Farm Fresh Blog

I just finished reading Joel Salatin's book, "Folks, This Ain't Normal" and I feel compelled to climb to the rooftops and shout across the land, "READ THIS BOOK!"

Salatin describes himself as an environmentalist capitalist lunatic farmer. The New York Times calls him, the "high priest of the pasture."  I first saw him in the movie, "Food Inc." but to truly apprectiate Joel Salatin, read his books.

The first chapter of this one had me hooked. It's called "Children, Chores, Humilty, and Health."

He talks about sitting in the airports watching young people:

"When I sit in airports and watch these testosterone-exuding boys with their shriveled shoulders and E.T.-looking fingers passing the time on their laptops, I realize that this is normal for them. This isn't happening because they are sitting in an airport trying to while away the time.  This is actually how many, if not most, of their hours are spent -  recreation, entertainment, and playing around."

Salatin then spends the rest of the chapter explaining the chores young people used to do. He explains these things in such detail that not only do I feel like I'm reading a Foxfire book, but I also realize how far our culture has strayed.

At the risk of sounding hypocritical, because I'm sitting here typing this on a computer instead of going outside to address the calves that are screaming at me through the window, our nation is becoming a culture of watchers and not doers. Most of us would be completely helpless without our current state of technology, our electricity, our computers, our smart phones, and our video games. (don't get me started on video games!) We outsource everything in our lives now. This not only promotes lazy bodies, but lazy minds as well.

Instead of advancing us as a culture, it is enslaving us, and we happily march forward toward the sterile, flashing colored lights, and away from the dirt, blood, or anything resembling physical labor.

I bounce between these worlds - the glitz and glow of a metropolitan city where your every physical need can be met with little effort, is balanced on the other side by a ranch so remote that cell phone service is spotty and we only get one television station. (and that was for one weekend. Since then, no signal whatsoever.)

At one house we have cable television with hundreds of channels. We probably watch only four of those. At the other house, we must listen to the radio. This radio becomes our "way back" machine. We enjoy old classic radio programs and I marvel at how these shows are so much more clever than the stuff churned out on television today. They also allow us to multi-task, not zone out like a vegetable in front of a flashing box. Now we can argue that it's Sirius Satellite Radio and that's certainly technology, but the point is that I'm not against technology. Heck, I don't want to live in a age without antibiotics either, I simply believe that better, stronger, faster, isn't always best for us. To paraphrase Jeff Goldblum's character in Jurassic Park, "Just because we can, doesn't mean we should."

For all our modern conveniences, most of us have no more free time than our ancestors did. In fact, we spend most of our lives working to afford those conveniences. We gamble that we'll be healthy enough, or even alive, to enjoy our retirement. Our culture is in a losing race to earn enough money to retire so that we can enjoy actually living.

Rather than downsizing our lifestyles, we 'upsize' our expectations of technology. It has become our teacher, our babysitter, and ultimately, our master.

With each generation, we are losing the skills necessary for survival without our fancy techonolgy and our ability to get cheap goods from overseas. This bothers me. As a child, I can remember my grandmother making beautiful quilts, yet I can barely sew buttons back on. My mother is a mean seamstress though. When I wanted curtains for my cabin, I toyed with the idea of buying the burlap and sewing them myself, but then realized, DUH! I don't sew! I don't know how. Fortunately, Mom came to the rescue and gave me some curtains SHE HAD MADE!  One day I'll have her show me how to sew my own curtains. (Maybe I should order the burlap now!) My mother used to preserve food from the garden in Mason jars. She canned all sorts of things. I never learn this skill and now I deeply regret it. Fortunately, my mother is still alive to teach me these things, but how many other skills are dying out with each generation?

How much knowledge is being lost because it is cheaper, easier, or faster, to get it somewhere else?

Perhaps we should do something about that.

"Real ranchers don't eat quiche."

Or maybe that's real men .... oh well, same thing.

Actually, they might eat quiche. That may be a line they do cross. Mine won't, but then again, he's not very adventurous at the table. He's a meat and potatos guy.  I, on the other hand, happen to eat quiche - and like it.

Then again, I'm not a 'real' rancher. I'm a bit too sentimental for that.

For instance, my recent proclamation that Grandma Deer would not be shot because it's a sin against the elderly, is a good example. And may I point out that Other Half called me from the deer blind this morning to tell me that he had let my does walk away instead of shooting one. I'm sure it is because I have become fond of my does and see them more as 'distant pets that can be eaten in an emergency' rather than game.

