We feel like we’re living in a Leonard Cohen song this past week. No. A Chris Isaak song: Things Go Wrong . . .

She just wouldn’t learn. Or couldn’t. What do you do with a chicken who’s a bully? Well, you can separate her from the flock. Like build a new coop just for her? No. You can clip 1/8 inch from the top of her beak. Yeah, can you see that? You can remove her. You mean? Yes.

There are several time-tested ways to “remove” a troublesome chicken. We all know you can chop off her head with a hatchet on a stump (this is what my dad always did). You can break her neck, and there’s a YouTube video to show you how. You can simply turn her loose outside the compound and depend on some other animal who wants a good chicken dinner to do the job. Or, you can call the vet hospital down the road.

You may be wondering how this bullying manifests itself? Okay, I came out to the orchard to check for eggs and found Toast mounted on Maddie’s back, pecking at her neck and shoulders. Feathers flying. I yelled, of course, and kicked at Toast to get her off. I’d brought some dried worm treats to the girls, and when I dumped them out, Toast went for the worms and Maddie crawled away. Not good.

I’m sure you know that we chose the vet hospital solution, and if we felt ridiculous, that’s the price for failure to suck it up and commit chicken murder. But $243 to euthanize her? Didn’t know it would be that expensive. Could have built a new coop for that.

But here’s the new three-girl flock, living in sunshine and harmony and laying lots of eggs:

So what else went wrong? We woke up the following morning to find no hot water in the house. Seems we have a “tankless hot-water system” which is supposed to be more economical and environmentally sound than keeping a tank of water hot all day and night. Right. But we sure do waste a lot of water waiting for the shower to get warm, especially when there’s no hot water to be found anyway.

Called the plumber, and he informed us that the installing plumber had joined copper and galvanized piping, to corrosive effect, and the joint had been leaking for months, probably. (In the way that one craftsman will find the preceding artisan a shocking failure.) I don’t know, but Chase, this week’s guy, patched things up and hot water returned. Of course, now we need to install a new system. Fine. Just do it.

Now our attention turned to the grapes out in the arbor:

We’d strung mylar streamers and mounted whirly-gigs to deter the birds from our ripening fruit. But grapes were, strangely, carpeting the ground beneath the vines, and they were still mostly green. Birds don’t usually go after green fruit, so could this be the work of ground squirrels? Then whole bunches began falling, and we turned to Shonnard’s nursery for a solution. Ah. Stem-rot. So the birds weren’t stealing our fruit, the grapes were committing suicide.

One last image before we turn the corner. Here’s our corn yield this year:

Of course, it’s not all bad! Here are some photos to cheer you up:

We’re in Portland this afternoon to meet with a tech regarding the TV and sound system in the condo. We’re planning to lease the condo until such time as anyone wants to move to toxic Portland. Oregon, and all electronic systems have to be operative, etc. More about that another time, but I will close with the note that as we left the farm house this morning, we discovered that a skunk had been busy overnight comprehensively spraying the entire building. Dear God. What do you do with a renegade skunk? We’re being tested!

See, I’m supposed to work out in our garage 3 days a week, walk the road 3 times without stopping on the other 3 days, with Sunday off for good behavior. This as per my buddy/personal-trainer Aaron. Here’s my workout equipment in the garage:

Right. So weights and bench, with treadmill in the corner, my pushup bar with squash, bench with TRX cables and straps. Yep. Can’t wait for M T F.

But today is Tuesday, walking the road day. I always listen to a book on this hour-long hike and today I was walking with Lisa Wingate and her book, The Sea Keeper’s Daughters. When in grad school for my MFA, I learned a nice metaphor. A pebble is tossed into a still pond, and the resulting ripples/waves are the story. Lisa apparently did not go to the same school as I. What’s this about a pebble? For 3 half-laps of the road I listen to description. Set up. Back story. Memory. More description. A gray cat and some camomile tea. Get on with it, Lisa! All patience exhausted, I jerk out my earbuds, go to Libby, and hit return. I will walk and observe Nature. See, there is an attractive feather. And a dead mouse or vole. I took photos, but I will spare you.

At home, I shower, etc., and am dressed, making my smoothie when the doorbell rings, and it’s Westin, here to check the squirrel traps. Which aren’t actually traps, but poison down a tube affair which only a squirrel can reach. But what if a turkey vulture eats one of the dead squirrels? He would, Westin has said, have to eat 30 or 40 squirrels before he became ill, as the bait is vanishingly non-toxic to carrion animals.

This morning Westin slaps at the long holster on his hip and says with a smile that he’s packing today. Okay if he walks the fields and hunts the squirrels? Sure, but I want to see his gun when he comes back in. It’s a single-action, 22 long barrel, Luger revolver. The thing is strangely compelling, and I want to touch it, but don’t ask. “What is it for?” I ask. “Besides squirrels?” Turns out that Westin hunts, fair enough, but also competes. He particularly likes an event called “Cowboy” which has to do with rapid draw and accuracy. He was a member of the OSU pistol team — who knew there was such a thing?

“Do you need a license for the gun?” I ask? No, so long as he wears it openly. If his shirt is tucked in and the gun visible, fine. Shirt out, gun hidden, he needs a concealed carry license. He explains this to me as he unloads the gun, tucks the bullets into a case, and he talks about hunting game birds. And his methods for cooking them.

At lunch I check email and find a note from Tracy. We can come and get a couple of chickens if we want them. Oh, man. Not sure, but finally decide to go for it. Our two chickies haven’t been laying very much and I actually bought eggs last week. We have to find a couple of boxes to carry the birds in, and Larry mows the orchard, cleans the coop. Ready or not!

Tracy and her husband Lyn live just across Bell Fountain, and raise sheep, geese, chickens, and have a couple of horses just to round things out. We don’t know them well, and haven’t been to their home before. We get out with our boxes, and on the way to the chicken run, Lyn asks if we’d like to see the airplane he’s building first.

No, really, he’s building a for real god damn single-engine, two-seater airplane in his shop. Should be ready in a couple of months. He did buy the engine, but all the hoses and wires connecting it to the frame, the frame itself, the cockpit, the wings, everything, he’s MAKING it.

“Um, are you actually a pilot?” No, but he has flown a lot of hours. He’s an engineer, got a good buy-out from HP, and decided what the heck. It’s unbelievable, and I kept thinking Gordon Has Got To See This! I can’t show you because I didn’t have my phone with me. Aaargh. Must get an invitation back! I asked Tracy if she’d go up with him, and she said of course.

Duh.

Okay, about the chickens. We got two, one Novo Gen, and one Plymouth Safire. We got them home and into their new digs with Rhody and Toast. Toast immediately went for the gray one and came out of the fight with a couple of feathers in her beak. The gray one spent the rest of the day in the coop while Toast strutted around in good bully fashion.

Oh, their names? Well, as we have a Burnt Toast, of course the gray one is — Gravy. The other is a French breed, now goes by Madeline. Here’s Gravy:

Pretty. Hope she’s tough. Hope she lays eggs! But it’s 10:00, and, having just watched a Netflix I’m auditioning for Zoom Chicks, bed time. Another day. Not sure if I can get an imogi onto my blog but I can’t find a yawning one anyway. G’night!