Bad Year 2020 - Covid-19 Pandemic

You would think I would record my thoughts more often in a pandemic, what can I say?  Nothing for 7 or 8 months?  I stay busy and this year with my husband home, it seems more so sometimes.  I have to take it easy here and there though and he picks up my slack.  

Just so you know, my brother Eric is hanging in there.  He is not doing well, but most people with Glioblastoma brain tumors don’t do well.  I went and visited again after I made something like 20 cases of food for my Great-Grand-Nephew, he is disabled and my Sister-in-law has two to do total care for, she is one strong lady.  Anyway Moe has a hard time swallowing and has to eat fine purées, so I spent some time cooking up low salt, low sugar, puréed food, canned it in my pressure canner and took it and visited a few days.  I wish I lived closer, so that I could help Sheila more often and see my brother Eric more.  Eric and Moe are both immune compromised though, and since then...well, they declared a Pandemic on Covid-19.  I think my husband and I may have gotten it, but we didn’t get tested or anything, we both were sick for a few weeks and the cough lasted more like a month.  I haven’t gone to see my brother since then.

With my husband home, I have been able to do more with the garden this year.  I have done a lot of freezing and canning and I am not done yet.  I actually made Ketchup this year and canning more tomato sauce and pickles than ever.  My corn did fairly well this year and I tried asparagus beans which are still growing, but I have been pulling up the wilted and dead plants and need to till and get some new stuff planted.  It is hot though, and it is hard for me to stay out long.  I need to finish pulling weeds today and get back to work out there.  I always need to do more than there are hours in the day to do it!  My kitchen is a disaster too, buckets of eggs and canning paraphernalia, jars, pressure cooker and pans are everywhere, along with bins of things waiting for processing.  I really need to go pick my Elderberries if the birds didn’t eat them all...and pears, and apples.  I need to do a run-through of my orchard period.  

I have a bunch of chicks I am raising right now too.  One of my 8 foot brooders is full, my two porch brooders and I have three in the house too.  Yesterday one of my turkey hens hatched 3 poults out and we need to keep an eye out for more babies.  She was not happy when we took them away either.  Once she finishes hatching, we may move her to a private coop and let her raise them...I haven’t decided yet.  There is danger in letting her raise them as we do have large chicken snakes that get into the coops.  I have not done a total head count of chicks, but I will estimate about 40 older chicks and about 50 less than two weeks old.  I am about to clean my incubators and set more eggs too, my flock has been reduced more by predators this year...and my chickens are getting to old to produce near as many eggs.  I have a lot of hens that go broody, and I let them sit on eggs for two weeks, then took all of them away and candled them.  I put all of the ones that looked viable in the incubators, that is where some of the chicks came from.  I got chicks locally too, but quite a few died and I still haven’t figured out why, but I am speculating the heat. After loosing a lot, we noticed when looking at trail camera footage temperatures got up to 111/112 degrees, I had the chicks on my covered back porch and had fans going, I have thermometers out there but never saw over 95 degrees.  That is why I now have three brooders of chicks in my house too, I can control their environment a bit better.  I think I have lost five so far, any that hatched and got stuck on their back for no telling how long seemed to die, I don’t get up in the middle of the night to check my incubators though.  I did start checking more often during the day.  There is a greater risk when you take eggs broody hens have been sitting on, they don’t all hatch at once.  I have given the eggs 2 weeks to hatch, none hatched yesterday...so today I am cleaning out the incubators and starting a new batch.  By the time these hatch, the oldest chicks which are 9 weeks old now can go to a grow out coop on the yard.  My current house chicks can go out to the porch brooder or the ones in the yard depending on the temperatures.

