It was just one of those weeks and weekends. I don't really have a very long list of accomplishments to give out. I stayed so busy I couldn't get anything done.

I think that last sentence may appear to be a contradiction of terms, but having lived through it, I can tell you that it is not.

In the past few weeks, quite a few things have happened, but I haven't done all that I hoped I would. I haven't been able to tear through my ‘to-do' list like I wanted, for one reason or another. I had hoped to finish working on my property by now and have a lot of other things finished, but it just hasn't happened. Now I am left wondering if it is due to my own lackadaisical approach, my continual lack of funds or other factors.

As I mentioned earlier, life simplification is underway and I am trying to get that process moving as quickly as possible. Along those lines, I decided to get out of the rabbit business. I don't know why I call it a business, since businesses, by their nature, are supposed to make money. My business was really more of a hobby. I don't need any hobbies. I will stick with the bees for a while.

I am not unhappy about having worked with the rabbits. I managed to learn a lot and get some valuable experience at shoveling manure. As if I needed any of that.

When I was young, we had cows, pigs and chickens to deal with. I was the lucky one that got to take care of the pig pen repairs. I think that made me a junior swineherd, if you want to get technical. My father, the sage farmer, usually gave me the pleasure of crawling around in pig poop to install boards around the pen where the hogs managed to knock them loose.

The task was made even more fun by the fact that the hogs were larger than me and liked to knock me down with their snouts as I attempted to get the job done. Given the fact that the floor was always slick with both known and unknown substances of equally unpleasantness, it was not a job to which I looked forward. Things finally improved once I learned how well a little board does at deterring their unwanted advances. After some time of working with me, they learned to stay where ever I wasn't. Before I sound cruel, let me make you aware of the fact that these weren't pigs like the one in Charlotte's Web. These pigs were hairy, stinky and generally bad mannered.

The cows we had were also full of personality. One black angus cow, Ruby, was particularly outgoing. She thought she was a bull and would sometimes butt me with her head as I attempted to give them grain or hay, especially if I wasn't moving fast enough to suit her.

Their shed also got the shovel treatment every once in a while, whether I wanted to do it or not. Ditto for the chicken coop, which was my least favorite place to use a shovel. It was always dry and dusty cleaning it up. Once you factor in the ammonia-like smell and the less-than-friendly rooster, it was also a recipe for aggravation. But that wasn't all there was to it, by any means. Listing the bad without the good leaves a false impression. It was a good life and helped teach me responsibility, the importance of doing chores and it helped me learn to work with animals. It also taught me the value of bacon, sausage, beef, fresh chicken and eggs. Not to mention the fact that I can toss manure with the best of them — now there's a marketable job skill.

My father still has a small backyard flock of chickens, black australorps and silver-laced wyandots. I raised them for him from chicks in a home-made incubator in the basement of the house. He told me not long ago that he is thinking about giving them up before this winter. He is also going through a life simplification phase of sorts. The decision might have been furthered along by a recent encounter with the rooster, which decided to spur him on the hand while he was filling the water jug.

The rooster always had been fairly even tempered before, but something must have happened to change that. Needless to say, the rooster is no longer with us — gone on to that great chicken house in the sky. But there's more to it than that. He also worries about going out in bad weather and falling down. Falling down is funny to a child and little more than a mild concern for a young man, but a man in his latter years has better reason to worry.

With no one living there but him and my mother, it is even more understandable. Last winter was pretty rough on him, with the dog and chickens needing daily attention.

Since then, the dog, Buddy, has found a new home with my niece's husband's family. I fear the chickens may leave to the tune of "She'll Be Coming Around the Mountain," much the same as the rooster did. Chicken and dumplings, anyone?

He has reached the point in his life that he is ready to rest more than he is ready to work. Sometimes it seems surreal to me, knowing how active he always was for the better part of my lifetime. Every day the sun rises and the sun sets, just like it always did. It's just all the stuff underneath it that changes.

Oh well, I better get back to work. My lengthy list beckons.

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