The Tail of King Yogi

My husband and I were talking the other day about how our dog, Yogi, has somehow become king of our household. He requires constant petting, attention, and a place on the couch between us – and he gets it.

We started taking that idea and running with it, deciding that we needed to get Yogi a little gold crown as befitting his royal status. So here is the story of King Yogi.

Once upon a time there lived a short little black king named Yogi. He came upon his kingdom one day after riding all day in a car from the smoggy, traffic-filled village of Phoenix. As soon as he saw the green and tree-filled half acre in the northern mountains of Arizona, he decided it would be here that he built his kingdom.

So King Yogi laid claim to the land. To help keep his kingdom and its vassals secure and under control, he employed his friend, Colby Jack, to serve as knight. Now Sir Jack was amenable to this, as long as he didn’t have to do too much. Sir Jack stayed within the confines of the kingdom’s fence and barked to alert the serfs inside the palace when a feline interloper was spotted or an intruder breached the security of the front door.

King Yogi made it known to his subjects that he ruled his kingdom with an iron paw. When the serfs ate, he was paid taxes on the food in the form of the juiciest pieces of fat, the tastiest bits of hamburger, and the finest crusts of bread. When the serfs were done dining, King Yogi would find the warmest spot on the couch and lay his head across a soft lap. He would demand to be scratched behind the ears and have his head caressed.


As long as the liege obeyed, all was good in the kingdom. King Yogi relegated Sir Jack to the unused loveseat, where he had to sleep without human companionship in order to better hone his fighting skills.



One day there was an uprising in the kingdom. Sir Jack used his superior size and might to oust King Yogi from his cushy throne. King Yogi did not take this rebellion lightly. With a series of low growls, he made it known that Sir Jack had overstepped his bounds.

(The picture on the left above depicts Sir Jack during the midst of the famous uprising of 2009 while the photo to the right shows King Yogi's eventual comeuppance when he temporarily ousted Sir Jack from the kingdom)

Today, King Yogi’s liegedom is peaceful. Sir Colby knows better than to usurp the King’s throne. The vassals have all been appropriately trained through means of growling punishment as how to best serve their lord and master. He is kept fat and happy with his favorite foods, petted incessantly, and cared for in the manner as befitting a royal dog.

We bow to you, King Yogi the Great.

It's Not 'Happy Holidays', It's Merry Christmas

I rarely get one of those emails forwarded to 5,000 people that I share but this one really hit home. It is something my husband and I have long considered to be one of the biggest problem in society today. I truly believe that the "de-Christianizing" of American society is hampering America's efforts to once again become the great country founded hundreds of years ago.

So here goes:

‘Twas the month before Christmas
When all through our land,
Not a Christian was praying
Nor taking a stand.
See the PC Police had taken away,
The reason for Christmas - no one could say.
The children were told by their schools not to sing,
About Shepherds and Wise Men and Angels and things.
It might hurt people's feelings, the teachers would say
‘December 25th is just a ' Holiday '.
Yet the shoppers were ready with cash, checks and credit
Pushing folks down to the floor just to get it!
CDs from Madonna, an X BOX, an I-pod
Something was changing, something quite odd! 
Retailers promoted Ramadan and Kwanzaa
In hopes to sell books by Franken & Fonda.
As Targets were hanging their trees upside down
 At Lowe's the word Christmas - was nowhere to be found.
At K-Mart and Staples and Penny's and Sears
You won't hear the word Christmas; it won't touch your ears.
Inclusive, sensitive, Di-ver-si-ty
Are words that were used to intimidate me.
Now Daschle, Now Darden, Now Sharpton, Wolf Blitzen
On Boxer, on Rather, on Kerry, on Clinton!
At the top of the Senate, there arose such a clatter
To eliminate Jesus, in all public matter.
And we spoke not a word, as they took away our faith
Forbidden to speak of salvation and grace
The true Gift of Christmas was exchanged and discarded
The reason for the season, stopped before it started.
So as you celebrate 'Winter Break' under your 'Dream Tree'
Sipping your Starbucks, listen to me.
Choose your words carefully, choose what you say
Shout MERRY CHRISTMAS ,
not Happy Holiday!
Please, all Christians join together and
wish everyone you meet during the
holidays a MERRY CHRISTMAS
Christ is The Reason for the Christmas Season!

Even though money is tight I, for one, am looking forward to a Christmas tree with an angel on top, lots of decorations, and a creche with the baby Jesus that will take pride of place in my living room. So may I say in advance "Merry Christmas!"

