Tag mareks disease vaccination

I had a lot of things I wanted to get done on Saturday, so much that I pulled out one of my infamous lists to keep me on track.  One of the first things I wanted to get done was giving the 11 chicks the Marek’s vaccine we bought online.  Both Cindy and I were nervous about the process since we never did it before but I had a step by step guide I printed off a website to help us out.  The process of preparing a vaccine was not what I expected, where you are injecting stuff between two vials, the actual vaccine and a jar of dilutant to make the finished product.

We set up a table in the garage along with the chicken run to put the chicks into after we vaccinated each one.  Cindy did most of the dirty work, my primary responsibility was to try to hold the chicks still while Cindy injected .2 ML of the vaccine into the pinched skin on the back of their necks.  Of course the chicks were not big fans of the process but for the most part it went well.  We had all 11 chicks done in around 20 minutes.  We now can only hope the vaccine does it’s job and helps the birds live a Mareks-free life.

To be more efficient we had Cindy do a Rural King run while I walked around and weed whacked the property.  She also did a thorough cleaning of the chicken tractor while we had the chicks in the front yard in the chicken run.  As the chicks get older and older, clean up of their living quarters is a more and more steady requirement.  I do not think once we move them outside to live in the chicken tractor in a week or so that all 11 birds will be able to live in there for very long. It’s just going to be too little space for too many birds.

We pulled the 5 younger chicks out for a short period of time and let them run around free under our close supervision.  The older birds bully the younger ones so it was nice for them to be able to do their own thing without the black chicks pecking them on the rear end.

Lola still has been pretty static in her condition, not acting significantly better or worse over the weekend.  Lucy still is acting just fine.  She wowed Cindy and I on Saturday when she managed to get all the way to the top perch in the chicken run, right below the roof.

I feel bad for Lucy.  Because Lola’s energy level is not good we have been leaving both of them inside the coop/run for longer periods of the day instead of letting them free range all day long.  I feel bad restricting Lucy but I would feel equally bad for Lola if she was stuck in the coop while Lucy ran around unencumbered.

On Saturday evening Cindy and I went to see San Andreas.  As we approached the theater we drove into a torrential downpour.  I dropped Cindy off closer to the ticket window and then parked the Prius in the back.  Despite the rain still falling at a downpour rate, I walked the couple hundred yards to the theater without even a hint of a slight jog.  I just don’t care much about getting wet.  By the time I met up with Cindy my white long sleeve shirt was drenched.  I surely would have won a wet t-shirt contest.

Cindy bought the tickets while I was walking up.  She told me that the staff warned her ahead of time that the AC was malfunctioning in the theater the movie was playing in.  Well I figured it was a good thing that I was soaked, perhaps it would help me stay more comfortable during the two hours.  It was warm in there but not unbearable.  It’s the second time we have had the AC in a theater at Coconut Pointe go out, the first time was REALLY noticeable.

The movie was full of absolutely A+ level visuals.  The level and detail of destruction depicted in the movie was perhaps worth the price of admission just to see in large screen, 3D, immersive format.  Of course the rest of the movie could not be all A+, disaster movies usually put so much emphasis on how things look that how things feel often gets secondary attention.  The movie is filled with situation after situation with outcomes that are just not unlikely, they are absolutely beyond the realm of the remotest of possibilities.  Sure, it’s a movie so you expect that to a degree but this seemed sort of ridiculous at times.  Despite the plot’s deviation into crazy town overall the movie was entertaining enough overall to earn a B+ rating.  If you are up in the air over a desire to move to California anytime soon I would suggest you don’t go see this movie. 🙂

Sunday morning we picked up the dogs early for a one night stay over.  After we got back Cindy and I did a very different type of exercise, something that used to be a 3-4 times a week thing for me, practice volleyball.  The reason this idea came to us was an email I got late in the week about the the beach vb series I used to play in making a stop in Fort Myers next weekend.  I mentioned the idea to Cindy of her and I playing co-ed doubles, despite Cindy having no beach volleyball experience and me not touching a volleyball for well over two years.  If I was going to consider this I would need to try to give Cindy a crash course in the sport.

On our runs through the nearby gated development I had noticed they had a basic beach volleyball court.  We drove down to convenience store, parked and then walked the roughly half mile to the court.  Not only was Cindy’s lack of vb experience a concern, my general poor condition of my joints was another issue.  My right knee has been feeling generally poor for a couple months, running, jumping and diving in sand is definitely not going to help matters.  But regardless of these issues it didn’t hurt to get out there and see how it goes.

Cindy is athletic, has good hand eye coordination and is a hustler by nature, three attributes that would give her a headstart.  We went through a number of drills including passing, setting, serving and hitting.  Although her technique needs work, for it being the first time on a beach court I thought she did very well.  My volleyball skills needed a bunch of WD 40 as well.  Towards the end of our practice I was feeling a little better but I have no doubt in a game situation I would be making a lot of unforced errors.

Cindy was surprised how hard she was working.  She was soaked with sweat and breathing heavy early on, aided by the fact that she insisted on running after most balls that went rolling off the court.  We finished up the workout with pass, set hit, drills.  We actually had a handfull of them that went like the should, with the ball getting driven relatively hard to the other side of the court.

