I feel like I've been slacking at blogging.

January is one of those months that is very frazzling. That's probably not a word, but that's okay.

I'm doing major preparation already for the art booth at PPBA, and I can't believe I'm doing this already. Means I'm procrastinating on other things (what, business taxes? oooh) but on the bright side I have quite a lot of things ready to sell now. There's still the matter of getting it all organized, labeled, and packed, but that's what the day before the show is for, right?? I'm really quite happy with how the tiles turned out, and I think I may even like them better than the full-color ones I did last year. I bought some nice little frames at Michaels last week (they were on sale) and I was thinking tonight about what I could use them for, like maybe I should do some drawings on paper or something, but then I decided I have taken some really pretty closeups of feathers, so I think I'll get a couple of those photos developed and frame them, and then have them in the art booth. My feather photo card has been pretty popular, so perhaps feather photos themselves might have an audience!

I washed eight chickens today for the Hollister show this weekend, and have four more to wash tomorrow. I went to a plastic supply store in Sacramento yesterday (my word, was that just yesterday??) and bought a couple yards of clear vinyl sheeting (think grandma's table cloth cover). I cut that down to size, and with a couple of small clips it makes a darn good tail-protector for the bantam cages that are used at shows (since invariably my best pullet takes great delight in poking her tail through the wire so it's not only messed up at the show, but quite often permanently damaged). Arg, I hate that. I don't know if there's any way to get them not to do that. Some of them don't, it's like some are very conscious of their own space, and some really aren't. And it almost never happens with the non-black birds. I'm not sure if they just don't do it, or if they are harder feathered and not affected. Whatever the case, I have enough to line all the cages for the black pullets now, and at the risk of looking like I'm trying to set up some kind of biohazard containment area with all this plastic sheeting, it may just solve the problem. Plus it was about 1/5 the cost of getting the same amount of plexiglas. Money talks!

And on a completely unrelated topic... I think whatever natural or unnatural force creates crop-circles is also responsible for the snarls that happen in horses' manes. Shylah had a real whopper of a tangle in there that I finally combed out today (broke 3 teeth on the comb! Okay, so it's a plastic comb that's at least 20 years old...but hey...). It's not like it just gets tangled. Hey, I know about tangles, my hair is rather long... but horse hair does these intricate things where it wraps around and gets little strands intertwined, and I just can't figure out how that happens. I mean, it looks like someone weaves it into this knot, I wouldn't be surprised to find Celtic knots in there (and no doubt some gripping beasts! Oops, sorry, art history joke.)

Okay, that's probably about enough of my long-windedness for today.