a wwoofer's morning adventure
Wake up at 6:30am to boys yelling at each other in other room, hear mom tell them to stop it, fall back to sleep. Wake up at 7:00am to boys yelling at each other in other room, hear mom tell them to stop it, fall back to sleep. Wake up at 7:30am to boys yelling at each other in other room, hear mom stirring her coffee, think: "Time to get up!" Take a moment to scratch the heck out of my likely to be forever bruised, battered and scarred legs due to a disastrous amount of unrelenting "sand flea" bites. Get up, put on grubby jeans and grubby shirt and grubby sweater (none are actually grubby.. but have deemed them this due to line of current work), join the family in the other room. boys seem very happy to see us, even though in the back of mind I'm thinking "you woke me at 6:30 you mongrels". I smile politely.
Make a cup of coffee, two scoops of instant crystals, one sugar (sometimes two), and a dollop of milk from Licky the cow. Sip coffee while reading a chapter of current book on the beautiful back deck in the crisp sunshine. Finish coffee, realize its much too hot out already for jeans and a sweater, go change into grubby shorts and grubby tank top (same rules as other "grubby" items).
Grab gumboots (there are a few pairs for wwoofers to use) and bucket for chicken feed, wander down towards the chickens. Enter first paddock that is empty, see all chickens at the fence, happily awaiting the arrival of food, pretend they're just excited to see me, try to get them more excited with a few high pitched "chicky chicky chicky" calls, feel happy that they're suddenly jumping on top of each other trying to get closer to me. (clearly it has nothing to do with the food in my swinging white bucket!!) Enter the chicken pen, feel overwhelmed with the amount of clucking chickens surrounding my feet and making it very difficult to walk without stepping on one and feeling bad for the terrible "SQWAK" I'd hear, then thinking "Hey! I'm the boss here, outta my way chickens!" Sadly, the chickens are clever little buggers. They know that white bucket = chicken feed, therefore they try not to let it out of their sight. I try tricking them by throwing a handful of chicken feed over to the left, then I quickly scurry over to the mini chicken-trough and start pouring the chicken feed into it. Usually as soon as I begin to pour the chickens are climbing on top of the trough and bucket and themselves.. so I devised a plan. Now I pour a little into the trough, get them all excited and munching away, then I secretly scurry away to the other chicken pen (which they have full access to, I'm not that tricky!) and pour the rest of the feed into the other trough. Usually over at this trough is my little chicken friend that I call Dementee. (maybe not PC... but hey, I'm on holidays). She had an accident of sorts. Her beak is all wonky and one wing is itsy bisty... kinda like Nemo! Her top beak bit always points West while her bottom beak bit always points North. Don't know why she's like this, but I get a little happy feeling inside when she's the only chicken in the other pen, so she gets full peck at the chicken feed trough while the others are climbing ontop of each other trying to get a few kernels in the other trough. "hah, dumb chickens" we laugh together. (likely just me laughing.. but I like to believe she gets me). Then while the chickens are all happily pecking away at their breakfast, I watch Luke feed the piggies. We got new piggies the other day, after the other much larger and "porky" looking piggies got "sent away". These newbies are much more shy and timid. Luke heaves a bunch of scraps and yuck stuff over the fence into their trough... and almost automatically, a few chickens come racing over to see what's going on with the pigs. There are usually one or two chickens in the piggy trough, pecking away at old vegetable scraps, bread, meat, leftovers, etc, along with the piggies! Silly chickens. Don't they know I gave them plenty of chicken feed?
Make a cup of coffee, two scoops of instant crystals, one sugar (sometimes two), and a dollop of milk from Licky the cow. Sip coffee while reading a chapter of current book on the beautiful back deck in the crisp sunshine. Finish coffee, realize its much too hot out already for jeans and a sweater, go change into grubby shorts and grubby tank top (same rules as other "grubby" items).
Grab gumboots (there are a few pairs for wwoofers to use) and bucket for chicken feed, wander down towards the chickens. Enter first paddock that is empty, see all chickens at the fence, happily awaiting the arrival of food, pretend they're just excited to see me, try to get them more excited with a few high pitched "chicky chicky chicky" calls, feel happy that they're suddenly jumping on top of each other trying to get closer to me. (clearly it has nothing to do with the food in my swinging white bucket!!) Enter the chicken pen, feel overwhelmed with the amount of clucking chickens surrounding my feet and making it very difficult to walk without stepping on one and feeling bad for the terrible "SQWAK" I'd hear, then thinking "Hey! I'm the boss here, outta my way chickens!" Sadly, the chickens are clever little buggers. They know that white bucket = chicken feed, therefore they try not to let it out of their sight. I try tricking them by throwing a handful of chicken feed over to the left, then I quickly scurry over to the mini chicken-trough and start pouring the chicken feed into it. Usually as soon as I begin to pour the chickens are climbing on top of the trough and bucket and themselves.. so I devised a plan. Now I pour a little into the trough, get them all excited and munching away, then I secretly scurry away to the other chicken pen (which they have full access to, I'm not that tricky!) and pour the rest of the feed into the other trough. Usually over at this trough is my little chicken friend that I call Dementee. (maybe not PC... but hey, I'm on holidays). She had an accident of sorts. Her beak is all wonky and one wing is itsy bisty... kinda like Nemo! Her top beak bit always points West while her bottom beak bit always points North. Don't know why she's like this, but I get a little happy feeling inside when she's the only chicken in the other pen, so she gets full peck at the chicken feed trough while the others are climbing ontop of each other trying to get a few kernels in the other trough. "hah, dumb chickens" we laugh together. (likely just me laughing.. but I like to believe she gets me). Then while the chickens are all happily pecking away at their breakfast, I watch Luke feed the piggies. We got new piggies the other day, after the other much larger and "porky" looking piggies got "sent away". These newbies are much more shy and timid. Luke heaves a bunch of scraps and yuck stuff over the fence into their trough... and almost automatically, a few chickens come racing over to see what's going on with the pigs. There are usually one or two chickens in the piggy trough, pecking away at old vegetable scraps, bread, meat, leftovers, etc, along with the piggies! Silly chickens. Don't they know I gave them plenty of chicken feed?
 Chicken Run - "i don't want to be a pie, i don't like gravy" |  Piggy Piggy Piggy Piggy Piggy Piggy |
Deanna's Random Thoughts
| Lately I've been reading a new author, Marian Keyes. One of the books I read is very similar to what I wrote here, very short, basic and to the point. I have found that at night I now dream about my days in this style, so I thought I would try recording it. Quite fun to write! On the topic of reading.. since coming to New Zealand I have managed to read five books! Quite a lot for me, as I never read very often in Victoria. Must be all this free time and free space in my brain :) is it bad that i'm really really excited for my birthday in 5 days? turning 25 doesn't mean I'm now too old to get excited about it right?  woooohoooo! | Have you ever taken the time to notice how your brain receptors adapt? I have been in one place for over two weeks now..the longest in one place since arriving in New Zealand.. and just today I was reflecting on the things that I noticed when I first arrived here, and how they now slip past my radar. I often imagine that as a "newbie" to an area (to a country, a region, a situation, etc) the things that your brain records as observations can often be completely different to what it records after some time. Once seeing something a few times, it just becomes normal, not worthy of consciously recognizing. So then it led me to wonder, am I still recognizing it, and my brain has simply decided that I have already given myself time to think about it, so there is no longer a need to do this again? Or do I just no longer recognize it? .... these are the random thoughts that I have to hold myself back from waking Luke up in the middle of the night to discuss with him... he doesn't seem to find life quite so interesting and mysterious as I do at 2am. Hmmmm Music for your ears :-) |
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