And on the home front...

Every so often I get the urge to write about something other than dry eye... and this is one of those days.

On the farm, the garden is winding down though we're still getting tomatoes, squash and (finally) eggplants. Also getting lots of peppers from the greenhouse. The apple trees are still showering us with far more fruit than I can deal with and they are sooo tasty.

The hens are being naughty. Very, very naughty. They have taken to hiding their eggs - always a risk with free-ranging chickens - and so we're only getting about half as many as we should be. It's all one hen's fault. She gets in one of the nest boxes and sits there half the day and kicks up a fuss at anybody that comes near her. At first, all the hens would line up nicely and wait their turn but they eventually got tired of waiting for Ms. Broody and started finding better spots. So, today I finally gritted my teeth and shut them in the chicken tractor for the day. If they get tired of waiting, they can lay in a corner of the roost which has plenty of straw.

We now have two more batches of birds, all for meat. Actually, two plus. There are three birds that were hatched from our own Australorp eggs and they should be ready to go in another couple of weeks. Then there's a mixed batch (variety of breeds), originally 25 but now down to 17 after a predator attack, that should be ready for the knife in about 6 weeks or so, and finally my husband talked me into getting yet another batch of 25 which just arrived yesterday and is peeping up a storm in their brooder in the mud room. Those ones are Barred Rocks, bought for no better reason than that the Mixed Bird Surprise batch that I got the last time had several of them and I thought they were pretty. As 2-day-olds they are adorable.

By the way, if you've never had home-raised organic chicken, you are missing out.

We've had a beautiful fall, warm and sunny a lot of the time though we're getting into the 30s here at night now, and I have been absolutely itching to get outside and dig up the garden or do SOMETHING, but just have not had any spare time. Hopefully I will still get a chance before the weather turns to the dreaded Grey, Cold and Wet of Puget Sound Novembers.

Our new (well, new to us) furnace is now finally fully installed and keeping things toasty warm. I think next I'll be firing up the humidifier.

As to family... Many months ago I posted (probably on the bulletin board, not here, come to think of it) about my husband having a degenerative brain disorder. Things have changed, so I thought I'd give a little update. Panos had severe dementia symptoms last year and because of his history, we had tentatively concluded it was primary. However, with a change of medications and a change of scene (his mother gave me a caregiving break for quite awhile earlier this year) that has actually backed off and the neurologist has now concluded it was pseudodementia, which is a huge relief. And as an aside... if you think dry eye is a complex area of medicine or if you've ever felt there's some kind of training gap between ophthalmology and dermatology... the spectrum from neurology to psychiatry is worse, trust me. Google frontotemporal dementia for more info.

So meantime, while I'm terribly thankful that we no longer seem to have a life-limiting diagnosis there is plenty on the plate with a cocktail of psychiatric and cognitive disorders of unknown origin. Between caregiving, running a little business and homeschooling my little girl I am in no danger of boredom anytime soon. :-)