There appears to be a murder of crows that have taken up residence in my neighborhood. Just trying to count the numbers this morning and I lost track at 30. Some of them took flight which of course made it impossible for me to continue. They have driven the songbirds out, leaving my once frequented bird feeder abandoned. No more jays, juncos or wrens to stop and enrich my life with song. Now I hear the caw and chatter of the crows and an occasional starling.

We had a storm late yesterday afternoon and after the storm I heard this very unpleasant chattering directly below our livingroom window. It sounded quite distressed so, of course, my curiosity got the better of me and I had to go and look. There were two crows on the grass and one of them apparently did not like the other being there. Not being that familiar with the hierarchy of crow society I can't say for sure what the problem was. It looked as if an old married couple were bickering. "She" was doing the nattering while "He" was calmly attempting to feed from something I couldn't quite see. Typical of most males "He " was totally ignoring "Her". Intent upon whatever his dinner was, and quite unconcerned with "Her" discomfort. I have no way of knowing what actually was happening but the above scenario occured to me and made me laugh. My laughter chased the disturbed crow away, but Mr. One Track Mind continued to pull on whatever he had his beak around.

He didn't give up until the Momma cat arrived with her kittens. I am familiar with the cat but I was unaware that she had had a litter of kittens. She didn't ever appear to be pregnant but there she was with 3 ginger fluff balls following along. Momma decided that Mr. One Track Mind would make a good dinner and went into stalking mode. Unfortunately at just that time the remaining crows decided to settle down around the kittens. Plus they did so in a manner that isolated the Momma from her kittens. I didn't like the looks of that. It may be that this many crows in my yard just spooks me, but I decided to go outside and even up the odds a bit. It was a good thing I did, because Momma cat had more than her share of trouble.

I knew that we had crows, but I never imagined that we had this many. The kittens were stressed out and the Momma cat was stressed out trying to get back to her kittens. She would run at the crows crying and they would fly up and at her but otherwise didn't seem to be too concerned. It's as if they knew they had her outnumbered and were just biding their time. When I got out there they took flight only to settle down a few feet away from us to watch. I expected some unpleasantness from the Momma because I fully intended on picking up her 3 fluff balls and taking them home. Momma is skittish and tends to run away from other people. Fortunately the little girl who had let them all out in the first place showed up.

She knows she isn't supposed to do that but at 8 she doesn't have the reasoning powers to understand why. She thought they'd all stay in the yard to play with her and I guess that happened until she went into the house to use the bathroom. I think that Momma heard the birds and came to investigate and her litter came with her. I would hope that they were told to stay behind but kittens, just like most kids don't mind that well. They have all learned a lesson, and hopefully any further adventures will wait until the kittens are older. Since I do understand that 8 year olds have short attention spans, I helped return the kittens to their home and made sure that Mrs. Smith knew they had been outside. I don't think she really cared. If she did, she would have had her cat spayed and none of this would have happened. If only getting rid of crows were this easy.

When you are in business there is a positive and a negative way to handle customers. I always try to take a deep breath and put on my game voice when I know there's a chance for some income. Most of the time I can manage quite well and many people have told Hubby that they hired us because I was so pleasant and helpful even though they might have been able to save $5 hiring a competitor. It's not always easy to maintain a pleasant attitude when dealing with some people. There are still men out there who seem to feel I don't know what I'm talking about because I'm a woman. I've actually had potential customers think that they could get a better price if they talk to "the boss". It can be frustrating, and also amusing at times.

The hardest thing I find is dealing with the elderly. It can be very exasperating because they can't hear you and if you raise your voice sometimes it adds a tone that I don't mean to use. They also have this habit of trying to argue the price down. "Do you give senior citizens discounts, I'm on a fixed income here, I'm over 65 you know?"
Some just don't understand, because they don't get out much, that the price of everything has gone up. Gas is up and that is our biggest expense. There really are people who can't afford to pay the full price all at once, so we do a payment plan with them, but they aren't the ones that ask for the discount. Usually the ones who can well afford it are the discount requests. I always suggest that they check other prices. They may find one more to their liking and they always call back to schedule. When that happens I know we aren't charging enough, all the other prices must have been higher, but Hubby sets the price and I just tell the folks what it is.

One of the more frustrating calls has been an ongoing situation with an elderly man who wants to have a new bathroom sink installed. Some people are just too difficult to work for and this will be one of those cases. I must admit though that he has presented us with a first. He is the first time we've ever had a customer say "This is what I'll pay you.".

