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A few weeks ago, one of our neighbors got arrested. AGAIN. I won’t go into details but we seriously wish those people would just LEAVE!

Last week, I opened the door to let the dogs out, and I smelled heavy smoke. I couldn’t tell where it was coming from. Trees everywhere block most of our views to the East. Brian was in town so I asked him to look for smoke plumes on his way home. When I stepped onto the back porch, I could actually see wisps of smoke blowing by in the breeze. That was scary!

Turns out it was on property owned by “those neighbors.” I’m not sure how it started but one neighbor called another neighbor, who called 9-1-1, and she then called another neighbor. Three neighbors showed up with water and hoses. One brought a rake to beat down the fire. The authorities called the forestry service. They guy they called was on Lookout Mountain. He looked over, saw the smoke on Sand Mountain (six miles away as the crow flies), and ordered the crews to go there with backhoes and water trucks.

By the time they arrived, the neighbors had pretty much put out the fire, which was quite large. The forestry service doused it with their big water hoses.

Then, yesterday, a firetruck showed up in the neighborhood. The people renting the AirBNB next door had left a pan on the stove, and then left the house. The oil in it burned up and smoke was in the house. A neighborhood boy heard the smoke alarm going off in the house, and called 9-1-1. The firemen gave him $5 and told him he saved that house, and possibly the entire neighborhood. It’s extremely dry here right now.

The property manager showed up (we know her) and the AirBNB guests showed up later in the evening. I’d already reported them to her because they were outside of the house yelling the “F” word repeatedly the evening before. Within 30 seconds of my call, they went silent. I don’t understand why people who are on vacation can’t respect people who are NOT on vacation, and who have to work the next day. We HATE having an AirBNB next door. Most guests are courteous but many have not been. One guy just walked into our yard to check out our chickens. He had a small child with him. Had Tank been outside, he might have knocked the child over in his effort to lick her to death. Tank LOVES kids but he’s HUGE! He does NOT like adult strangers, however.

Last month, there was a friendly group at the AirBNB. Late at night, I noticed them walking down the path into the woods. I stood on the porch and warned them about coyotes, wolves, and Bigfoot. I saw all their flashlights do a U-turn, and head right back to the house. Heh… I admit that’s not the first time I’ve played that joke. We do have coyotes and foxes (no wolves), but we also have bears. We haven’t seen a Bigfoot in a couple of years.

Last year, we had to put up no trespassing signs because the big path heading down in the woods goes between our property and the area behind the AirBNB. We have a shooting lane down there. One afternoon, people came onto our property (in the woods), got lost, and ended up coming back out of the woods into our backyard. If we didn’t have a shooting lane, we wouldn’t care about people being in our woods. But, we don’t want anybody to get SHOT!

Our six new chicks are doing great! We didn’t hatch them this year. Brian bought them at Tractor Supply. They got transferred from the tote into the chick condominium in the garage yesterday. They’re growing SO FAST!

RELATED

• STILL STUNNED!!! What Creature Did I See in the Woods Yesterday? Bear, or Bigfoot, or Something Else?
• PART II: Another Bigfoot Encounter!
• Two Forest Fires!
• Sand Mountain – Hog Wild and On Fire!! – by Brian Whiddon, Managing Editor
• Update on the Non-stop Forest Fires!
• 7 Chicks from 12 Incubated Eggs!
• The UFO We Captured on Camera Back in 2005 – Have YOU Seen One?
• PART I: A Snake Fell On My Face! ON MY FACE!!!
• Trunk or Treat and the Cemetery Crawl Were Big HITS!!
• Sniff, Snort, Cough… Is It Covid or NOT?!
• SNAKE BITE!

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