Friday Funny Farm Report

As some of you realize by now, it seems that the funny farm report is not as consistent as it was and for that I apologize. With the new filly to care for and the work that it takes to keep the farm running smooth, it is a busy time. On top of that, school has started on the funny farm so there are many fewer hours in a week now for my writing. I am going to try to do my best to keep this report on time from now on but please bear with me while I reorganize my schedule and try to fit life into it.

The filly is doing good. She turned two weeks old this past Tuesday and I must say that I am surprised with what they can do at two weeks old. She has been running and playing in the field and seems to enjoy the attention that she gets when we go to play with her. We have named her Cinnamon's Vanilla Sundae and I refer to her as Sundae. Cinnamon is her mom's dad and since we bought her from a sale and we aren't sure who the father was, we decided to include mom's name in with hers. Cinnamon seems to be doing well too as she is beginning to gain weight and she protects the baby as much as she can. It is so rewarding to watch her as she is guiding the filly on where she can go and what she will allow her to do.

All of the other animals are doing well. Arnold, my pig, has decided that he needs more attention than he is getting and so when I go out back to feed or anything, he is constantly oinking until I pay attention to him. Some days that can be just a few words to him and yet, other days it is a stop at his pen and talking to him and petting him. He is getting bigger now too and seems to be getting red hair on him instead of the white that he had for so long.

Our duck sat on eggs for over 6 weeks and the eggs never hatched, so we decided to remove the eggs as they could not be fertile eggs. I must say that I was disappointed as I was certain that by now we would have baby ducks. I was looking forward to that as I had decided that they would be more fun to watch grow than the baby chicks that we see many times. Maybe next spring, I will get that pleasure of watching her hatch some.

We seem to be in the midst of a drought here in central Indiana as I am not sure of when it rained the last time. During the spring, it seemed to rain most days and we were all so tired of it. I remember thinking that we would want the rain in August and I was certainly right. I believe that we had one of the driest , if not the driest August's on record. The heat that we seen in August was also extreme, but I am thankful and happy to say that it has been a little better. We have gotten a break from the hot and extremely humid weather that we were getting. Matter of fact, yesterday morning was quite enjoyable as most of the day was as well. Yesterday evening as we were attending a music show at a local park, we had to put sweaters on as it got down into the 50's and with a breeze, it was a little cool. I believe that the high today is going to be 70 which should make for some nice riding later.

Speaking of riding, I am happy to announce that we did return to the state park to go camping and riding last weekend and we rode without getting lost this time. Although, it does not make for the same story that getting lost in the woods made, it was much more enjoyable. The weather was much nicer and we did ride several trails without getting lost. We even took off on the same trail on Sunday that we had ridden and walked the night we were lost and enjoyed the trip this time. It was about a 21/2 hour trail ride through the park with very nice scenery during the day. It seemed that the parks department had been through the trail with some sort of heavy equipment and cleaned the trails up as there were not trees across it and things that we had to deal with the night we were lost. My daughter and I both feel that we have conquered the trail now.

My husband is moving a little slow as he has a severe infection in his foot at the moment. He has been working down south cleaning up a farm. He has been in a lot of weeds for days on end and the chiggers have been extremely bad (possibly due to the weather). He came home a couple of weeks ago with several bites on his ankles and lower leg area. I treated them with some medicine but as anyone knows chigger bites itch intensely and he is not one that can not scratch. Well, he continue scratching one of them and it must have gotten infection from dirt under his nails into it. When he came home on Thursday of this week, he complained that his foot was swollen so I immediately went into nurse mode and asked him to remove his shoe. His foot was red and extremely swollen and you could see that the spot was infected. I treated it and bandaged it and left it alone, but yesterday when I removed the bandage it seemed to be worse as the redness in the foot was spreading. Once again, I treated it with some antibiotic cream and peroxide and I bandaged it again. We will see what it looks like today. I have already informed him that if it is worse, he will have to make a trip to the doctor. Of course, as with most men I know, he says it will get better and he doesn't need a doctor. However, this time I will have to stand up and make him go as I know that it can only get worse if he doesn't get it treated.

As most of you know,my mom lives with us and now we also have my brother living with us. He is a 38 year old kid who needs guidance but doesn't realize it. He can't seem to make the right choices in life and that leads to many problems. He really needs help in the grown up department and I am hoping that he will see that. He doesn't seem to like responsibilities or authority and we all know that makes for an unappreciative adult. We have already seen many issues with him that he really needs to work on and yet, doesn't want to listen to anyone's advice. It is sad! I have been telling my husband that this house is just not big enough for all of us and that we need to get someone moved out.

Well, I guess I have talked enough this week so I will close this for now and I will write again next week. Until then "y'all have a great day and I hope you will stop by next week to hear the funny farm report".