I ended up being the one to pick up their family’s dog food from then on, because it was still the best price for good quality food. If you have dogs, cats, or bunnies, check out your local farm stores. You’ll probably pay less for better items than you’ll find elsewhere. Stan doesn’t like to be questioned or corrected, especially by a woman. Case in point: DJ is working on perimeter fence, along with a teen he has hired for the day. He’s going to need more metal “T” posts. He calls the farm store to check prices and availability. This is the only store we know of that carries posts 6 1/2 feet long, the others only carry up to six feet. I offer to make the run to town so the guys can keep working. “Sure,” DJ says, “They should be fine in the pickup, just put them in diagonally and they’ll fit. Once at the store, I pay at the counter for seven 6 1/2 foot posts. “Head down to that next building,” the clerk tells me. “Stan will load them for you.” I drive down to the place indicated. Stan comes, looks at my receipt, and heads for a stack of posts on a pallet clearly marked “6”. Surely not-- I ease out of the pickup. “Umm…” I say, holding out the receipt again. “We need 6 and a HALF foot posts.” “That’s what these are,” Stan says, breaking open a bundle and sliding the first one up into the bed of the truck. It fits easily even with the tailgate up; no need for diagonal placement. I look at the ones Stan is holding upright. Clearly, they are more DJ’s height (right around six feet) and definitely not more than our son Marc’s 6’4”. “Uh, those aren’t long enough. We need six and half foot,” I say, pointing to the next stack over. I am careful to keep my tone neutral, my gaze slightly averted, so as not to make Stan feel put on the spot. Stan grabs the receipt again and studies it. “Six and a half,” he says. “That’s what these are.” “These aren’t right,” I say. “Do you want me to go get a tape measure and show you?” he challenges. “Yes, that would be helpful,” I say. He stomps off. I’m sure DJ would be able to get the right posts without a scene, I think. Stan returns, tape measure in hand. He pulls out the 6 foot post and measures with a flourish. The tape shows just over 6’. “See?” he triumphs. “Six and a half, just like I said!” Six feet, one-half INCH. “But we need six and a half FEET” I say. I take the tape measure and one of the longer posts and show him. “Oh!” He harrumphs. “If you needed six feet six INCHES that’s what you should have said!” Obviously the injured party, he loads the six-foot- six- inch posts and I drive away. Sometime I’ll tell you about the happenings when I went back to get fence panels