by 
Abigail helped me plant more flowers in the pond. Joyce had gotten a tray of several different varieties in 4-packs. They were small which made them easier to plant in the tough clay of the pond bed and it also made them cheap. We also planted a patch of corn next to the flowers, just for fun. No use in letting all that water go to waste.
There is an assassin loose in the neighborhood. A couple of weeks ago Po Kitty went missing and all we found were a couple of suspicious-looking tufts of fur that looked like they could have come from her. Then a couple of days ago we woke up to tufts of Cotton fur in the backyard outside my bedroom window and a Cotton that was much the worse for wear. I slept the night before with my window open and did not hear anything. A couple of evenings later while watching TV I was jolted out of my easy chair by the sound of a godawful cat fight on the front porch. I rushed out to make inquiries and saw Elmo and a strange black cat we’ve seen for the last few weeks around the neighborhood going at it with a purpose. This wasn’t some hissing contest. It was a fight, if not to the death, at least to remove Elmo from the premises permanently. I roared to part them and was horse the next day for my trouble. My blood was up and I grabbed a couple of fist-sized rocks out of the landscaping with murderous intent. Elmo and Cotton are elderly old eunuchs used to the soft life and I’ll be damned if I let some stray come along and interrupt their routine. Unfortunately I went out without any shoes on which hindered me in my pursuit of OJ (that’s what we’ll call the stray until justice is served) and I never got any kind of shot with my rocks. My preferred remedy would be my 12 gauge but the neighbors might complain. In lieu of that, I’ll try to trap OJ and turn him over to the tender mercies of the animal “shelter”. Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge.
Now that the guinea hen hatched her brood and Joyce and Chris moved hen and brood out of the guinea tower to the chicken tractor because the keats didn’t have access to water in the top of the cat litter box nesting box Joyce rigged up so the hen wouldn’t lay her eggs somewhere on the place and become an ex-hen and the hen didn’t keep the keats warm and several were dead the next morning, the survivors have been placed in the shop in the box Chris built for the last batch of guineas and kept in his garage until Joyce wanted to sequester henpecked John Henry but it was too cold outside the chickenhouse so he brought the box down to the shop. Kari laid down the law: No more guineas in her garage because of the mess they make with the dust they raise so now they are in the shop where they can make a mess with the dust they raise without bothering Kari. At last count we were down to three so it isn’t likely there will be much dust raised.