Cook out, little successes, the chase

We got word Saturday morning that our Chinese New Year Dinner had to be cancelled. Alex simply texted that his fryer had quit, and we would not be having the dinner. What we assumed was that the actual piece of equipment at the restaurant had failed and would need to be replaced – a very expensive endeavor. What actually happened was that the person working with him in the kitchen had quit and he was working the kitchen alone. That made more sense. We had scheduled to bring him some older hens over the weekend, but that did not happen because of how drastically his workload picked up. We grilled out instead. It was perfect weather for it. Between bus calling in the morning and working a couple hours on our business – with men’s prayer time thrown in – we had a pretty full Saturday.

Sunday started our revival. Bro. Dan Martin is the evangelist preaching the services. This year has turned out a bit differently for all of us. There is a lot of flu in the area and our church is no exception demographically. Even Bro. Dan came to us with some type of bronchial issue. He is doing his best to get through the preaching but it is clear that he is struggling to keep his voice strong enough. Even still, his messages have been poignant and powerful; though less vocally dramatic. Last night, his voice seemed a little better, but he struggled with a cough through the message. He simply asked a series of challenging questions, then shifted gears and listed a series of questions Jesus asked of those around him. It certainly got his point across.

Yesterday Mama and I kept the kids so Nate and Cori could take their travel vehicle and get the alignment and brakes checked. They knew it would take some time, so they planned a date-time around the repairs. Since Mama needed to go to Walmart, she took all the girls shopping and I stayed at the farm and worked while the boys played nearby. I was able to install the walkthrough door on the shop and weld up a gate on the fence we are installing for a new goat enclosure. The boys entertained themselves with a mix of Nintendo, trash collection using some plastic rods as spears to stab everything they found and eventually sitting nearby and talking. By the time the girls got home, they were ready for lunch. Me too.

Shortly after lunch, while I was working on setting posts for the fence I had installed the gate on, Mama came hurriedly out of the house yelling for me. Lin had called. He and Alex wanted us to deliver a goat and two chickens to them between 6 and 7 pm that evening. Mama was a bit overwhelmed by the suddenness of the request. I had to drop what I was doing and get things set up for the delivery. I saw it as an answer to prayer because we needed to sell out Billy goat and they were interested – at a very fair price. I backed the truck up to the back gate of the yard and loaded the dog cage into the bed. The cage for the chickens was already in the bed of the truck.

When the time came, Nate helped me drag, lead, chase, herd our stubborn little Billy across the yard to the truck and load him into the cage. He bucked, he flopped, he tried to run. I used a choker collar and leash hoping to lead him through the yard but eventually had to get my hand at the chain near his throat so he would not strangle himself and drag him every step of the way. It honestly did not take very long. It just felt like it. Now we had to catch the chickens.

We had all the help we could handle for that portion. All our grandkids wanted to participate. Blake wanted gloves and all Mama could find were some plastic, food service gloves. Mama scattered some bread pieces and the chickens gathered around her. That was the last time that evening they would do so. As soon as I caught the first hen, the rest scattered – and the chase was on. The kids dove, pounced, tried to corner and chased chickens all across the coop area. They even stuck out their legs toward an escaping bird as though they were a ball rolling across the ground. Over and over, the birds won the contest until finally, we caught three total.

The rest are now so traumatized that we will probable not get any eggs the rest of the week.