The Hen In The Head Saga

I was hit in the head with a chicken a week ago. Seriously. Kept finding smashed eggs on the concrete floor of the wash house and then a tallish friend discovered Gabriella the Black Hen sitting on one lone egg up on the top of a built out wall. When she tried to reach past her to collect six rotten eggs that had rolled under a shelf said bantam took fright, flew to the window before making a target of my head. Not that I got any sympathy from my friend "Just another day of excitement at the Little House On The Prairie" was her comment.

The unplanned pregnancies of the past year have resulted in a surplus of roosters. This causes terrified hens who are sometimes cornered by young cockerels with gang rape on their mind. So far have put adverts in local free trader magazines and the school newsletter but apparently "Gorgeous colourful bantam roosters" are in plentiful supply as I haven't had any replies.

Meanwhile Stig is mortified at the appearance of firewood in "his" shed so during the daytime I have been tethering him to the fence along the driveway so he can mow the lawn and the trees and make rude faces at the chickens. He still bawls like a stuck pig when he sees his Mummy but otherwise we go minutes at a time without even a maaaah so he is growing up at last. However there is some resentment simmering there as when I am busy undoing his chain from the fence he usually sneaks around behind me and butts me up my backside.

After a few days of 36oC weather in Tikokino the garden looks pretty sad. However there are two new additions. I finally managed to find an upright rosemary bush for just $3, in part due to extreme woodiness. I've planted it between the Margaret Merrill bush rose my friend Jacqueline gave me and the thyme bush plonked on top of Sarah the gray bantam hen. My friend Glenys is forsaking Central Hawkes Bay for Cromwell down Otago way and last Friday her husband and brother delivered a large green container filled with waterlilies which now graces the patio outside the dining room window. Despite its size the cats have managed to completely ignore it until this morning when Peaches decided it made a great drinking bowl. She is nothing if not practically minded.

Another Unplanned Pregnancy, Fire Across Road and Death

January began with a cluck. A filthy hot day (3rd Jan) I was sitting at the computer when I hear loud cheeping coming from the vicinity of the hen house. Except this was a newly hatched cheeping and my other chicks were a couple of months old at the time. Went out in the scorching sun and discovered Kit sitting next to a tiny black chick. Picked it up and wandered 50 feet into the paddock where I had thought I'd heard cheeping a couple of days before coming from the other side of the woodshed. Sure enough I discovered Lara the black hen sitting under a mess of old bikes. When she saw the chick she called while it ran madly towards her. Thinking that was sorted I went back to the computer. Half an hour later I heard more loud cheeping coming from the hen house. Back out and discovered Kit watching a pale gray chick wandering round. I collected it and took it to Mum. Obviously she'd become thirsty and hungry from sitting on her eggs and gone to tank up at The Big House and the chicks had followed her and got left behind. The next morning Lara appeared with the gray and two black chicks so I put them in a cage to keep them safe from predators.

Meanwhile Ella's eight chicks were growing well although unfortunately a large proportion turned out to be roosters. Very funny to watch her try to brood these huge babies when she could only just manage to cover two with her wings. Even she soon tired of this and in mid January went off the cluck and back to the flock. Meanwhile I became close to one speckled baby who enjoyed sitting on my knee, arm or wherever she could perch. Well I hope it's a she although I did catch her trying to crow one morning. At the moment she's transgender.

The 15th January was another scorcher. My garden had given up and turned brown. It was windy. So was I. Mid afternoon I glanced outside and everywhere was bathed in an eerie orange light. When I went near the windows I could smell smoke so panicked and rushed out to rescue my underwear off the line as there is nothing worse in life than smoky knickers. Stig the goat and I went to the front gate and across the road saw a haze of smoke with four helicopters and monsoon buckets trying to put out a grass fire. My landlord's son rode over on his bike to say that the neighbour had been combine harvesting when the tractor hit a stone and the fire started. All in all 120 acres were burnt and it took the fire brigades of Tikokino, Onga Onga, Waipawa, Waipukurau and Hastings (forty minutes away) to put it out. I spent a nervous night wondering if the high winds would reignite it. Next morning heard the fire sirens again but they were only dampening down smoldering areas.

The same day I'd found a Sheltie dog for free on Trademe. Rang the owner who told me she and her husband were re homing him as they wanted to go out camping more. I said I would take him and she said she would talk to her husband about bringing him across from Wanganui. To say I was excited would be an understatement although his name (Buffy) did give me cause for concern in a household of Demelzas, Baldricks and Stigs. Wednesday morning the owner emailed to say that she had decided to give him to someone else as they didn't want to drive over. Didn't even give me the chance to find another way to get him. This was all the more painful as an hour before I'd learned that my mother had died during the night. So the following week was spent with high emotions as we attempted to give Mum the proper send off.

Monday the 24th January was her funeral in Napier. My cousin Elaine and I drove up on a wet and nasty morning and had lunch with my brother, his wife, birth mother, brother and partner and sister. After the funeral at St John's Cathedral and a quick cup of tea Elaine and I came back down to Central. Next day I was back in Napier for a doctor's appointment which has resulted in an emergency referral to the rheumatology clinic at the Regional Hospital as the GP thinks I have an extremely rare auto immune disorder which only affects two people in Hawkes Bay. Guess that explains why I have felt like crappier than usual for so long. So if I have two rare disorders I guess that just makes me more exclusive. And interesting in a wane, windswept sort of way. Although I really feel as if I've been hit in the head with a frying pan with the events of the past month I try to be grateful for all the good things in life while trying to make sense of all the bad.