A mate.

Yesterday, because we were feeling sorry for the surviving chicken who seemed so lonely and sad, we decided to go get her a mate. Just the one, because I dare not let them out into the field now that the fox knows where they are. So Graham and I drove to the nearby chicken farm and intended to ask if they could let us have perhaps a rescue hen. There were several escapees in the front garden of the bungalow. The hens were allowed out for an hour to conform to regulations and had escaped through the electric fence. The woman wasn't there but her daughter was and after conferring with her mother on the phone she invited us to take a hen as they were escapees and no one would know. So we acquired a free hen and brought her home in a box. She tried to escape from the box several times on the journey home but is now at home with the surviver. There was an initial stand off but they seem o.k. now.
Sonia just rang to give me the news that Diane, a girl that used to live with my mother, has died yesterday, after a short battle with cancer. My mother thought the world of her and would have been very sad. I don't know how old she was but I would guess not yet 50.Such a waste.