Puddled & Befuddled

It appears that my mental acuity is as consistent as the weather. The sun shone brightly yesterday morning with a mere 10% chance of rain. As I mentioned in my last blog, that changed to 100% as the rain came down in torrents and the pups, who spent the winter sleeping out in the snow by choice, were on the back porch trying to avoid the onslaught.

In the meantime, I decided a cup of coffee sounded like a great idea, so I poured in some cream and sugar and stuffed it in the microwave. When I went to retrieve my cup, there was creamer bubbled up and boiled all over the inside, as I forgot to put the coffee in. Chagrined, I turned to look at the pot only to see that I must have THOUGHT about pouring it, because it was no longer on the stand, but set on the counter. I decided instead to have some yogurt, which I had made the day before. I’d heated, cooled, inoculated and set it in the incubator. After 4 hours I then removed it and put it into the fridge.

Upon removing the lid, I realized I never PLUGGED IN the incubator! So it was just milk.

Giving up on the yogurt and coffee idea, I decided to check on the 25 new chicks, only to find to my horror, that they had developed “pasty butt”. Don’t ask. It’s icky…it just is. I had to catch them one by one and give them ‘sitz baths’ to clean them off, or they could perish from the consequences. There is a problem. The big box I am brooding them in is just tall enough, that I cannot reach inside and catch chicks with my little short legs. Therefore, I grabbed a knife and started sawing a hole in the cardboard so I could reach my hand in and nab the little boogers…of course, I had to saw a hole on every side of the box, as the minute I would go to stick my hand in, they would all run to another corner. A mere 45 minutes later, I had captured 8 of the 25 and became a living bidet to a chicken herd. Humility is just a byproduct of living on a ranch and having stewardship of animals. There is no end to the alarming things you may find yourself doing to promote their welfare.

Day after the storm was beautiful. I finally felt well enough to ride, so I saddled up Wimpy and rode out to check out my bovine maternity ward. Quasimoto wasn’t so anxious to stare me down when I was horseback. Afterwards, me and Wimp just went for a cruise, and found a good level spot free of rocks and gopher holes where I rode in circles awhile, working on re-strenghtening. It felt good to be horseback again after these long months.

I got back and Cider found puddles. It made his day.

I am drying up Prissy goat, as the cows will be freshening very soon, and I am tired of her abuse of me. She looked engorged, so taking pity on her, I decided to milk her just a bit to relieve the pressure. As I didn’t need to save the milk, I didn’t put the hobbles on her…

…I don’t know what exactly happened, but the world suddenly went white and I felt white hot, searing pain tear through my previously repaired shoulder. I returned the ungrateful wretch to the pasture and am just now learning how to fill calf bottles with the use of only one arm.

At my age, in my condition, it has come to the point that just pickin’ lettuce has become extreme sport.

 I just love life livin'on the edge.