Saturday, January 28, 2012

Kindle and Kindle

For Christmas my Husband got me an Android Media Pad (or Notebook).  I have been wanting a Kindle every since I was able to accept the fact that it would, indeed, be more convenient.  Books can be very expensive.  I love books.  Love everything about them, the crispness of the paper, the cracking sound of when you first open a brand new book, the smoothness of the pages, and the way I can get totally lost in a story.  And of course I love the smell.  As I was growing up there were two kinds of stores I loved and could consider owning when I grew up.  One was a book store, the other a feed store.  Both of those places I love for their smell.

Anyway, you probably get my point. I love to read.  Technology takes me time to grow to like.  But once I decided I wanted an E-book Reader I really wanted one badly.  I am so glad Eric got me this one.  It was less expensive than a Kindle, but has a lot of neat things you can do on it, besides read.

I just finished reading a book I have wanted to read since it came out this year: The Land of the Painted Caves, by Jean M. Auel.  I have read every other book in the Earth's Children Series starting when I was 9 years old.  To my sadness this was the last book in the series.  I hate when I get towards the ending of a book, it gives me actual anxiety -- weird? Yes I know.  Since this was the last book in the series I was really quite agitated by the time I got to the last chapter.  It was good but I have a touch of disappointment with the ending.  It felt incomplete to me and felt as if Mr. Auel was in a hurry to be done with it.  Part of me feels like she may even write another book.  If she doesn't I really hope a good movie team picks up the series.  It would make great film if they stayed true to the story enough.

I have been trying to occupy my mind lately with other things besides pregnancy, conceiving, blah, blah, blah.  It gets tiresome after several months and I always have to take a break from it.

Speaking of babies :) I have a rabbit ready to kindle (LOL just realised why I like the name of the Kindle Ebook reader).  She is a Champagne D'argent doe -- a meat breed.  This breed is a French heritage breed, they are not commercial rabbits but produce a nice large, meaty carcass at about 8-12 weeks of age.  I have been very happy with this breed.  My buck is a New Zealand and mixing the two has been a great choice because the babies grow even faster and are very heavy by an early age.  They are beautiful too.  Anyhow, this doe is a doe I chose to keep back from my very first litter of meat rabbits.  She is a pure Champagne and I loved her Mother, who was a very good Mother and easy keeper from the first time she had a litter.  I kept this doe back out of three to choose from, she was the most physically balanced of the three does, and the heaviest at her age.  She has not disappointed me with her growth.

I put her nest box in with her today.  I was "smart" and lined it thickly with newspaper because the nest box is metal and it is not the warmest weather of the year.

I just went out to check my little lady and to my delight she is nesting, to my chagrin she has chosen to nest outside of the box.  The only thing she has found use of the box is the newspaper which she has uniformly shredded and placed in the opposite corner along with a bunch of hay.  I admit I am impressed with now neatly the newspaper was shredded, but wish she would have chosen the box.  I am slightly concerned that she might have eaten some of the newspaper as she was making an exaggerated chewing motion the entire time I was picking out the paper.  It may be because she is in early labor though.  I moved the nest box to her chosen corner (which is also her potty corner dang-it!).  I added another several handfuls of hay and she immediately started rebuilding her nest inside the box.  It is rather cute to see her gathering huge mouthfuls of hay and carrying them around and placing them so carefully inside the box.  Then she rearranges it.  I will go check on her a couple more times tonight in hopes to catch her before she starts to kindle.  If she has those babies outside that box they have no hope.  It is not unusual for a first time momma rabbit to have her babies "on the wire" -- anywhere outside of the insulated nest box.  They die quickly, being born with nearly no hair and quite helpless.

I am finding this new mother stuff with the rabbits to be a little stressful.  This breeding took two months and a lot of time to complete.  Miss Bunny wasn't cooperating with our buck, despite his best efforts to woo her.  The second month was better and I've known she was pregnant for the past two weeks when I could first feel her babies moving around in her tummy.

I will probably wake up at least once during the night to go check on her too.  I really don't want to have to dispose of a whole litter of them in the morning.  If I can save them I will.  They are food, but until they are in my freezer I really care about them and feel terrible when one dies outside of slaughter for consumption.

2 comments:

Cal said...

I know what you mean about becoming anxious as you get to the end of a good book. I too, read "The Clan of the Cave Bear" etc. a long time ago and have considered getting the new one on my Kindle. I just don't know if I would like it as much as I liked her earlier works.

Hope your rabbit has a lot of babies so we can have some rabbit stew sometime.

Love ya,

Dad B

Jamie said...

I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who feels a tiny bit of stress or anxiousness when the end of the book is near LOL. I always thought that was a little weird....but I'm not the only one I guess it's ok. I'll let you know about the litter when she has one. I love you too, Dad xoxo