Phone conversations with him take place at least once a week lately. Hubby has been to his home to look at the job, and the man is waiting for his estimate. I have caller ID so I always know it's him and answering the phone requires a few deep nerve cleansing breaths because he's very difficult to deal with. I dislike using the word senile in reference to him because I don't know the man personally. He is hard of hearing, so I know enough to use the other phone when speaking with him, but even with the amplification there are still things he can't hear. Mostly he doesn't seem to understand why installation of a $40 sink should cost $250. In his estimation that's too high a price. If the remaining amount of the estimate was nothing more than labor I'd agree with him although I wouldn't mind the income.

We would be replacing a sink installed back in the 1940's with a newer sink which means his faucet won't fit. So he has to have a new faucet installed with the sink for another $40. Copper pipes, because the old ones leak, are the next thing factored in which will run another $30 or so dollars. Then, because this is a wall mount sink there is carpentry work to be done. He needs a new sink because he let the old one leak for so long it damaged the wall and there's nothing left to secure the sink too. So, we are now looking at material costs of approximately $150. The job, without any incidents will take around 3 hours. Technically the price should be $300 but Hubby says $250. Since the price of the job is not over $350 we need to charge sales tax which in NY is 9%. So the actual price of the job with everything would be $272.50. The problem seems to be that the customer can't hear any part of our conversation except the cost of the sink and the total price. Everything else is missing.

So I hear "$250 to install a sink that costs $40? You can do better than that." To which I respond that he has all the other materials involved which is why it's so expensive. He then tells me "the sink only costs $40." So, he wants a sink hung on a wall with no plumbing? One that will not stay up because the cross brace between the studs, which holds the sink, has rotted out. No, he wants the entire job done for $40. We've had this conversation every week for a month now, complete with his wife screaming in the background for him to hang the phone up and call someone else. He doesn't hear her either, he just keeps on trying to get me to lower the price to $40. Mind you, Hubby says there's a brand new Lincoln sitting in his garage which the man stated he paid CASH for, yet he is concerned with the price of installing a $40 sink.

At the end of last weeks conversation I told him he has to call someone else because we don't want the job, which opened up a whole new can of worms. I do hope he's quit calling because the reality of his situation is that he really isn't capable of making informed decisions, and apparently neither is his wife. I sent the estimate, in writing to him after our first conversation so they KNOW exactly what the cost is and what the job entails, yet I still get these calls. Like any other customer, he has the right to choose his contractor. All we do is work out a price that we feel we need for the job and the customer can take it or leave it. I don't hold a gun to anyones head, but after a month of dealing with this man I'd like to hold a gun to mine. Shoot myself and put me out of my misery sounds rather enticing some days. Maybe not that bad, it does leave me chuckling and shaking my head in confusion. And you wonder why I say "the more I see of people the better I like my cat."

Yesterday I took one of those Blogthing quizzes about my deadly sins. I love those things they're fun, but one of the questions stumped me. It was something about daydreams and what you daydream about when you do it. The multiple choices were nothing like my daydreams. They were choices like being rich and famous, getting even with people you don't like, or being the best at something and rubbing everyone elses nose in it. For the fun of it, and because my daydream wasn't there, I chose being a celebrity whose fans adored them. Lets just say it was better than the other choices. I think that was the answer that gave me the deadly sin of pride. Apparently my sins aren't that bad because there was only a 14% chance that I'd go to hell when I died. I guess that's kind of nice to know.

When you're older you don't daydream as much nor do we have any specific topic. The only consistent daydream I ever had was that I was going to own an animal boarding facility that was very different from the ones that were available then, and even now if the nightmare stories I hear are true. It was going to be both a boarding facility and a place where unwanted cats and dogs could live when they were no longer wanted. Of course it necessitated having a rich long lost relative or a big lottery win to come to fruition, but that was all right it's just a daydream.

It was going to be a cage free facility with each animal having their own rooms, complete with beds and whatever amenities I deemed necessary to the comfort and wellbeing of the animals in my charge. Dogs would have televisions, cats would have radios and of course their own climbing tree for entertainment. The dogs would have individual fenced in places where they could run outside and still be safe. The cats would have these neat window boxes that extend out into the air fully enclosed by screen materials so they would be safe. Of course in my daydream no dog ever dug under the kennel run and escaped nor did any cat manage to separate the screening material to run away. I no longer see the cat window boxes advertised in magazines, I wonder why? Since it was only a daydream I didn't address other issues like how to keep the rooms clean? How to keep the animals from getting fleas? What was I going to do with all the waste generated by the animals in my care? This was going to be a state of the art facility that was perfect in every way.