Cindy’s body was not used to the impact of a relatively heavy beach volleyball on her forearms and hands.  She had clear bruises all over the place.  In addition she was hurting in various other places.  Even if you are in great shape, volleyball makes you utilize your joints and muscles in ways that are normally foreign.  I was feeling it as well although not quite as severely as Cindy was.  At this point I don’t know that jumping headfirst into a tournament would be a wise move without a more gradual practice curve leading to game conditions.

Early Sunday afternoon I tasked myself with giving Nicki a haircut with the clippers. Ali said she was shedding like crazy and her coat was looking very shaggy so I figured it made sense.  In the past Cindy has been the one trimming Nicki, this was my first time doing it solo.  I was out there buzzing away for close to 45 minutes I bet and could have spent another 30 probably.  Nicki was unwilling to stand for the process so I had to do the best I could with her laying down on each side.  When I was done there was a massive halo of black fur surrounding us.

Ever since Friday when I stopped at Sam’s Club for a few things I have been fighting an impulse buy for a 4K tv.  They had a Vizio 70″ UHDTV set there that I was interested in.  Although not cheap by any means, it was a good value for the money.  I had only a couple reservations.  The idea of losing 3 inches of diagonal size (current Mitsu DLP is 73 inches), seemed like a compromise, even though a 70″ tv is still quite huge in most people’s eyes.

My other concern was buying it at a place like Sam’s versus through my preferred retailer, Amazon.  Buying it through Amazon would allow me to both using my accumulated points to knock down my out of pocket cost AND collect triple points on the purchase to be used in the future.  These two things add up to over $350 in savings.  On the downside, it doesn’t allow me to scratch that impulse itch where you have the item RIGHT NOW.  I would have to wait until June 8th for it to show up.

I got close enough to pulling the trigger that I texted Cindy, asking her if I should do it or not.  After all I certainly don’t need to do it.  My old DLP Mitsubishi tv still works fine, the Vizio would just work/look better.  I didn’t hear back from Cindy before I checked out with my grocery items so the impulse was derailed for now.

Well I still had the idea rolling around in my head most of the weekend.  I texted Ali and asked her if she would want the 73 inch tv for her place since she has more than enough room to accommodate it.  She hasn’t let me know yet if she wants it.  I am basically letting her decision dictate what I am going to do.  If she wants the Mitsubishi I will pull the trigger, if not I will look at as a reason to just stay with what I have.

Here is the TV I am considering in case you are curious.

Yesterday I was out at our annual tax certificate sale where people can “buy” certificates for taxes that have gone unpaid.  It is a way to make a quick 5% on your money at a minimum and a way to potentially get a leg up on buying a delinquent property down the road if the taxes remain unpaid.  The event is held auction style with bidders holding up their bidder number plates.  It works in the opposite direction of a conventional auction however.  The numbers, which are the interest rate the bidder will get, start at 18 and work their way down, all the way to .25%

My role there was just to ensure the hardware/networking portion of the sale went smoothly which it did outside a few brief wifi hiccups.  The rest of the time was just sitting around basically, watching bidder cards flash up and down.  If the boredom wasn’t bad enough, the deep freeze temps they had the AC set at in the auditorium left me chilled to the bone.  Thankfully it is only a once a year event.

I am already emotionally attached to all 11 of the new chicks we have been raising for the past month and a half but I definitely have a favorite, Pumpkin.  Pumpkin is the runt of all of the chicks but she also is one of the most docile/friendly.  When we open the door to the coop she will come right over, hoping Cindy or I will pick her up.  The other day we almost had a baby chick mutiny on our hands when I took Pumpkin out and allowed her to eat exclusive of the other 10.  She seemed so content. It really is interesting just how diverse the personalities of the birds are, something the average, non-chicken owning person would never realize.

The baby chicks are becoming more and more adult in their habits.  Last night was the first time all 11 of them headed up top to roost for the evening together.  A few of them had been doing it for a few days but now it apparently is a total group effort.  Of course they are all growing rapidly, we have to come up with a time line as to when we can move them out of the garage and into the back yard.

There are further complications to that timeline because of Lola’s ailment.  Even though the vet said she has parasites, I am not 100% sure that she doesn’t also have Mareks disease.  My reading about the virus makes it seem it is EXTREMELY easy for bird to get the disease.  A common practice at hatcheries is to immunize baby chicks as soon as they are hatched against Mareks.

We have been trying to find out if the chicks Rural King sells are immunized.  The staff there has proven to be pretty clueless for the most part regarding background of their chicks however last night Cindy was able to get the name of the hatchery in Michigan they get them from.  She is calling them today to find out definitively if the chicks are immunized or not.  If they are not, we have 1000 doses of Mareks vaccine in the fridge that we will be administering to the chicks this weekend.  Unfortunately, the longer you wait to immunize them, the more susceptible they are to getting the disease but it’s still worth doing obviously.  It takes 10 days after the vaccine for the immunity to be developed so that means we should keep them garage bound at least until that amount of time passes.  Of course the logistics of vaccinating 11 high energy, squirmy, baby chickens will be quite challenging and surely require two people.

This weekend has a lot of little to do’s in it which will be peppered with lots of chicken care I am sure.  It almost feels like cheating having another weekend after only three days of work but it’s a situation I could certainly get accustomed to.

Despite recently passing 150k miles on the odometer Cindy’s Prius is still rolling along at a very economical pace.  The car still drives like new, looks great and can still average 50mpg with hybrid sensitive driving habits.  It’s a seriously awesome vehicle.