Fie Upon Second Chances! (and other things)

Phil woke me Saturday morning. "This is heavy to have to say so early in the morning." And I waited for news about the death of one of the cows.

"We have no more ducks."

The night before, we had three. None lost in their months here; since they arrived on the farm, we'd had no deaths from disease, accident, or predation. But then, in one night, the dogs took all three.

I suspect the ducks had glimpsed the stock tank and, wishing for an early morning swim, left their secure electrified pen and walked into the yawning maw of Socks and Co. I don't know what day Socks will leave this farm, but I think he's had far too many second chances. Boo.

Perhaps it was wise of Isaiah not to play with his ducks too much. He knew which duck was Daffodil and which was Daisy, though they looked fairy similar to me. He still grieved, but it was managed grief. I am sad to never again see the funny tuft on the back of Dandelion's head, or to glimpse the beautiful colored feathers on the three birds' wings.

But there wasn't much time to think of this loss. We had a team of five willing men come down from church. One of them dealt with grilling ribs for lunch, and I had to do nothing at all.

Phil put them to work in a variety of ways. They moved the insulation over from its year+ resting place. Phil said there were a lot of mice. One bag even had a black snake wiggling around! I love having a clear view of the orchard again.

They put caulk along one wall. They cut wood to ensure the long beams would not sad (the wood will be knocked away when the building is finished).

Then they put up the first several sections of the actual skin: insulation trimmed and taped up, blue panels screwed into the metal structure.

When they left in the early afternoon, one man said, "All that effort, and just that little bit of paneling up to show for it."

And from the downhill side, it didn't look like much. But up close, the panels made the building look incredibly enormous.

I went up to help Phil in the afternoon. We put up another two panels. I'm afraid my help was imperfect at best, as the first panel angled down a bit and the second panel showed a little bit of insulation along the bottom ("Diaper showing" said Phil). He's going to regroup, to figure out a better way to get the skin of the building on.

It took a lot of strength to drill through the metal structure: each screw pushed in with aching muscles.