Friday afternoon, Bob came by my office and told me that he had Oliver’s sister if we wanted to take her. I went over to his house Saturday morning, and he caught the kitten for me. He flipped it over and said “hey, this is a male!” Long story short, we took Oliver’s brother. He looks a lot like Norman, instead of Oliver. I put him in the dog kennel, and he began running laps around it looking for a way out. I forgot that I had left the second kennel door unlatched the day before, and when he bumped into it, the door flew open. He took off. Of course, I couldn’t catch him. The good news is that he’s still hanging out in our barn, and last night I saw him inside the kennel eating. Norman is still sticking around also. I managed to catch him this weekend and hold him for a few minutes. He wasn’t too thrilled about it, but he didn’t put up a fight. Oliver is still Oliver, and now he’s found a better place to sleep than the beanbags - our bed!

Saturday I made my first attempt at canning salsa from scratch. I chopped jalapeño peppers and about a million little yellow tomatoes, as well as a half dozen other ingredients. It took HOURS, and I got FOUR pint jars. We haven’t tried it yet, but if it’s not the best salsa I’ve ever eaten, I’m NEVER doing it from scratch again.

Yesterday I helped Steve dig a trench and run the phone line from the barn to the trailer. He hasn’t gotten everything hooked up on the ends yet, but all the underground work is finished.

Also, we moved the chicken tractor yesterday. We’re getting ready to build them a permanent coop behind the barn, so we wanted to migrate their ‘home base’ toward its future location. Well after dark last night, they still hadn’t found where we moved the tractor. They were running around crazy making all kinds of noise and looking for places to roost. Stupid chickens. Hazel tried to jump onto the front of the 4-runner, and Gertrude managed to nest about 7 feet up in a tree. We moved their tractor back to its normal location, and Hazel made her way inside. Gertrude was settled into the tree just over Steve’s head. Somehow he was able to grab her out of the tree, wings flailing and squawking up a storm. Once he got a good hold on her, she settled down and we petted her before he put her back in the tractor.

Our propane tank is supposed to be delivered tomorrow afternoon. We’re looking forward to being able to turn on the heater in the mornings.