Yep. I’m a day late again. Totally not my intention. I got rained in at a friends house last night. Went over after work to have a glass of wine and catch up. It started raining around 6:30 and I thought – I should go soon so I can help put up the chickens if it starts raining at home. Started saying my goodbyes; at 6:45 it started absolutely pouring. I hurried on out and jumped in the car. They live on a dirt road and it was already flooding. I knew of two ways to get out, one was a short cut and fraught with gullies and dips that surely were flooded, the other was the more used way, down the quickly flooding road. It wasn’t deep, so I decided to slog it that way. I got half way to the main road that is blacktopped when a guy in a lifted truck flagged me down and said – “you can’t go that way. The wash is flooded and you’re car is too small. So I had to call Sue and let her know that I wasn’t going to make it – and I turned around to wait out the rain at my friend’s home.
After 20 minutes or so, as they were sitting down to dinner, I tried my luck again. It was still raining, but only softly and the flood waters had begun to recede. I got in my car and started down the road again, with some new directions on a safer exit route. I didn’t even get a block away from the home when lightning began to strike all around me. To my right I witnessed a horizontal flash of lightning strike all down the road at roof top level. I turned around and went back to the house. The lightening kept up for a long time, striking very close in the neighborhood and above the house. Finally – around 9 – my friend’s husband offered to trail blaze for me and get me to the county road via the safer route they described to me earlier. I gratefully accepted, and finally arrived home around 9:30. I know, doesn’t sound terribly exciting, but that’s the closest I’ve ever been to lightning; it scared the begeeses out of me. I’m sure I’ll have more experiences with it here – that was just the most prolonged. I think the storm stalled out right over their street. I kept getting “Severe Thunderstorm Warning” on my phone. No duh. True story.
I kept checking in with Sue, she kept saying – “No rain here.” She did get all of the animals in pretty easily and quickly; they might have felt the storm coming and it put them in a more cooperative mood than normal. Usually the layers out in the RCW and the RRb#1 don’t like to go in until the very last bit of light has left the sky… cloud cover helps. Luckily RRb#2 were still in their tractor and didn’t need to be shepherded in. Today they got to come out of their tractor to explore their new environs. I wasn’t around, but Sue said they were sticking pretty close to the tractor and the hay bales. We’ll help them find their way in tonight and then it shouldn’t be to very difficulty for them after that.
Yesterday, we emptied out the goat shed again. There must have been some very hard driven rain Sunday while we were in town because the goats’ hay was terribly wet. Sue cleaned it out and I wheelbarrowed it out to the pasture where Sue wanted to spread seed over the spot the chickens recently vacated. She spread the seed after I had gone to work, but had to move 10 more wheelbarrows full of used straw, from the last time we cleaned out their shed, to be able to cover the entire area. That’s a lot! With the gentle rain that we had last night, and the rain we’re still expecting this season, it should be able to grow in really well.
That’s our story for today. We’ll be writing new chapters as the week goes on. Tomorrow is another great day! Until then, as always~
Thanks for reading.
Today’s Weather: Warmer. some clouds, but no rain. Currently, 6:35 p.m. it is 94° with 24% humidity. Our high today was 101° and our overnight low is predicted to be 67°. Tomorrow and Thursday are supposed to be Sunny with more rain expected on Friday.
Egg Report: Saturday – zero goose, 2 duck, 29 chicken. Sunday – zero goose, 2 duck, 24 chicken. Monday – zero goose, zero duck, 27 chicken. Tuesday – zero goose, zero duck, 28 chicken eggs.
Wing and a Prayer 