Oh, and BTW - did you know our nation's capitol Christmas tree came from the forest right here in the White Mountains of Arizona?

If I Only Had a Brain

I would probably look something like this.

Honestly, with the weather getting colder and all the leaves turning color up here in the White Mountains, I have been more than ready to put up my fall decorations. It's not like I have a lot - I'm no Martha Stewart by any means - but I do have a few things I enjoy seeing each year, such as a collection of little stuffed cats wearing Halloween costumes. They are jointed and I can place them in different poses. Maybe that's kinda weird, but I love my Halloween kitties.

Anyway, I cannot for the life of me find my fall decorations. I have looked high and low, in closets, in sheds, in the spare bedroom - everywhere I can possible think of. But they are gone, simply gone.

I told my husband that someone must have broken into our house and took my autumn decor. This makes perfect sense, doesn't it?

To compensate for my lack of decorative items I decided to make a scarecrow with the straw I keep for lining the chickens' nesting box. I had a bag from flour, some old clothes I was going to give to charity, and a couple sticks, too. I put them all together and voila! a scarecrow was born.

Of course the only one who gets scared by Ms. Scarecrow is me, when I glance outside and seeing someone sitting in my front yard. Oh, if I only had a brain...

Soufflé, Anyone?

So far, being a chicken “farmeress” has been quite the experience.

We started out with 10 checks at the beginning of April. We lost one due to a hungry cat. As they started to mature, we realized we ended up with 6 roosters and 3 hens. Then we changed our minds and thought it was 5 roosters and 4 hens. We decided the roosters would make a great stew, but neither my husband nor I was brave enough to kill the darned things and nobody else wanted to, either. So we gave the 5 roosters to a nice man who’d just bought a large property here in the White Mountains. Last I heard, they were comfortably roaming his property in an enclosure along with a goat.

The four chickens we kept are named Peaches, Zelda, Henrietta (the little red hen), and Pat. Pat, of course, was the chicken of ambivalent sex (remember Pat from Saturday Night Live?). It didn’t take long to realize how wrong we were about Pat. Within a couple days of getting rid of the roosters, Pat began to crow. He now crows all day long and spends his time not eating and pooping jumping on the hens. Pat does not have a real good grasp on the concept of foreplay. He bites the hens on the neck, then jumps aboard for a full 10 seconds of pleasure.

Our chicken farming has finally paid off. After weeks of threatening the hens to start laying or they would go the way of the roosters, they did. At least two of them, anyway. We are getting about two eggs a day, which is a good amount for just my husband and me.

Maybe I’m weird, but going out to the coop is like Christmas. When I open up the nesting box and there’s an egg or two waiting, it’s like finding a little present inside. I carefully scoop up the eggs and place them in the cartons I’ve been saving for months. They’re not the biggest eggs, actually pretty small, with thick brown shells. The yolks are really bright, more orange than yellow. But hey, I’m not complaining. At least the girls finally got the hint.

Soufflé, anyone?

It's a Bird's Life

Lately, I can't help but humming "Birds to the left of me, chickens to the right, here I am, stuck in the middle with you" (thank you Stealers Wheel for that parody! - and why didn't you ever do another song?). Anyway...

Back here in the rural enclaves of the White Mountains, I seem to be destined to live an aviary life.

To the left of me, on the front porch, a momma bird decided to make a nest and lay her baby chicks. The little buggars are growing by leaps and bounds and they constantly cheep, cheep, cheep, asking momma to feed them. We keep the windows in the living room open to enjoy the breeze, but at times they raise such a cacophony I can barely hear myself think.

On the right of me I've got the hens and roosters. They're making a whole lot of noise now, too, as the roosters vie for the title of Cock o' the Walk and try using their charm and charisma to get lucky with the hens. And because we don't have the yard fenced off yet all the way, the chickens keep coming across that invisible line between their run and our grass and flower beds. We've tried training our dog, Colby Jack, to be a good chicken herder, but when we leave the house and return, it's to find piles of chicken poop all over our deck and all the leaves on the flowers mysteriously gone. As you can see from the picture on the left, they are not averse to going anywhere. Hey, who needs a coop for shelter from the weather, anyway?

I guess I asked for it, though. Just call me the Chicken Lady. Pfftt! Had a feather in my mouth.

Candy Land

I wonder when I changed from being “Candace” to “Candy”.

