Rotten Eggs

Farmer Food Lady would like to teach all y’all city folk a little lesson about the perils of non-urban living.  I mean, besides the fact that right now I really want potato chips, and the nearest store is, like, far… and all my Facebook friends are ignoring my pleas for someone to bring me chips.

Anyhoo.  When one free ranges ducks, one runs the risk of ducks laying their eggs anywhere they damn well please, because ducks are assholes.  And not only are they assholes, they are lazy and/or stupid assholes who either forget where they laid their eggs, or grow tired of sitting on them and abandon them for something better, like a piece of corn.

When one has acres of overgrowth and free ranges ducks, and one ALSO has something called A Terrier, one will periodically be called upon to remove stolen-slash-found eggs from said Terrier’s mouth.  Because one does not know when that egg was laid, and what state of decomposition it might be in.

And so begins my cautionary tale.

You know that eggs rot.  You know that rotten eggs “smell like sulphur” and that gas companies use an additive to make dangerous, odourless gas “smell” like rotten eggs. But I am here to tell you that YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT A ROTTEN EGG SMELLS LIKE, ACTUALLY.  Specifically, you have no idea what a fertilized egg that has been roasting in the sun for days or even weeks smells like.  It smells like you murdered it, rolled it in decaying fish, buried it in manure, basted it with goat urine, ate it and then vomited it back up.  Oh and also you’re a rotting animated corpse that has been roaming the country feasting on human flesh for a millennia.

Eggs that go bad like this smell like nothing on earth that you have ever smelled before or will ever smell again.  The mere hint of the smell will trigger your gag reflex.  A whole egg-full of it will cause you to projectile vomit for like 9 straight days because, as an added bonus, the smell adheres to anything it comes into contact with with the tenacity of super glue.  And sometimes, when they are feeling playful, they will randomly explode.  They’re super cheeky that way.

So today when Winter popped out of the underbrush with a blue egg in his mouth I went into Happy Mommy mode and cooed at him to bring me his Precious for which I would offer cheese or gold or my first born child in exchange.  He brought the egg to my feet and dropped it … and it cracked.  And as I bent down to touch it, the delightful aroma reached my nose at the same time my fingers touched it.

So I screamed.

I scooped it up with the Chuck-It as I fought the urge to vomit and I used the Chuck-It to lob it through the air into the goat pasture where it would be safe from dogs.  As it arced gracefully against the sky, backlit by the afternoon sun, it exploded mid air like a Canada Day firework.  That was three hours ago, and if you go outside right now you can actually air scent its path through the cosmos.  I dropped the Chuck-It in the duck pool and ran for the house with my hand held as far away from me as possible and collapsed on the kitchen sink, gagging, as I scrubbed my hand with dish soap, an SOS pad, bleach – whatever was handy.  And when I rose to dry my bloody papery skin bag of a hand I looked out the window to see Spring and Mini Mama taking turns rolling in the egg stink on the gravel that the crack had left behind.

I hate this dog.

And I hate this dog.

And I especially hate this dog.

All these dogs also hate me, because they all got a bath.  Winter didn’t actually smell bad, I just did it out of spite.

For good measure I’m gonna hate this dog too, because I think he was laughing at me.

I don’t hate this dog though, because she’s my good girl.  Those of you on Facebook know that a week ago she had a vestibular attack and scared me half to death because although I am familiar with vestibular, I am not familiar with it in my own dogs as none of mine has ever had it before.  Not even Gemma, and she was born around the same time as Jesus.  So we’ve had a trying week of falling down and eyes darting back and forth and getting stuck between walls and furniture and no appetite.  But she’s improving day by day – she can get up and down the porch stairs on her own now, though sometimes she misses the door and gets stuck on the porch, and she “plays ball” with the other dogs every day. I’m not taking her hiking anymore, and I do have to trick her into eating by putting food on the floor and telling her to “quick!  Get it!”, and she has a wicked head tilt … but she soldiers on.  Thank doG.

So I’ve had my bad run of threes, right?  Cyrus blocking, Dexter trying to break a puppy, and now Piper?  Gosh it would be such a shame if something happened to Peetie.  Boy would I ever be devastated.  It’d be awful if she drowned.

Or jumped face-first into a fence full of blackberries.

Or some other horrible fate I don’t have a photo illustration of.

