Birds of a feather and all that

Well, in the end we didn’t go to Fish Lake after all. Turns out that the pinks are running (salmon that’s good for smoking) and Mike wanted to stay in town and fish. Which he did, for a total of close to 20 hours in the last 3 days. And caught exactly nothing. Oh well. I went with him and Kevin yesterday afternoon. We were out from about 3:30p to 8:00p. Kevin caught one fish, I got one almost to the boat and lost it, and that’s it for the weekend. Bummer. Guess we should have gone camping after all.

Friday night while Mike was fishing with a friend I went out to dinner with my friend Shannon to Bistro Vino in downtown Everett. As usual the ambiance was wonderful and the food fantastic. We had a couple of cocktails and ordered a selection of small plates to share. We topped it off with the most amazing chocolate cake I’ve had in a while. Just delicious!

Last night it started to rain hard and it kept raining until about 1:00 this afternoon. I went to the farmer’s market expecting it to be really slow, but found that we’re all a hardier bunch than I gave us credit for. The farmers said that it had been a quiet day, but not nearly as quiet as they expected. Worked out well for me – I got 4 ears of corn for making corn chowder later this week for $1. And 5 lbs of tomatoes for tomato soup for $5. My haul this week from the market included: corn, tomatoes, jalapeno, red leaf lettuce, green beans, garlic, summer squash, fresh bread, peaches, nectarines, plums and fresh Alaskan halibut. The halibut obviously isn’t local, but the fish that I’ve gotten from Ike the last few weekends has been wonderful, and much less expensive than at the grocery store.

Now I’m sitting here at the kitchen window while Mike and the dogs nap. I’m watching the chickens wander the backyard and interact with each other and the neighborhood birds. There’s the five crows that have been watching from the power lines, just waiting for a chance to swoop in and steal the greens that I put out for the girls. And there’s the sparrows that keep coming in looking for seeds and scraps. The hens just yell at the crows but they chase the sparrows. Good thing those sparrows are fast!

It seems sure that we’ve scored only 1 out of 3 on the chicks. Lola is most definitely a rooster based on the way he stands and walks and his “bigger than life” attitude. I guess we’ll dub him Leo and try to find a time to get him to Denise.

 

It seems that DeeDee, now to be called Danny, turned out to be a rooster as well. The silky in him means he’s growing and developing more slowly than Leo, but still based on stance and feathers, she is a he. Wonder if Denise would take him too?

Maisie tho, she’s going to be one of my favorites, I can already tell. So calm and low-key. Curious and friendly. What a sweetheart! Plus, seems that while she’s got yellow Cochin legs she still got the characteristic Ameraucana muff. How fun – I wonder if she’ll lay green eggs?

On Saturday, September 8th Penny, Agnes, Maisie and I will be at the Seattle Tilth Harvests Festival in Wallingford from 10 am to 4 pm. We’re participating in the Backyard Goats & Chickens exhibit to educate people about keeping chickens in the city. They’re also giving out ribbons for pretties, friendliest and most talkative. I’m not sure that me and my mutts have a shot at any of them, but it will still be fun to share my girls and our stories.

 Jake has continued his reign of terror for the week by eating a brand new circular knitting needle, shredding the mail and then climbing on the kitchen table to eat the last of Mike’s sandwich that was forgotten. And all without a shred of remorse. Earlier this week he pulled another 3 branches off his favorite young apple tree, dug two more holes in the yard and chewed on the patio chairs again. And we wonder why we haven’t made more of an effort to use the patio and get the backyard in shape this year. Damn puppy – good thing he’s cute or he’d be dog meat!