Wow, what slackers. I know we said that in the last post, but I think we can say it again. Last time my parents had been in town so we didn’t get too much accomplished. This time we were on vacation, followed by being so busy with work that we found ourselves slaving away until 11pm every night to catch up, followed by Patrick coming down with an unpleasant fever. Now we finally feel like we’re starting to catch up with life…work is getting back to normal, Patrick is feeling fine, and we’re starting to get our yard under control again (you know how those weeds grow when you’re gone for a little while!).

So even though we’ve been doing a little house work here and a little yard work there I’ll post about that later. In the meanwhile I’ll share some more non-house related things, like happenings in the neighborhood.

As spring/summer was coming, the trees were filling in with leaves, and the birds were busy making nests. While checking the mail one morning I was upset to see one bird’s hard work hadn’t paid off. The nest had fallen on our path and the blue eggs were lying smashed next to it. :(

Bird nest

In the meanwhile at a neighborhood association meeting someone asked “What’s going on with all the dead chickens in the road?” – Patrick and I, like much of the remainder of the room, burst out in a puzzled laughter. What on earth were they talking about?? Someone else chimed in and said they’d seen them at various intersections as well.

A couple of days later we drove down one of the nearby streets and saw something laying in the middle of the road. What do you know, it was a dead chicken!! Of course there has been much speculation as to the reasoning of this, the main one being that it’s some sort of voodoo related thing. I believe someone mentioned that it may be a type of initiation ceremony, or someone doing a protective “spell” on the neighborhood or something. If anyone knows about these types of things, please let us know what else it may mean!

Voodoo Chicken

Otherwise we’ve been very busy with neighborhood related work. One of the recent projects was a neighborhood BBQ…an “excuse” for neighbors to come out, meet new neighbors, chat with acquainted neighbors, and an opportunity to get to know their local police officers and firefighters. The firefighters brought out the truck for kids to play with, the police brought out barricades to block off the street, and generous neighbors donated food, money, and time to make the BBQ happen.

Patrick and neighbor Leslie enjoying some food in the shade during the Ontario Park BBQ.