Up before the chickens, reader

This morning Cindy left very early to drive cross state to attend a fitness certification seminar.  Of course she was worried about the chickens, I assured her I would take care of it.  In order for me to clean their coop and still leave the house on time I had to head outside before sunrise, around 6:35.  Even with turning on the coop light, only a few chickens were brave enough to get off the perch.  They have very poor vision in low light conditions.   I wound up picking up several of them and placing them on the ground which they seemed to appreciate.

Since the motor for the chicken door was sent out for replacement we have to manually open and close the door each day, securing it with a spring clamp for now.  After dropping down the feeders which we hang high at night to keep them out of field mouse range I went inside to begin the coop cleaning which I do via mouth breathing the entire time to avoid the smell.

We used to have shavings on the ground that we would have to pick through and refresh daily after pushing down any poop that is on the roost into the shavings as well.  It was tedious, time consuming, and you never got all of the poop no matter how much you tried.  A few months ago we instead bought rubber mats that Cindy cut to fit the dimensions of the floor under the perch.  We now simply pull the mats out of the coop each morning and blast them clean with our fire hose nozzle.  Sure the mats look absolutely disgusting each morning after 11 chickens pooping on them all night but clean up is very, very simple.  The mess dissolves almost instantly under water pressure.

I was able to get the coop cleaned, birds fed and mats hung out to dry in the span of 15 minutes.  Hell I had enough time to even fill up the Tacoma with gas on my way to work and still arrive on time.

Last night I finished reading the first of a long series of Warcraft books, a Christmas gift I received from Cindy.  Although as an adult, I have never been a consistent reader, the times where I have plowed into books I always find it enjoyable.  The Warcraft books paint a huge and detailed back story to the game I have been playing for over a decade.  Even if you could give two shits about the game, if you are into Lord of the Rings type stories I am pretty sure you would find these books very interesting as well.

The first book was published somewhere around 2004/2005.  I just tracked down the second and third installment in the series on Amazon for less than 10 bucks each.  Sure I love watching TV but the quiet solitude of reading a good book is something I should be doing more often to help balance things out.  After all moderation is the key when it comes to most things in life.