In fact, I object to the very word "game" in reference to hunting critters. It is not a game. Don't get me wrong, I'm not against hunting at all, I just don't think it's a fun game. When I was a child, we were poor - really poor. There was no such thing as game hunting and hunting seasons. It was called "pot hunting" because unless it was a rattlesnake, you didn't shoot anything you didn't plan on eating. 

(Although I do recall my stepfather shooting a tomcat that kept beating up our cats. It was my early introduction to the concept of "shoot, shovel, shut up," but I digress.)

Although I had a vague notion of hunting 'seasons,' I fully understood the concept that "Daddy shot a deer and we need to shut up about it. I knew the term "firelighting" before the affluent children did. I understood it was against the law, but I also understood that sometimes "daddies have to do things that are against the law to put food on the table."

Then I grew up and discovered grocery stores. Although more convenient, I never thought for an instant that it was 'better' than nature's grocery store. Which brings us to the ranch.

Real ranchers can't afford to be sentimental. While Other Half has a crusty exterior, he's a softy about a lot of things. But when it comes to ranching, he tends to share that 'matter of fact' notion that what's good for the wallet rules. I, however, can be very sentimental about my animals and my land. I can afford to be, I play Twister over dead men. That gives me a certain amount of flexibility. (No pun intended. Okay, maybe a little pun intended...)

Anyway, the latest crisis on the farm is Bully. (again)

Bully is an old bull. He was older when we got him, and he's served us well.  Bully produces a consistent calf crop each year. Despite the fact that he's bred to cows that look totally different, Bully stamps a calf crop that I have trouble telling apart. They have low birth rate and gain weight quickly. And EVERY cow gets pregnant. He is not aggressive, easy to handle, and stays inside fences.

We moved the tame former show cows and Bully up to the ranch in North Texas. Bully was having problems maintaining his weight down here. His age was showing. We had hoped that up there with all that grass, he would gain weight.  He isn't. He is losing weight.

He is also not keeping up with the girls as they migrate around the ranch. He gets lost. Bully pretty much confines himself to the west side of the property. He's safe there. He has two big meadows, forest, and two ponds. The only real danger to something his size is getting caught in a flash flood of the creek.

I wonder about his vision though. As you recall, several years ago he had a month-long brush with blindness. He recovered but I don't know that he re-gained full vision. It was enough to get around here, but here the fence borders are pretty straightforward.  Up there, he might as well be a wild cow with no fences.

So here is the dilemma. Other Half wants to sell Bully for slaughter before he dies of old age.

"Get some money out of him. And he won't suffer. If he goes down there, the coyotes will eat him."

From my line of thinking, here are the flaws in that perfect ranching logic:

We don't need to get any more money out of him. He has given us a great deal of money already.

Sending him to slaughter to keep him from suffering is laughable. He will be confused and frightened. And if he has a vision problem it will only be worse.

I argued that we owed Bully better than that.  Other Half cocked his head, much like the RCA puppy staring at a phonograph. This was a novel concept for him.

My solution:

Bring Bully home and let him stay with the bull calves here. If we decide to put him down later, we can take him to the butcher ourselves and grind the meat into hamburger. Our butcher will handle things humanely and he won't be frightened.

I can handle the idea of eating Bully. What I can't handle is the idea of using him up, discarding him to make a buck, and sending him into a situation where he will be frightened before he is executed. That doesn't seem right.

Yes, that kind of logic is lost on most people. People with empty wallets cannot afford to be sentimental. And yes, I have been preaching that we need to start living now on the paycheck we'll receive when we're retired. But if we discard Bully for the quick cash, I fear that though my wallet will be fuller, my moral bank account won't.

My aircard died before we went to the north ranch a couple of weeks ago and so I'd been living on my iphone for internet until yesterday, when my husband and the AT&T salesman dragged me further along the road to technology with a new - Hotspot!

I am now, back in 'bidness!'

So let's catch up on the latest at the ranch. One of my favorite parts of the ranch is best seen from a game camera. I love game cameras. They are a wonderful way to keep tabs of the wildlife on the ranch. (and your cows - I firmly believe that as soon as a deer feeder goes off, no matter where she is on the property, Dancing Cow races like Secretariat through the forest to scoop up deer corn.)

There is a good side and a bad side to game cameras. First of all, they give you a snapshot of your wildlife . . .

 I love turkeys. We have a lot of them and they leave feathers all over the ranch. I delight every time I find a feather. It's like finding a smile, just layin' there on the ground.

And deer, we have a 4-6 does that I see each morning or afternoon when I roll around on the 4wheeler. The game camera allows me to slow the action down and look at them more closely.