Actually the dog who is probably going to drown is Miss Chase The Water Droplets.  Can’t keep Addy out of the pool for anything!

Except when she’s standing on guard with Alfie.

Alfie is boarding with me off and on for the next several months.  He’s 120lbs of the nicest dog you’ve ever met in your life.  He’s super easy going, lets the puppies skitter and climb all over him when he’s in the house, which is like, almost never because he spends 99% of his time out in the yard sleeping amongst the poultry and getting up to do a tour of the property perimeter to let everyone know he’s on duty.  Even TWooie only objected to him for about 20 minutes and then decided he was totally cool.  I luff him!  I kinda wish he never had to go back to his real home.

And speaking of going home … the puppies are now EIGHT WEEKS OLD.  I can’t even believe this and have checked the calendar like 7 times to be sure I didn’t suffer a head injury and lose like a month of my life.  Soon they will be leaving for their new foster homes (in singles, rather than as a group, because while I may be talented at several (okay a couple) things, housebreaking 4 puppies simultaneously is not one of my talents.  I mean let’s face it, I had to give up area rugs because I can’t even get Addy to stop peeing on anything soft on the floor.

This little tan boogityboo was my favourite puppy from day one, but as he has grown up, his lung capacity has exceeded his small stature by an alarming amount and he NEVER F*CKING SHUTS UP.  He’s really loud and bossy, hates being left alone and is convinced that near constant shrieking will entice me to let him out of the xpen.  It’s fairly safe to say that he is no longer my favourite, and has slid way down the list to last place on the charts.

Ginormo Girl remains a third or so bigger than all her siblings, and though she started out as one of the shyest puppies, she has blossomed into this super hilarious little dog who gives me the awesome photo ops ever!  She’s absolutely hilarious and launches herself through the air at me every time she sees me.

Her black and tan brother is easily the most middle of the road puppy in the history of puppies.  He’s so average.  Like super sweet and such, just as the rest of them are, but he stands out in no way at all.  He’s just really darn nice!

But this little darlin’ is my hands down favourite now.  She is beyond sweet and cuddly, and gives me full on whole body wiggles when I call her.  She’s snuggly and hilarious and throws herself on her back, wiggling away, with a little neon sign flashing “LOVE ME PLEASE” over her.  She’s the one that will follow me from room to room, and was the first one to learn to go down the porch stairs on her own.  I love her!

The black and tan ones are very long, longer than they are tall, and pretty tube shaped, so I wonder if they have dachshund or beagle or something in them.  The brindle and white female has really long floppy ears.  The tan guy is smaller and taller than the rest, but his ears look like they might one day stand up.  I can’t even begin to guess who the baby daddy(ies) was!

They’re so small it’s easy to forget that they are the age that many puppies go to their news homes at!  So I am going to miss them a ton, but they’re ready to move on and make the transition to adolescents in their new homes.  Also I will not miss the pooping.  So. Much. Pooping.

But so much cute!

Unfortunately, because of timing and the generous folks who donated to brown puppy’s vet bill, we didn’t get a ton of suggestions for the naming fundraiser, but the ones we did get were pretty cool, so it’s time to vote on them!

• The fairies from A Midsummer Night Dream –  Peaseblossom (big girl), Cobweb (tiny brown puppy), Moth, and Mustardseed (twins)
• Names from Murdoch Mysteries (Canadian, albeit eastern Canada): William (or Wills), Julia, Thomas, Jonny, Emily (or variations on those names)

I should have started the contest earlier and posted it in more places, but time just gets away from me these days.  Nevertheless, post your favourites in the comments … or if you have other suggestions, why not post them too and we can do a vote at the end of the week?

Here’s a random photo of Fae guarding an egg.  After this afternoon’s escapades, she can just HAVE THE F*CKING THING.

 

And here’s a composite of four photos of puppies being weighed for deworming, which I posted on Facebook a while back.

I’ve been teaching myself to composite because I want to up what I have to offer in the photo department, and also because it’s fun to make something out of something else.  This is my latest one, which I am SUPER proud of, that I did for a client.  She’s finally seen it, so I ca finally share it!

This is the original, straight out of the camera shot, taken in the evening on the mushroom manure pile in the back field:

And this is what I turned it into through the magic of photoshop!

What do you think??