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Dumaine Poultry
A couple of weeks ago I had an episode working over at Rocheblave where I almost "fell out" from heat exhaustion. It had been cooler for the previous week and I had under estimated the need for hydration, thinking it would be ok to be careless for one day. It's not ok.
Today is like a typical winter day, with lows in the forties, highs in the sixties. The wind is blowing hard out of the north and looking out the front door I can see the leaves of the banana trees on the south side of the property are shredded as testimony to a losing battle.
I have not been supervising, or doing myself, any maintenance of Dumaine street this year so stickered weeds are growing high in the cracks (or high from the crack(s)) in the sidewalk and along the curb. Candy and food wrappers and plastic bottles are compacted against the curb in front the house.
Across the street the dumpster is familiarly overflowed, garbage and broken down cardboard boxes strewn about. An emaciated black cat lurks nearby. And although I've never mentioned this before there are a few free roaming chickens in this area. Mostly they stay down around Dorgenois, but this morning one crosses from this side of the street and does that aggressive chicken walk dance towards the dumpster, and pecks a few times at the hardscrabble urine and greased soaked cement. The scrawny dark cat suffers a fleeting moment of grand illusion followed by the survivor's instinct of flight, which keeps us all breathing, and alive, to lurk by the dumpster another day.