 (dates on camera are incorrect)

And bucks. They only come out at night and are almost always at the feeder with the rascally little raccoons. We have one little raccoon that is so obese that I call him Fat Albert. This coon isn't pregnant, it is OBESE. The coons are eating pretty well around here. This raccoon in the photo isn't Fat Albert. I don't have his/her pictures on this laptop. I saw Albert running one day when I was on the 4wheeler. Fat Albert was so fat that I thought he was bear cub when he climbed that tree!

 And naturally, the game cameras allow us to keep loose tabs on the hog population. Yes, they're still here. Yes, I still carry a gun when I walk. Yes, when I walk I take one of those evil assault rifles.  (for more on that read this:  Assault Rifles)

 Game cameras are nice, but . . . they also allow you to get to know the animals, and that isn't always a good thing for the men in the family who put up game cameras to monitor wildlife for hunting purposes. Depending upon the womenfolk in the family, this can work against them. For instance, we have a nice population of does, but we also have one  'grandma' doe. She is obviously older and the men took one look at her picture and proclaimed,

"Oh, she needs to be weeded out."

I took one look at her and announced,

"NO! She is a grandma! You can't shoot GRANDMA!"

Thus you see the problem with game cameras. Gentlemen, game cameras allow your spouse to get to know the little creatures under her care. And as such, she is inclined to make sweeping proclaimations such as,

"There will be NO killing of Grandma Deer!"

The men argue about the good of the deer population and such, but I hear them much like Charlie Brown's teacher - "waa waaa waaa waaaaaaaa."

And so, if one of these boys shoots Grandma, there will be hell to pay around here.

 "Such is the danger of cameras."

Certain members of this family have way too much time on their hands.

We kept a group of calves at the house and without their mothers around, there is no one around to keep this group of pre-schoolers out of trouble. Last week Other Half was out of town and I was juggling the farm and a full time job. Naturally the calves discovered the joys of playing in the water spigot.

Yes, one, or more, of the calves figured out how to turn on the faucet and flooded the arena - twice.  They got so bad that I had to turn the water off to the house to keep them from burning the well out.   At one point, I trotted out to the pasture, turned the spigot off, trekked back to the house, and twenty minutes later the calves had turned it on again.  WTF!!!

So I solved the problem by just turning the water off at the well and turning it back on when I needed to take a shower and fill the water tanks. After days spent screaming at Other Half on the telephone, and threats of steak and BBQ, the problem was finally solved when he returned home.

For a while at least.  Other Half returned home and made a little Fort Knox around the water faucet. This seems to have done the trick. We'll see. Kindergarteners with nothing to do but graze can be quite creative.

Someone has clearly not read her contract! The document in question should read:

"kill coyotes, bobcats, raccoons, opossums, and anything else that threatens livestock."

Nowhere in this contract can I find the words, "kills baby squirrels," and YET . . .

a certain someone has murdered not one, but TWO young, (and probably stupid) squirrels in two days!  I am NOT amused. I have never seen a squirrel eat a lamb. It is probably my husband's fault. Other Half has probably slipped her a Scooby Snack because the squirrels have been eating his pecans.

  Mugshot of murder suspect

"There's no sense crying over spilled milk."

I saw it coming before it happened. I even considered stopping and pouring my precious nectar into another bucket, but no! I pressed onward. And even while I watched the storm brew, I considered the phrase "crying over spilled milk."

But with the arrogance of a typical busy human, I muttered to myself,

"She wouldn't dare . . . "

Oh, but she would.

And she did.

I have two good milking dairy goats. They are sisters, Clover & Crimson.

I bought Clover because her breeder hated her color. I loved it. She is also the most delightfully friendly, adorable, pettable, make you love goats, kind of creature you ever wanted to meet.  She is Glinda the Good Witch Of The North.

And then there's her sister . . .

 The Wicked Witch of the West

The breeder had planned on keeping Crimson.

I had Clover and she was the perfect first dairy goat. Clover was the kind of dairy goat that made you want to dance to the Sound Of Music with Julie Andrews. Then I got the call about Crimson.

"If you want her, come get her. If you don't, I'll sell her for meat."

Alrightie then. According to the breeder, one of her teats was bad but she still gave plenty of milk. Since she had so many goats, she didn't have time to fool with her.  I only had one, and didn't need a lot of milk, so I took her.

Right off the bat, I figured out that although she was a full sister to Clover, they were as alike as the witches in The Wizard Of Oz.

Glinda The Good Witch of the North

The Wicked Witch Of the West

Yeah....

She gives a lot of milk . . . if you are willing to rodeo for it.

Kicking the bucket is her forte. Kicking you is just icing on the cake. I developed a whole new milking style to deal with this bitch.

