Random Friday

1.  One of our chickens has gone broody.  She has been sitting in the nesting box for a week now, fluffing her feathers in a matronly way, and settling in for the 21 day incubation period.  Initially, we tried convincing her to leave the eggs so we could collect them but she was rather violent in her defense of her nest.  We decided to leave her be and see if any of them hatch.  We value our fingers and our arms -- and baby chicks would be very cute.  This morning, she left the nest for a couple minutes to grab a quick meal and poop.  I ran into the hen house and counted the eggs -- six eggs, a mixture of white, brown and green eggs.

2.  Between the very hot days and the brooding chicken, our egg collection has dropped to one or two eggs per day -- and some days there are none.  I do not know if the other hens are adding to the pile under the Cuckoo Maran.  Today was the first day I happened to be in the area when she left the nest so I could count.  I put a couple wood eggs in the other nesting boxes to encourage the hens to lay there.  Since then, we've gotten two eggs -- and one of the wooden eggs has disappeared.  It isn't under the nursery nest and it isn't in the boxes.  Very odd.

3.  My dressage trainer, Sandy Savage, was in a riding accident about a week ago.  A horse she was training spooked and lost its footing coming out of the arena at Sandy's barn.  The horse fell on her, fracturing her leg, and she smashed her head on the ground.  Thank God she was wearing a helmet.  She suffered a severe concussion, and seizures, and spent some time in the trauma unit.  She is home now but her recovery is going to take awhile.  Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers as she heals and returns to teaching (from the ground initially, of course).  She is hopeful that she will be well enough to return to the barn and start lessons again in a week or so.  This was not a naughty horse, it was not going rodeo on her (and I've seen her stick like glue to horse doing that... ahem, Winston).  It was a simple spook, a slip and a horrible fall.  Please, please, PLEASE always wear a helmet when you ride.  If Sandy had not been wearing her helmet (and she always does), she would not have survived the fall.

4.  Camille flew up Wednesday afternoon so we could go to the Dixie Chicks concert together.  Back in the 90s, and early 2000s, we were hardcore fans.  Camille sang "Travelling Soldier" in the shower and begged me to hit repeat when we played my CDs in the car.  I named our goat, Cowboy, after the song "Cowboy Take Me Away" (its his registered name).  It was over 100F when we drove to the outdoor amphitheater north of Sacramento, but thankfully cooled off to 98F while we stood for an hour in line.  My foot, in its air-cast boot, was not impressed.  The concert was well worth the wait and the heat, though.  They played all of our favorites and we sang along at the top of our lungs.

5.  I took Thursday as a vacation day at work.  I knew that Camille and I wouldn't get back home Wednesday night, after the concert, until the wee-hours of the morning.  Thursday was another very hot day so we loaded up the kayaks and headed to Bear River Reservoir, one of the few lakes that rents kayaks on weekedays.  Our plan was for Brett and I to use our kayaks, and for us to rent one for Camille.  Unfortunately, all they had available was a two-person, tandem kayak.  So, we left my kayak sitting on top of the car and I joined Camille in the tandem.  It all started out okay...

But then the kayak started taking on water in the back, where I was sitting.  We tried sloshing it out the side but the top of the kayak side was sitting at water level so any shift in weight, or ripple on the water, brought more in.  A speed boat went by and we came very close to capsizing in the wake.  An hour of paddling down the lake, we found a sand bar.  Camille transferred her camera, my Fitbit, and my water bottle to Brett's kayak.  We dumped the water out of our kayak, and got back in.  We hadn't paddled more than a few feet and it was already full of water.  And then we did capsize.  Camille and I swam (my foot was not happy) to shore, pushing and pulling the half-submerged kayak.  Brett paddled back to the marina.  The little bit of beach we found on the steep, rocky shore, was at a campground.  Camille and I beached the kayak, grabbed the paddles, and started walking back to the marina.  Camille asked people in the campground if we were going the right way and they told us we were crazy to walk... the marina was three miles away.  And I didn't have my walking boot, just boat shoes.

Meanwhile, Brett paddled like mad, making it back to the marina in half the time it took us to get out to where we capsized.  He stashed his paddle in the car, prayed that no one would steal his kayak from where he left it near the dock, got directions to the campground from the office staff and set out to find us.  Thankfully, my foot wasn't hurting as Camille and I trudged up the dusty, hot dirt road.  We were thrilled to see Brett, coming to our rescue, after we had gone a mile or so.  Back at the marina, we gave staff directions to the crippled kayak, loaded up Brett's, and went off in search of ice cream.