Hens and caffeine

Today on Twitter, I noticed that BBC Leicester broadcaster Damien St John was asking people to tweet a photo of their mug of tea. I decided to participate, but thought I'd get all fancy and take a photo of it with my chickens...

I used my Savannah Wildlife Refuge mug, which is covered in bats. My neighbours brought it home from me after a recent trip down south. The hens were very suspicious at first.

Then of course Anastasia had to go stick her beak in. Then Henrietta. Then Charlotte. Then tea was flying everywhere, and let's just say I didn't drink any more of my Yorkshire Gold! Hens love caffeine. Like they're not jittery enough already.

I have plenty more Mexico pics coming, but I'm a bit off my game. I went to Mexico with a cold, got better, then got another cold just before flying home. 18 days later I'm still sick and finally saw my doctor today. He thinks I have walking pneumonia (so called because it's a mild form and the patient presents well, i.e. walks into the doctor's office looking not too bad.) So I had a chest x-ray and got some good drugs! The worst part has been a very irritating cough that has kept me up until 2 am for five nights in a row. 

I'm hoping I'll be able to knock it back now. I had tried everything under the sun: vaporizer in our bedroom, steaming my face over a bowl of hot water and eucalyptus, spoonfuls of honey, cough syrup without codeine, cough syrup with a minute amount of codeine (available over the counter), bags of Ricola cough candies, herbal tea, many oranges, Hydrasense nasal wash, you name it. Now I'm sipping on three spoons of apple cider vinegar in water. But I also have some stronger cough syrup with codeine for bedtime, yay. And antibiotics. Those Mexican colds are TOUGH! I hadn't had a cold in about three years, so I guess I'm making up for it now. Thank goodness for laptop computers!

Not to mention Scrabble on Facebook. What did I do in the old days when I was sick? Well, watched The Flintstones on TV, I guess...

The apple cider vinegar/water combo is not particularly tasty but you know, it's soothing for a cough. The things you can learn on the internet.

Happy Spring! It has come very early here and the temp was something like 15 or 16C today, i.e. really warm for this time of year The snow is almost all melted, the grackles and red-winged blackbirds are back from down south, and the chipmunks have emerged from the ground.

More soon...