When I was growing up, I was always called Candy. In a bit of defiance, and to prove that I was different from everyone else, I decided to spell it different than the norm. From junior high to high school, I was “Candé”, as if all of a sudden I’d turned French.

Round about the time I started college, I decided that Candy was either too little-girlish or made me sound too much like the happy hooker. So I went back to going by my full name, Candace.

Nowadays, except for those few friends who have known me for decades, I am known as Candace.

Except here in my new home in Arizona’s White Mountains, that is.

For some reason, everyone here shortens my name to that childhood nickname of Candy. I introduce myself as Candace and at the end of an encounter, my new friends and acquaintances are saying “Nice to meet you, Candy.”

Even complete strangers do it. The propane delivery driver handed me a handwritten receipt for my tank fillup. It was made out to Candy Morehouse. My neighbors call me by my nickname, so do people at church, and even the checker at the grocery store.

I gave up trying to correct everyone a long time ago. I guess up here in the rural outskirts of town, I have gone back to living a simpler life, in every sense of the phrase. First it was my name, then it was the chickens I bought. I’ve got my eye on a goat to add to our farm animals but I just hope he doesn’t eat the vegetables I am growing in my garden with my own homemade mulch. What’s next? Riding a horse into town, grinding my own flour, and fermenting my own wine? Sounds good to me.

Until next time, yours truly, Candy

I'm in Love

Yep, I admit it.
I'm in love.
He's tall, dark, and handsome, a big galoot by the name of Cochise. He's a black brute who stands 17 hands tall.
Of course Cochise is a horse.

I recently met a lovely lady by the name of Pat who lives just a couple streets down from me. My husband did some remodeling work for her. She's a retired school teacher whose real passion is for horses. She has several of her own, and boards a few more.

Pat thinks it's just great that she got to meet me - a real live author.

I've been jonesing to get back on a horse ever since we moved here to the White Mountains with a stable and corral in the back yard - but no occupants. With a signed copy of Golden Enchantment in hand as a bribe, I casually mentioned to Pat that if she never needed someone to ride her extra horses, I was the woman for the job.

Well, she did, and I got to. Ride, that is.

Little did I know she was going to pick this big black brute of a gelding named Cochise for me to ride. The first time I used a stepstool to climb aboard and view the world from up in the clouds. I didn't feel so bad when another riding companion, Rosie, had to do the same to get on her smaller horse.
(That's the three amigas there in the photo - Pat on the left on her horse Ribbon, the 80-year-old dynamo, Rosie, on Bunny in the middle, and me, astride Cochise.)

I was a bit nervous at first. After all, I haven't been on a horse for nearly two decades - almost since I got rid of my own pure blooded Arabian, Nijem Warrior, so many years ago.

"His ride is as smooth as glass," Pat assured me. "You could hold a glass of wine while he's trotting and not spill a drop."

I was skeptical at first. How could such a huge animal be so smooth? But she's right. The big brute is gentle as a kitten and his gait feels like I'm riding a Cadillac.

According to Pat, Cochise loves me. I've taken a big leap and can now mount him without that silly step stool. I trust him enough to let him gallop. He hugs me with a nuzzle from his smooth, velvety face and I feed him a horse cookie to watch his gentle brown eyes close in contenment. I'm falling, fast.

Yep, I'm in love. And his name is Cochise.

The Chickens Definitely Came Before the Eggs

Life out here on the farm is…well, farm-like.

Especially with our new addition, ten baby chicks. We’ve got five that are Rhode Island Red mixes and five that are black Leghorns. They’re pretty cute little cheepers right now that peck at the sides of their box home and fall asleep standing up. They are congregating in the corner beneath the heat lamp and sometimes they even pile up on top of each other.

Our hope is that the majority of these little fellows turn out to be hens (it’s nearly impossible to tell at this point). We’ll keep one rooster and eat, or sell, the rest. My husband is making them a fine coop to move into when they are old enough to put outside.

Since I didn’t grow up on a farm or even participate in 4-H, this is a new experience for me. I’ll let you know how it goes. I can’t help but remember the I Love Lucy episode where she and Ricky moved out to the country and started raising chickens. Lucy had to bring them indoors to keep them warm and Little Ricky lets them loose so they had little chicks running all over their house. And then there was the episode with the eggs, when Lucy decides to buy store bought eggs to convince Ricky her hens are good layers. She puts them down the front of her blouse and then does the tango – only to have them all break down the front of her chest.

If I encounter any Lucy-like episode with my chickens, I’ll let you know. After all, if you can’t laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?