And it worked. But goats are clever. Today the Wicked Witch Of the West came up with a new trick.

"Just sit down in the bucket. Yes, just collapse your back legs and sprawl right into the bucket of milk. And yes, that will spill milk all over the milker, the milkee, the milking stand, and the grass underneath the milking stand."

(much to the delight of the Livestock Guardian Dog)

I wanted to shoot her. 

I really wanted to shoot her. I wanted to take her to the sale barn right then. I smacked her on the ass. I screamed.

I yelled. I threw a fit.

I swear she turned around and smiled at me.

With great effort, I finished milking her out and instead of turning her back in with the other goats, I hauled her hiney to a dog kennel where she could watch the other goats. Then I turned her sister into the milking area. Clover ran to the milking stand, climbed up, put her head into the stanchion, and started to Hoover up the feed her sister had left. Then she turned to me and smiled. Glinda The Good Witch.

I'm so glad she was my first dairy goat. If I'd started my experience with Crimson, I would have given up milking goats entirely. Milking Crimson is like playing a game of Chess. She is a worthy opponent. I've had the upper hand for a while, but I forgot this one little rule about board games . . .

. . .

"When you're losing, turn the board over!"

Dear Friend Kim had a rough morning, but not as rough as the night her turkeys had last night. She had two turkeys, Thanksgiving & Christmas. She had become quite fond of them. They were eating a steady diet of grasshoppers and making themselves quite at home on her ranch. (about 25 minutes from our ranch)  Last night a cougar made a visit. It had turkey dinner.

There is no doubt in my mind that it will be back tonight for the second turkey.

Dear Friend Kim posted a picture on Facebook of the cat's pawprint. BIG cat. Bigger than Briar.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, when the sun goes down around there, the Flying Monkeys come out. We just 'thought' we had a predator problem at my old farm. There I lost 11 turkeys in one night. I lost 10 chickens in a week. I lost a goat not 100 yards from the barn.  Farming ain't for sissies, Folks.  It's a dog-eat-dog world out there. Actually, it's an Everything-Eat-Bird world out there.

If you want to know what predators you have, get chickens. Or geese. Or turkeys. Damned near everything but an ostrich is on the menu in Texas.

And that's why if you keep birds in the country, you need one of these:

 No, not the sheep, the DOG!

A Big White Dawg!

Best $50 I ever spent.

  "awww.... shucks!"

Will she be able to protect all the stock when we move to the ranch? Nope. Hell, that cat is as big as she is! That's why the small stock needs to be in a pen surrounded by a MOAT of nasty dogs. We need to make it too much trouble for the predators to come to our birds. That's what ranch dogs are for.

Otherwise, it's Bye, Bye, Birdie . . .

 The Apple Dumpling Gang

 Geese are just little dogs with beaks. They are the most delightful of creatures and I will not have them again until I'm in a place where they can be surrounded by Big White Dogs. It is simply too heartbreaking to lose them.

One of the first dirty jokes I learned as a child was this:

"Wanna hear a dirty joke? ....... A white horse fell in a mud puddle!"

(Hey, that's hilarious when you're eight years old.)

     There is nothing quite like a farm to illustrate both the tragedy and the comedy in this world. Today I was blessed with the comedy. In fact, I'm still RITGLMAO (rolling in the grass laughing my ass off)

Picture this:

Take advantage of the break in the rain and feed the livestock. Briar pokes around pasture in typical Livestock Guardian Dog fashion - ooze around the stock, don't make waves. And ooze she does,

 until I call her.

Her main goal is to not ruffle feathers, well, not ruffle wool. (she doesn't care if she upsets chickens)  Nevertheless, neither she nor I am prepared for one of the calves to decide that he can bully my Livestock Guardian Dog. 

Literally.

Now I know where the term comes from. Briar is minding her own business, caught up in the world of smells brought out by recent rains. The calf looks at her, sizing her up. Since she normally stays across the fence from the cattle, they are unfamiliar with the big white dog. She is a Livestock Guardian Dog, but both Briar and the calves know that guarding cattle is not part of her job description. The calf makes a fake rush at Briar.

She startles and runs backward, barking at the calf. I cuss the little bastard and am reminded that his mother hates dogs too. (must be genetic) Even seven hours away, his momma would be proud of him.

I let Briar in with the sheep and putz off to let Joe the Paint Horse out of the barn, and that's when I notice two little black butts sticking out of the barn.  Hmmmm.... I left the barn door open and now two of the calves are inside munching hay. Unfortunately for the calves, the barn door is pretty darned close to the back yard - and the Border Collie.