I shared this daydream only once with someone who immediately jumped on the fact that it was designed to help animals and not children. Given the attitude she displayed when she questioned me I didn't bother to defend myself, just pointed out that this was a daydream after all. I considered telling her that children would provide the free labor I needed to keep the place running, but she wasn't familiar with me and my sense of humor so I chose to keep my mouth shut. If I had taken the Blogthing quiz back then, I could have told her that as far as daydreams go, it was better than being a celebrity adored by a legion of fans. It's definitely better than getting even with someone you secretly hate, or being the best at something and rubbing everyone elses noses in it. It's my daydream anyway and I think I'll keep it.

I've said before that Hubby was born and raised on a farm. He comes from a long line of dairy farmers on his fathers side and on his mothers side as well. The one exception would be his maternal grandfather who actually was born on a farm but didn't like farming. He owned a cheese factory in the Governour, NY area. He sold out and became the foreman of the Dairylea factory in Remsen, NY sometime around 1910. It's not an easy profession, the hours are long and the work is back breaking. Hubby took over running the farm when his Dad became really sick and when he died Hubby's Mother wanted him to be something besides a farmer and she sold the farm out from under him. His Dad died in 1968, and Hubby was only 19. She did let him try for awhile, but he didn't have the support of his wife, so his Mom sold the land.

In NY state back in the 60's boys were not considered "of age" until they were 21, so although he actually owned a share in the farm his Mom was the executor and could do with it whatever she chose. He received money for his shares, she didn't cheat him by any means, except that he always resented her not allowing him to try to make a go of it. There is a part of him that knows it would be impossible, but he's always wanted to try.

We've discussed the possibility of getting back into farming, but to start out fresh requires the kind of capital we don't have and probably never will. The cost of farmland and stock, plus the price of feed is quite expensive. Many of the farms owned by our friends are going under. Those that aren't are working their owners to death. The only farms that are making any money are the corporate owned farms and they are hurting the smaller farmer.

It's his dream and I would like to share it with him, but I was raised in the city and have little knowledge of what it takes to work a farm. Also with arthritis in many of my joints and spinal problems I'm not sure I could hold up my end which would be absolutely necessary if we were to survive. Another thing that bothers me, and it's something that he and our friends tease me about, is some of the ways in which the animals are treated. The raising of veal is lucrative, the problem is that the calves are confined to "veal boxes" which don't allow for much movement. They can stand, but allowing them to roam toughens the meat. Also, all calves are removed from their mothers. Some farmers allow the calf to nurse for the 3 days that they can't milk the cow, but some remove the calf immediately.

I once helped at milking time at a very small farm. I fed the calves while listening to their cries and the answering cries of the mothers. I understand that all these things are business decisions. The farm has to be productive, and you can't be when the calves drink all the milk their mothers produce. I understand it, but I don't enjoy it. These animals do have a very strong bond and the mother will fight to get to her calf. A ton of cow can do a great deal of damage when she's trying to pull away from her stanchion to get to her calf, believe me. The difficulty for me is that this is a business and hard decisions are having to be made in order to boost milk production, yet I see that these are animals and they are capable of experiencing anxiety. I helped without complaining, but because our friend could see my struggle, he never asked me again.

Then there's the joy of raising an animal only to slaughter it for food. I have a girlfriend who was raised on a farm and to this day she will not eat beef. She had a pet cow that wound up on the dinner table. She's not too fond of pork either, and for the same reason. She lives mostly on chicken. Something about raising chickens for food didn't bother her at all. Both she and Hubby say they're pretty nasty. I think I'll forego the experience. To be a farmers wife requires an objectivity that I don't have and at my age, I see no need to acquire. Neither does Hubby and he doesn't really wish to experience all that work at his age. So, I'll never be a farmers wife, but that's fine. I get to go and pet the calves or play with the barn kittens and not have to deal with the reality of the life. That life is fine for some, but not for me. I don't mind living in the "country" rather than in the "city", but the life of a farm wife is not for me. I'd be a duck out of water, know what I mean?

I wasn't planning on posting this song, but somebody else has all ready posted the one I chose for tonight. Anyways, I figured I'd get this one up before someone did this one too. Some days you just have to move fast around here.