Oh yeah!  I got bees!  We have been wanting bees for awhile.  I bought a hive for my husband’s birthday a couple of years ago.  A neighbor (well sort of) keeps bees and asked if I wanted a swarm, we had to put the hive together quickly but we have had them about five weeks or so now.  We couldn’t see a queen but they did stay in the hive and built comb and were hoping they would create a Queen.  No such luck...but, Steven brought me some capped brood and then I aquired a wild Queen from a swarm.  The existing bees seemed to take to her quickly, and in a few days we will see if she has been laying eggs.  I have to try and get there numbers up, if they don’t increase in numbers they may not make it through the winter...it is late in the year to get started, but I can feed them through the winter if needed and insulate the hive if I need to.  My husband is excited too.  He cleared trees up on the shooting range and we got fencing put up with a string of electric fencing on top to keep critters from climbing over it.  We haven’t moved the hive up there yet, but after we get some more work done and make sure the hive will survive we have enough .room for at least five hives fenced.  It will take time to get several hives established, but I am hopeful...and the bonus will be honey...and my orchard and garden will have plenty of pollinators!

Hard Times

I am grateful.  Grateful I still have a roof over my head, grateful to see another sunrise, grateful for many other things.  Last year was rough though and I am hoping this year will be better.

We ended up closing down my husband’s computer shop, there was just not enough business to keep it open anymore.  We closed it down before Christmas.  It was the first year we did not even exchange gifts to each other at all.  The previous two years weren’t much better, gifts that were more necessities were given.  The little town my husband had his shop in had another fire and it pretty much destroyed or heavily damaged three buildings.  After that business was even worse.

My husband is applying for jobs, but has only had one pre-interview, I would call it...with a recruiter.  I went for an Interview at a Walmart, but it was over the state line in Louisiana and to get there was very winding roads and it was 23 miles...and they require you to work nights.  I have an issue seeing on these dark roads with no street lights at night, headlights are like laser beams in my eyes and it really makes it hard for me to see. I told them I would have to pass if I had to work nights.  So I applied for more jobs, but so far only have had an interview at McDonalds.  I figured before I started a job there I would get my yearly health exams taken care of, went to the doctor and my blood pressure was high, had a UTI too which surprised me, I didn’t have symptoms really.  Anyway, doc put me on high blood pressure medication and something for the infection and next thing you know I was having horrible pain, especially in my knee.  Back to the doctor I go, two days before I am to start at McDonalds.  My doctor was afraid I had developed a blood clot, so he sent me to the hospital across the way for a Doppler sonogram on my leg.  No blood clot, thank goodness, but a Baker’s Cyst was found behind  my left knee.  It hurt something awful when the technician ran that Doppler doohickey across it and pressed down on it.  My knee is still having pain after almost two months of what I call rest.  I called McDonalds and told them I couldn’t come in.  I am afraid since it still hurts and is still swollen, I am going to have to go see an Orthopedic doctor.  So no real job for me right now.

I have been resting my knee, sitting on my butt the majority of the day.  I wouldn’t be able to do it if my husband wasn’t home.  He has been taking care of the poultry...what is left of them.  We have been having pretty bad predator issues this year.  This year we have a bobcat or two, raccoons, possums and possibly an owl or eagle and hawks.  We have been losing several poultry a week.  Some just disappear without a trace, others we find half eaten out in the yard in the middle of the day.
We walked out onto the back porch and saw a huge bird drop out of the sky and swoop down into the chicken yard.  The chickens were under the bushes screaming, geese honking, turkeys gobbling, ducks making a racket...I don’t blame them, whatever came at them was huge.  It looked to have a six foot wingspan.  I was thinking it was an eagle, I am still not sure what it was, through the wings looked a red-orange and the primary flight feathers were white.  I didn’t see any barring or black on the underside of it, and it had a white or cream colored belly.  Anyway, after catching numerous critters in the trap, and one of my neighbors dogs...we are still having 2 to 4 deaths a week.

Now for news on my brother with Glioblastoma.  He got through his radiation and first round of chemotherapy, and things looked pretty good.  They started him on another stronger chemotherapy and he ended up in the hospital.  In a months time, the tumor they had removed grew back and has spread to the other side of his brain.  I have been doing research and it looks like he has a Butterfly Glioblastoma, one of the rarest types.  The chemotherapy has been stopped since it is not working.  They are suppose to start another type of treatment soon, I hope it works.  I was able to go see him for a couple of days.  I have not seen much of my family since we moved to the country, it is what I miss the most since we moved out here.  It is tough with a farm, when you have animals depending on you and no one to care for them while you are gone.  My husband took care of them so I could go.  I am just hoping it isn’t the last time I see my brother.