Inquiring Minds Want To Know
Please, enough already! Your stony silence only serves to prove to me that you're hurting for an update on the Toxic Household. So here it is:
Bees
Aren't they gorgeous?
Both the wild hive (to the left) and the bought hive (to the right) have got a third tier to their apartment buildings: a shallow honey super. That will be filled with honey we can steal from them. Each hives' two bottom boxes are chock-full of honey, brood and pollen, which we'll graciously allow the bees to keep so they can survive all winter.
The interesting fact about the two colonies is that the wild colony is much farther along in filling their honey super than the bought colony is, even though they had a later start in getting their hive going. Guess it proves they have a good, strong queen.
See the way the front of the bought colony's hive has bees all over it? That's called bearding. It is a natural process formed just to freak me out, as it means the bees are hot inside their hive and they're working to cool themselves. Which is my cue to over analyze, spend hours online researching, and continually pester my bee club 'mentor' about cooling the bees. Luckily, my mentor caught me before I started sticking ice packs all around the inside of the hive, so all the bees have is a shade umbrella propped in front of them. Oh, and as an unforeseen bonus: turns out that Bee's and my horrible carpentry sense might work to our summer advantage, as the off-kilter hive boxes we put together allow a little more cooling airflow than the perfectly square (and therefore perfectly stacked) boxes of professional beekeepers.
Chickens
OK, I still like having chickens.
Except that they've torn up our yard.
Oh, and that they've started slowing down on their egg-laying (they ought to stop when they molt, which should be soon).
Not to mention that they've been jumping up to eat the leaves off the linden tree that grows into their yard:
And I still like having them despite the biggest nuisance: the chicken pictured below . . .
That's Marty, also known as The General or Princess Leia -- depending on who you talk to.
And she is a pain in our collective butts for two reasons:
1) She isn't laying well. Because she's stupid. So stupid that she can't figure out to eat the crushed oyster shell I leave for her, therefore she doesn't have enough calcium in her system, therefore the shells of her eggs are so thin that they often just break in the coop.
2) She insists on alerting us that morning has arrived with a very loud and grating 'bwk bwk BAWK!!' in the morning. Which forces Bee and me to start our day by fighting over whose turn it is to jump out of bed and run outside in varying stages of undress to let the chickens out before they wake the neighbors.
I mean, if she wants to bwk bwk BAWK mid-morning, it's not so bad. But she does it at 7 a.m. And, if I wanted to be awake at 7 a.m., I'd have a 9-5 job, thank you very much. What does she take me for?
Work
OK, I'm starting to get a little depressed. Apparently, I'm waaaay too slow helping Bee in the shop. It takes me an hour to do what he can do in 15 minutes. The fact that I don't have 20 years of experience doing it counts for nothing.
To make matters infinitely worse, the farmer's market at which I'm in charge of selling is not going well for us:
The sales sheet above shows how many items I sold in the 4 hours of sitting out in the 90 degree sun.
That's right: I sold 11 items.
At Bee's market the day before, he sold 76.
Yeah, yeah: his market's more-established, he's got that cute-and-loveable sales quality, etc. etc . . . but my self-esteem is really taking a hit.
Luckily, I've got one thing going for me:
I got another cake order. Of course, it was through a friend of Bee's; but it's got to count for something, right? After all, it's $25 I didn't have before. Oops, I mean, we didn't have before.
Creative Fulfillment
OK, baking sort of counts in the Creative Fulfillment category, so there's a bonus.
On top of that, since I pretend that my writing is highly fulfilling, I should let you know that I finally finished the first rough draft to my piece o'crap book. It only took 4 years!!! And, boy, is it a rough draft.
It is nice to have it done, but frightening because it means that now I'm to the point where I'll have to go back through and read the whole thing at once, instead of three-pages-per-month-as-I-wrote-it; and this will only show me how truly horrendous it is.
But don't worry: it ought to be at least another 4 years before I've gotten off my lazy ass enough to edit it all the way through. Then I'll have to work up the nerve to decide if it's worth subjecting myself to the humiliation of countless rejections from agents and/or publishers. SOOOOOO: it'll be at least another decade before you'd ever have to worry about seeing it in print and feeling guiltily like you must support me by purchasing and reading it.
Does the convoluted sentence-structure of that last paragraph only serve to prove why I should not be trusted with a book deal?
