Some of them have wings
A lot of times people want me to watch a show that I have zero plans to watch (looking at you Game of Thrones - also the show where Kristen Bell is dating a rabbi who was in the OC, and the show about teenagers and every episode is one take) but I really do want to watch White Lotus! We saw the first two seasons and at this point by the time we watch it I’ll have no one to talk about it with. Lately all we watch is ants.
Look, I like bugs. I like living in an ecosystem. But lately our food is more ants than food, there are so many ants in my hair - it’s too many ants. At the risk of sounding like someone who can’t handle ANY ants (which isn’t true, I’m fine with a few ants) I should let you know I cleared my schedule for an hour last week and handled the ants using some tips I found on Reddit. It seems like it worked, we haven’t seen any more ants. One less obstacle between me and White Lotus.
Do you have the right amount of stuff or too much going on right now? Do you feel like it’s possible to think you don’t have enough going on? Have you dealt with ants, or other uninvited guest problems like rats, birds, raccoons, moths? Is there a show you’re waiting for the right time to watch, or a show you think everyone needs to watch?
This week I liked listening to “Bullet in the Brain” by Tobias Wolff and read by Liev Schreiber, the story starts at 17:18 on this link, but all the stories they featured were nice. This week I heard someone in a bakery recommending Breasts and Eggs, and I stopped what I was doing and ran over to also recommend it - it turned out it was my friend, I hadn’t recognized her voice.
Thanks for being here and making time for this. I hope this week the surprises in your life aren’t too enormous, and that everyone in the bakery turns out to be your friend.
I loved this missive and came running to read all the comments. But it looks like there are no friends in the comments bakery with me yet. As someone recently beset with ants (we finally have an 🐜 strategy after years of being thrown off each spring by their relentless marches) I feel this! Both the ants and how I feel sometimes like I live in a slightly-over-full controlled chaos that I feel like I can manage until one unexpected hiccup (ants, father in law goes to the hospital, the mower is broken) and then there tumbled the whole House of Cards™️ (another show I know I’ll never watch). I’m still trying to figure out the right amount between too much and not enough so I too can watch White Lotus. Thank you for illustrating all this so beautifully 🖤🐜
We deal with rats. I know, gasp! What no one warns you is if you have chickens, you have rats. Three hens equals approximately 300 rats. I don't know how many really. But more than three. We don't kill things at our house, so no traps, no poison. We spent hundreds of dollars (twice) to hire people to rat proof. Didn't work. Rats can dig through copper mesh, wire mesh, gravel. They don't care. They're happy to work hard for their food which is really the chickens food. We moved the food, we took up the food, doesn't matter. You can buy rat birth control, which I did (again hundreds of dollars), but I could not afford the amount I needed to put out daily. SO, I looked up the ingredients, figured out a recipe, and now I bake "rat bars" every four days, and feed the rats birth control every single day. Is it working? hard to say. Hopefully it will cut down on the multiplying of rats, and eventually they'll die of old age, and we won't have as many even if they come from the neighbors (who also have rats whether they know it or not). I'll just keep baking birth control bars (which are safe for the hens, btw).