Hello everyone!
Happy New Year to all of y'all!
Jethro is still hobbling around, but he's back to driving and working around here. I'm leaving it up to him to get the meniscus cleaned up when he can't stand it any longer. He's had it done once before on each knee, so he knows what happens to get the surgery!
We had a leak in the hot water tank line underneath the house. Ugh! I figured out there was a problem when I bent down in the chicken bedroom to pick their water bowl up and smelled mold. I opened the closet door and the mold smell just about knocked me backwards. I went searching in the laundry room for wetness and found the floor to be wet between the wall and washing machine. I told Jethro about it and he went under the house. That's when he found the leak. He got the leak fixed and I started pulling boxes out of the bedroom closet. That's when I discovered we also had a rat living in there. The damned thing had chewed up a lot of my stuff in boxes. As well as lots of wooden stuff in the boxes.
I went to get Jethro the spray bottle of bleach so he could spray the mold areas and discovered the bottom of the bottle was wet. I pulled everything out from underneath the kitchen sink and found a large puddle of water. Well just shiit! So Jethro started on that project next. He's got all the leaks fixed and even replaced the seals in the shower areas to stop those leaks too.
After getting everything pulled out of the closet? It moved on to other parts of the house to chew things up. It had even chewed a hole in the back of the couch and had a huge nest chewed up inside of it. They are truly destructive creatures. We put out two large snap traps and killed it the 2nd night of the traps being put out. It looked like there was a murder in the chicken bedroom. When the snap came down it sprayed blood all over the carpet.
Our home right now looks like it was picked up, turned upside down, shook real hard and then set back down. It's a mess!
Three nights ago I discovered our large hen, Strawberry, was missing.
There's no signs of her being attacked anywhere! So I'm hoping she's under Jethro's barn setting on eggs. It's been bitter cold here, freezing rain yesterday night and we have two days of snow flurries expected. We haven't seen her come out to eat or drink either. She's been laying her eggs underneath the barn for awhile now. IF she's under there on eggs? Hers aren't fertile. But La Nora has been laying her eggs under there too and hers ARE fertile. So all we can do is wait and see at this point. It takes 21 days for eggs to hatch.
Our little Airam we got last year right around Labor Day laid her first egg yesterday. The three other girls are a week younger than her. So they'll be laying eggs soon! Don't have a clue what we are going to do with a dozen eggs a day? Ugh!
Jethro showed his asss on Christmas Day. He didn't go with me to my Mom's for Christmas lunch. The following day he was good as a little Choir boy again. Then two days ago it happened again. I hate it when he takes a pain pill. He treats me so badly! I just shut down and avoid him until he snaps out of it. Thankfully it's by the next day. I'm tired of this roller coaster with him.
Everyone have a clean day!
TOD