pacificpikachu | Feathery hellos and goodbyes

*Phew* I'm sorry about the lack of update yesterday... By the time I actually had time to sit down and write in my LiveJournal at the end of the day, I was so exhausted I pretty much just conked out right away. Today was even more busy than yesterday, but I feel like I should write.

Yesterday, I spent very very close to the whole day working on the chicken coop. There was sweat, blood, and...uh...money. No tears. Tears are not needed for chicken coops. XD; The guy who is building it, Al, is a pretty nice guy, so Ryan and I talked to him as we worked. We got all cut up, dirty, scratched, and such, but it was actually not too bad. I took breaks to check on the jays, and at the end of all that work, I treated myself to watching the newest Haruhi episode and reading the first four chapters of the novel. Both were glorious, of course. It's Haruhi--there's no way it can't be glorious!

Today was completely nuts. I spent the whole morning making about three hundred phone calls, trying to get the jays to a flight cage. Eventually I worked it out, though Mom got mad at me because she didn't want to give them a ride to Auburn (Jacqui and Chip ended up taking them). We were supposed to bring them to Jacqui's before my appointment with Sierra College, but we were too late to the Sierra College appointment so the poor guys had to stay in the car.

The Sierra College appointment was...er...I can't decide if it was uplifting or scary. ._.; It's a little scary because I'm signed up for frickin' Physics (*weeps silently*) and I'm scared out of my mind over that, but on the other hand I also got to sign up for Psychology. They couldn't sign me up for an English or Math class yet because I need to take the assessment test first, but...um...not looking forward to all that science and math... Oh well. I'm determined to be a vet, and if that means willing myself to sit through godawful math and science classes and actually doing well in them, I guess that's what I have to do. Anyway, the appointment only took a half-hour or so, so it wasn't too bad length-wise.

After that was all over, we went to Jacqui's with the jays. While I was there, Janey was there, too, so I got to see the poor injured adult Band Tailed Pigeon she's working with, and I also chose what three birds I'm going to have next. Two of them are baby Tohees, which are SO CUTE I can't even tell you, and the third is going to be a baby flycatcher with airsacks, who I haven't gotten to see yet. Poor guy. I'm going to have to help him out. I'm sure I'll have more than that, too. Unfortunately, it means I had to turn down a baby jay tonight, but I'm hoping he'll go somewhere else. If not, I might end up with him, too.

Then I had to say goodbye to my loveleh jays, which I shall miss a lot even if they squawk constantly. What will I do without my adorable jay husband?! Really, though, my room seems very vacant and quiet without them. I'm gonna miss those little guys... T_T

Once I said my goodbyes, we went and did chores for a while. This was boring and uneventful, other than buying some dowels for perches in the chicken coop and considering buying an electric fence to put around the chicken coop. Oh, and going to Ridge Feed to get chicken food, straw, and stuff. I won't recount any more than that--it was hopelessly dull. While we were at Grocery Outlet, Karen (Jake's mom) showed up and picked Ryan up, so once we got rid of him we headed off to Rusty's house to get the chickens.

Catching the chickens was actually considerably easier than I thought it would be. It took about a half hour, all in all, but basically I had to do was strategize to capture them, grab them, and stuff them in boxes. I felt bad for them, but chickens aren't easily stressed animals, so they were okay. I managed to stick all fourteen of them (I thought there were eighteen, but apparently I was counting Rusty's chickens, too) in three boxes, so that was a success. The ride home went without a hitch, and when we got home we let them run around in the new (BIG, but sadly unfinished) coop for a while. I had no idea what to do with them for the night, though, so I re-caught them all (this time, it was harder) and stuck them all in a cage. They didn't like it one bit, but I thought it seemed safe.

I continued doing chores (cleaned the cockatiel cage, the now-vacant jay cage, the cat litter, covered the guinea pigs for the night, unloaded the dishes, made phone calls, etc.) for a while, but when I went to check on the chickens again they had apparently not fallen asleep, and there were also dogs barking all around the neighborhood right around where the coop is. I took that (and an odd rustle in the bushes) as evidence that there are wild scoundrels afoot, so I no longer felt so confident about the chickens in the cage in the coop. Ryan arrived home while I started putting straw in the shed, and so he helped me spread straw and move the chickens (cage and all) into the shed. I think they're a lot safer there--I'm no longer nervous about them.

So, that was my day. It's supposedly my "day off" as far as birds are concerned, but...uh...it didn't end up as much of a day off. Oh well. I'm looking forward to meeting my next birds, and I hope they'll be young enough that I can easily tote them around.

Here's a quiz from