Bees
Both the wild hive (to the left) and the bought hive (to the right) have got a third tier to their apartment buildings: a shallow honey super. That will be filled with honey we can steal from them. Each hives' two bottom boxes are chock-full of honey, brood and pollen, which we'll graciously allow the bees to keep so they can survive all winter.
The interesting fact about the two colonies is that the wild colony is much farther along in filling their honey super than the bought colony is, even though they had a later start in getting their hive going. Guess it proves they have a good, strong queen.
See the way the front of the bought colony's hive has bees all over it? That's called bearding. It is a natural process formed just to freak me out, as it means the bees are hot inside their hive and they're working to cool themselves. Which is my cue to over analyze, spend hours online researching, and continually pester my bee club 'mentor' about cooling the bees. Luckily, my mentor caught me before I started sticking ice packs all around the inside of the hive, so all the bees have is a shade umbrella propped in front of them. Oh, and as an unforeseen bonus: turns out that Bee's and my horrible carpentry sense might work to our summer advantage, as the off-kilter hive boxes we put together allow a little more cooling airflow than the perfectly square (and therefore perfectly stacked) boxes of professional beekeepers.
Chickens
OK, I still like having chickens.
Except that they've torn up our yard.
Oh, and that they've started slowing down on their egg-laying (they ought to stop when they molt, which should be soon).
Not to mention that they've been jumping up to eat the leaves off the linden tree that grows into their yard:
 |
| see the mangled leaf stumps? |
And I still like having them despite the biggest nuisance: the chicken pictured below . . .
 |
| bitch |
That's Marty, also known as The General or Princess Leia -- depending on who you talk to.
And she is a pain in our collective butts for two reasons:
1) She isn't laying well. Because she's stupid. So stupid that she can't figure out to eat the crushed oyster shell I leave for her, therefore she doesn't have enough calcium in her system, therefore the shells of her eggs are so thin that they often just break in the coop.
2) She insists on alerting us that morning has arrived with a very loud and grating 'bwk bwk BAWK!!' in the morning. Which forces Bee and me to start our day by fighting over whose turn it is to jump out of bed and run outside in varying stages of undress to let the chickens out before they wake the neighbors.
I mean, if she wants to bwk bwk BAWK mid-morning, it's not so bad. But she does it at 7 a.m. And, if I wanted to be awake at 7 a.m., I'd have a 9-5 job, thank you very much. What does she take me for?
Work
OK, I'm starting to get a little depressed. Apparently, I'm waaaay too slow helping Bee in the shop. It takes me an hour to do what he can do in 15 minutes. The fact that I don't have 20 years of experience doing it counts for nothing.
To make matters infinitely worse, the farmer's market at which I'm in charge of selling is not going well for us:
 |
| sales sheet |
The sales sheet above shows how many items I sold in the 4 hours of sitting out in the 90 degree sun.
That's right: I sold 11 items.
At Bee's market the day before, he sold 76.
Yeah, yeah: his market's more-established, he's got that cute-and-loveable sales quality, etc. etc . . . but my self-esteem is really taking a hit.
Luckily, I've got one thing going for me:
 | ||||
| carrot cake (unfrosted) |
Creative Fulfillment
OK, baking sort of counts in the Creative Fulfillment category, so there's a bonus.
On top of that, since I pretend that my writing is highly fulfilling, I should let you know that I finally finished the first rough draft to my piece o'crap book. It only took 4 years!!! And, boy, is it a rough draft.
It is nice to have it done, but frightening because it means that now I'm to the point where I'll have to go back through and read the whole thing at once, instead of three-pages-per-month-as-I-wrote-it; and this will only show me how truly horrendous it is.
But don't worry: it ought to be at least another 4 years before I've gotten off my lazy ass enough to edit it all the way through. Then I'll have to work up the nerve to decide if it's worth subjecting myself to the humiliation of countless rejections from agents and/or publishers. SOOOOOO: it'll be at least another decade before you'd ever have to worry about seeing it in print and feeling guiltily like you must support me by purchasing and reading it.
Does the convoluted sentence-structure of that last paragraph only serve to prove why I should not be trusted with a book deal?
That cake looks yummy!
ReplyDeletehey...you are funny as heck.
ReplyDeleteI think only BEE can sell Bee's spoons...it's strange but true.
so.....make more cakes!
your chickens are beautiful...make chicken coats...just kidding. chicken feather hats? keep writing....it's funny