Common Crow

Corus brachyhynchos

Tree

Catch up, home, thoughts,

Farmtalk:

First the farm. I am back at the farm alternating schedules of two days, three days. This week is a three day work week.

I have combed a bunch of goats! Today was Nasrim, a very pleasant grey doe with nicewhite fluffy fiber and short guard hair.

Then on to the bucklings on the hill. Two were scheduled for wethering via elastrator. I grabbed and collared Nix's small star for combing, but found myself drawn into the wethering, this time as a needed helper. R took the back position, which left P and a needed I on a leg. Last time R could handle both hind legs, but I had to remind P twice to pin the leg to the ground and not just hold it in the air where they can get some yanking behind them.

Boss was running the tool, and with a hand on a leg and one on the sternum to calm the goat, and also help press the body against R who was standing behind, I was in perfect coach position for Boss.

Although I have only wethered one of my own, I am not too squeamish and have a fair memory enough to coach boss which way to position the tool, watch for the nipples, etc...

While it might seem audacious to be coaching boss, she is, as much as I hate to admit it, showing the symptoms and is aware of them, of Alzheimers, or memory loss in the aged.

After wethering Pablo and Carmella's brown, I combed Nix's small star. Then I helped R in spring cleaning chores and went on to the big bucks over at Prescott. Today I landed Nishak and Shiraz, the latter of whom is a reknown vicious little bastard. Boss took a fiber sample looking for a reason to cull him. I did voice comments on how nice his fiber is-his personality is really the bad case, as he hurt boss on Tues while she was doing his hooves.

I am not sure what happened, but she gave several exclamations (rare for boss) and then nearly threw the hoof clippers before scraping hay until we were finished graining, when she had R hold Shiraz to finish.

The other buck that gives Boss a hard time is Prince Edward ("he is NOT a sweetie"-old blog).

I landed him for combing on Tuesday and we manage fairly well. He has beautiful bright blue eyes and likes cheek scratches and organic crunchy peanut and blackberry jelly on whole wheat-or course we get along! hehehe.

Prince Edward was the only comb for me on Tues, as the day started off damp, so I had opted to do buckling hooves. I went through the whole of six of them, not an easy task, as they can be difficult to catch and I was on my own on the hill. I did four sets of hooves in an hour and a half. ONe was so bad I had to call Boss back, because one clew had a puncture and the other was a mess.

Boss was cleaning it up(she is the BEST on hooves-I call her the "Mac Ridley"-a reknown farrier in these parts-of goat's feet)and I was leaning over the goat observing (I love to watch a good hoof trim!) when I felt a cool mist-I thought it was misting-and Boss let out an exclamation!!!

Homer, the grey buckling, was standing nearby giving us a goatie bucky golden shower with his urine!!! Yes, I still think it is funny! hehehe

Hometalk:

Moonie spent one whole day over the weekend jumping the fence-and finally I could stand now more and put him in with the bucklings. I thought they would kick his ass, but since little homeboy Derek, who grew up respecting Uncle Moonie, is lord of my bucklings, they all now bow to Mr. Moonshadow. Well, I plan to wether the lot of them soon.

Scrounging for hay-bought five bales for 4.25 each-ouch since I was paying 3 for organic!

Cleaned the chimney yesterday in high winds, but the stove was out cold and the stove had been smuttering for days it was so plugged.

That was quite a project-the lat time, in January, was a quick job. This time, I had re-arranged my bedroom in the interim, so I had to move the mattress and box spring to position the ladder for the hatch in the ceiling. I felt like comedy central trying to move the queesnsized mattress, sans handles, by myself, but managed to do it with out breaking anything.

Once on the roof, it was bloody gorgeous out-I was tempted to haul up a lawn chair and soak up a few strong spring rays, the hell with the wind...However, I bent to task and ran up and down twice yanking the chimney brush and enormous clouds of creosote despite the plastic shield I put around the bottom-can you say, "black snot"?

Then it was time to tap out the elbow. WTF?!?!? The thing fell apart. Good thing it was off the stove, and it was a decade old now...

That left the whole project in limbo while I ran off on errands, now including an elbow and reducer...think it ends there? Wrongo bongo...Then I had to bring it home and sheet metal screw the damn thing together...now, don't get me wrong here, any regular reader will know that I am pretty independent (can you spell feminist..lol)..but I did, at this point, wish for THE GUY. Yes, sheet metal screwing stovepipe is a man's job, goddammit...

Well, it was down to me, if I didn't get it all re-connected, it was going to be a chilly night, but somehow I half-assed it and yes, managed to get a fire going before nightfall. And, I think it is safe, so that is cool.

Politics: Al Gore has been a busy topic for me this week, with a CBS 60 minutes interview that showed me exactly WHY he did not run for president this time around. The last fiasco crushed him, and he found a cause in Climate Change to bring him out of the bottom of the pit.

Now Obama is claiming that he is willing to give Gore a high level cabinet post..(please don't presume that Al will go for another VP ).

I have seen that Obama will be our next president, and while his declaration of direct Al Gore involvement is encourging,Obama also indicated that Global warming should be addressed now, not in ten years. Still sound good? Well, the favored position of attack would be to trade carbon credits, and reduce consumption .

Since this leads to higher energy costs via carbon taxes, the spiel is to reduce and with possible intial tax recovery going to compensate poor folk that cannot afford the higher prices...while they are learning to reduce consumption...(obviously Barack has never been poor enough to know how to reduce consumption-which the poor already do....)

Guess that's all for now, folks...