Too many eggs, Sleeping Dragons, long hours, OOPS, WE are the intruders

My apologies!  It had to be pointed out to me by a couple of die hard readers that it has been way to long since I blogged.  I have excuses.... lots and lots  of them. So, here goes: Since Jimmys birthday we have had a steady stream of visitors...which we have enjoyed immensely, especially the visits from family.   Of particular delight was the visit from Dad and step-Mom.  I just wish they lived closer.  'Course I would seldom see Jimmy if they did.  He'd spend all of his time picking dad's brain for  'how-to's' and arguing politics.
We didn't have enough chairs for all the visitors.  So, I'm slowly fixing that.   The antique mandarin chairs in the dining room just cant handle the amount of butt traffic we asked of them over the last three months. 
Little home owner-y projects that are necessary but to dull to blog about have sucked up our time.  Gardening, canning, soap making,  bread making, cooking from scratch, recycling old things into usable, functional things, raising chickens.... all that is easy.... But, putting a new threshold on the back door and  fastening it to concrete? Cleaning clogs out of forty year old pipes that haven't been cleaned in thirty years?   Continually chasing vermin from walls and attics that have lived here so long they think WE are the intruders? (a spider so big it made Jimmy scream like a girl, crawled from behind the wood stove two weeks ago) .  That foam sealer in the can? Who knew that when you used it to seal cracks to keep out the cold air, that when you came back an hour later it would  look like a snow storm had hit the laundry room?
 I still haven't figured out how to get a covering over the super  sized,  custom made,  sliding glass door in living room.
I'm afraid of the leaky faucet in the kitchen (what if I try to fix it and wind up having to replace ALL the plumbing in the house?)
The vent over the kitchen stove vents back into the kitchen... WTF? Whose lame ass idea was that?
There is no cold water going to the downstairs shower and the only way to find out why is to pull out the shower stall and take a chance  that the whole house will come crashing down around us when we do.  We decided, together, to let that sleeping dragon lie for a while! We have enough mythical monsters nipping at our heels right now to wake one up on purpose!
   That is just the home owner-y things that are sucking up our time.   Jimmy has been working  long-long-long hours.  I see him for about 15 minutes at 5 am and about a half hour around 9 pm.  He's exhausted.  I just cant bring myself to say things like "Honey, I poked a hole in the pipe under the bathroom sink today. (it took me all day to fix it and I now have a crush on the old grizzled guy at Ace Hardware)  Or "Sweetie, I accidentally ran the dishwasher and the microwave  at the same today and when the circuit blew it burned out the microwave.".  I just quietly  bought a new microwave.  When Jimmy saw it and asked about it, I just said  'the old one broke".  He said 'ok' and promptly fell asleep face down in his dinner.
I have been taking classes and auditioning, hoping to get as much commercial work as possible to pay for the plumbing I keep breaking.
I have too many eggs.  For reasons relating to  above complaints, I cant put out my fantasy sign by the roadway yet.  I currently  have 5 dozen eggs in my fridge and by Monday I will have 5 more . Good Typist... please come get some eggs (Feral Jane, ALL  the Chris's  and Christines  that I know, Darling Daughter, Brother Matt and those I haven't mentioned by name... please drop by for some farm fresh eggs).
 

Best parenting EVER, gold panning, free eggs

Back in May I went for a walk down to the river behind my house.  On my walk I spied  a man and two little girls.  The little girls were wearing swimsuits (it made me cold just looking at them) but they were not turning blue.  They were in the water with the man who had his jeans rolled up to his knees. They were NOT splashing around. But they were as giddy and excited as two kids could be, in the river ,on a hot august day.  I asked what they were doing.  The little girls answered  'gold panning'.  I looked at the man and he confirmed with a nod.  I said ' Really?.... there is gold in this creek?' The two little girls who couldn't have been more than 6 and 8 years old  started talking. They said yes and then showed me what it looked like, how to find it, where it came from,  They taught me the term 'placer deposit'.  Every now and then the man would chime in. (he had a sluice set up and  he wanted me to know that he had his permit for it).  I talked to them at length and those two little girls knew exactly what they were doing. They answered every question I had, knowledgeably and confidently.    After about 5 minutes their collective body language told me they wanted to get back to what they were doing.   I was greatly impressed by two things. 1.)  This was some quality parenting.  Without even thinking about parenting.... Dad had  shared his enthusiasm for  gold prospecting with his kids,  gotten them involved in his passion.  He had obviously shared a great deal of knowledge with them.  It was obvious to me that they talked about what they were doing in the car, over dinner, at the grocery store and pretty much anywhere else  that a family could chatter away at each other.  There wasn't a cell phone or mp3 player in sight. (there was a back packed crammed with sandwiches and towels).  Dad wasn't sitting on the bank  with his data phone as the kids frolicked in the water.  These people were engaged... together...in a common interest. The kids didn't feel locked down  and Dad didn't feel 'obligated' to spend some time with his kids.    This wasn't 'quality' time with the kids .  This was QUALITY time.  I applaud this father and his neurotic obsession with gold . I applaud him infecting his children with 'gold fever'.  I don't care what a mess the  rest of  his life might be (mom was conspicuously absent).  The one thing he needs to do right... he is doing right!
2.)  Their enthusiasm was so infectious  that I went  home and ordered a $31  gold panning kit from Amazon.   I have been going down to the river two or three times a week since I encountered  them.. I have a bucket full of  'fines' that I just have to figure out how to get the gold dust out of the sand (then I can buy those shiny red mary janes with the bow on the toe).   I wish dad would bring the kids back. I have a bunch more questions for them!
And completely off topic... All my girls are laying..I'm getting 9 eggs a day.  I cant set up my fantasy egg business yet because I need a dedicated fridge to store them. I cant put in a fridge until we have the electricity in the house redone.  So, for this moment in time and to make room in the kitchen fridge...... Any body want some FREE, farm fresh, free range, organic, eggs?