For this, and any other Wacky Writing Ideas, I happily release them into the wild for anyone to use. If you like the idea and want to write it up, do so with my blessing! If you want to change it or use it for something else, have at it! If you really want to do […]
Recorded My First Audiobook
This week (on Monday, November 14th) I launched the audiobook version of my non-fiction book “Negotiating After Getting A Job Offer“. I’m not much of an audiobook “reader” myself. Almost all my reading is done electronically on an iPad, with a tiny amount of print reading on the side. I keep encountering the fact that […]
The Emotional Impact of Butchering Our Pet Chickens
I recently posted about butchering our pet chickens. In my previous post, I focused on nut-and-bolts mechanics of killing them and preparing them to be eaten. In this post want to explore why I killed them and what the experience was like emotionally. For years I thought it was important that people who eat meat […]
Is There A Benefit To Having A Blog?
Some time back (early in 2022), there was a Reddit post asking about the benefit of having a blog as a self-published author. I posted a comment giving my view on this, but felt this was something worth expanding to a blog post. I was a personal finance blogger before I started writing novels and […]
The Complete Tightwad’s Approach To Shoestring Publishing
I’m a big believer in keeping costs low when you’re getting started writing, but the VAST majority of writers advise: “spend money on this, spend money on that. It takes money to make money!” Everyone gets to decide how to write and publish for themselves. I’m firmly of the opinion that there are *MANY* reasons […]
We Butchered Our Three Chickens
Today’s post will be discussing butchering our three chickens. While there shouldn’t be anything too graphic, I will be discussing the process in detail. I would recommend skipping this post for readers who will find this disturbing. Butchering Your Backyard Chicken Chickens are considered one of the easiest animals to “dress” – clean the carcass […]
Accidentally Bought Crumble Instead Of Pellets
We’re on our third bag of feed since we got our chickens in May this year. This is pretty good, considering that each bag is 50 lbs, we feed them kitchen scraps and we bought them a 50 lbs bag of scratch as well. We’d been really happy with the pellets we got the first […]
Winterizing Your Coop
One of the things that surprised me when my wife and I first started learning about chickens is that they can survive in the winter in cold climates. I had assumed that chickens were only in warmer climates year-round. Instead, I learned, as long as a few basics are ensured, they can thrive throughout the […]
Droppings Board
Last week I wrote about the deep litter method to manage your coop’s bedding. Another popular way to try to minimize the work involved in keeping the coop clean is the droppings board. Also known as a “chicken poop board”, the idea behind this is to put a removable tray underneath the chickens’ roost in their coop. […]
Deep Litter Method
I’ve previously written about the different materials you can use as bedding in your chicken coop. Beyond what material you provide for bedding, one option is to use the deep litter approach. Using a bit of strategic laziness, the idea behind deep litter is that rather than cleaning out the coop and providing fresh bedding, you […]