One calf sees the writing on the wall and beats feet. The other calf keeps right on eating. Lily has been watching all this from the gate. She misses nothing. All Border Collies should be named "Ready" because they are always 'ready for duty."

I open the gate and Lily stalks inside. By now the calf inside the barn has realized that his partner in crime has left him and he's trying to decide if he wants to follow her or stay in the barn. Lily oozes in his direction like a shadow. He glances at her but clearly doesn't take her seriously. He is more concerned about me. I stand at a distance and let Lily handle it. She glares at him. He finally notices her. I note with smug satisfaction that this is the same calf who bullied Briar. Alrightie then!

The bull calf glares back at Lily. She smiles at him, much like a serial killer. He lowers his head to give the snotty little dog a warning. After all, he sent the Big White Dawg packing, this tiny beast is barely worth his trouble. And that's when Lily launches - straight at his face.

She grabs his nose and swings all 40 pounds of her little self into the air. She lets go at the highest point of her arc, sails through the air, and lands - in a water puddle.

She goes from Border Collie Ninja to Jackie Chan in the blink of an eye.

The calf and the dog are both in shock. I'm laughing so hard it hurts Lily's feelings. Her entire left side is covered in mud. She isn't sure what to think but decides that if I'm laughing at her, it must be bad. Fortunately I'm quick to realize this and remind her that she is the Best Border Collie In The World. She recovers her dignity and stalks toward the bull calf. He trots to join the others. She starts to gather them but I call her off and congratulate her on a job well done. She shakes off the indignity and once again dons the cloak of Ninja Border Collie.  Her cloak is a little muddy, but she wears it well as she slinks back out of the pasture.

 My Precious Little Ninja
 

"The only good snake is a dead snake."

Well, considering his experience, I can understand his viewpoint.

"Snakes are misunderstood and are an important part of our ecosystem." 

Remember Nadine?

Yes, Miss Nadine lived in our barn for the better part of one summer and took care of our rodent problem. She gave me the creeps, but I let her stay anyway.

Then there are other kinds of snakes.

"The only good snake is a dead snake!"

Yes, I share his opinion of pit vipers. Sorry folks, I understand they are an important part of the ecosystem, but if I shoot all the rattlesnakes and copperheads, then that's just more rodents available for the rat snakes. But what about the cottonmouths?

For most people, if it's black, it's a cottonmouth, also known as water moccasin, and is shot on sight. My experience has been that most of what folks call a water moccasin is actually some kind of harmless water snake. In fact, it's so obvious that I feel sorry for the snake.

But then again, there are imposters, snakes that mimic the dangerous cottonmouth, to borrow a little 'bad-ass rep' from a real nasty character. So while I have no problems identifying a copperhead or a rattlesnake, I hesitate a bit before I pull the trigger on a black snake, which brings us to last Sunday...

Lily and I were doing our soap deliveries and were enjoying a stop at Dear Friend Mindy's farm, when we noted four of Mindy's dogs rush up and hover over something small.  I was thinking "baby bird" or something else helpless in theface of a pack of curious dogs, when Mindy gasped, "SNAKE!"

Few words will galvanize country folk like that word whispered, gasped, shouted, or screamed in that particular tone. So we ushered the dogs away from the snake, and went over to investigate the intruder. He was inside her back yard, beside the chain link fence. We cautiously poked at him with a rake. He slithered into the tall grass along the fence.

Hmmmm.... we needed a closer look.

Neither of us wanted to kill an innocent snake, but on the other hand, Mindy has an adorable young son, and multiple curious dogs. Proper identification was imperative.  So we poked and prodded the creature in an attempt to get him to move into an empty kitty litter plastic tub. Eventually he cooperated and we were soon rewarded with a black snake in a bucket. He looked pissed. Or scared. Or both. It's hard to tell with snakes. No eyebrows.

Here's what we had:

Mid-sized black/brown snake with triangular-shaped head
pale pink, not quite white mouth
body not exactly fat for its length
not particularly aggressive
yellow belly
darker band along the bottom of his face, making a mask over his eyes, but not exactly like a raccoon

Hmmmm. . . Mindy suggested we photograph it and Facebook for advice. In a moment of insanity, I argued against that because I knew that the majority of our friends know even less about snakes than Mindy and I. But duh! I should have agreed to take a PICTURE of the damned thing. (Hindsight is 20/20.)

So we examined our snake quite closely and still couldn't decide if it was dangerous. We finally decided that since cottonmouths are aggressive and our snake wasn't, he must just be a black snake flattened out in an attempt to mimic a cottonmouth. Satisfied, we patted ourselves on the back for our Snake Social Enlightenment. We carted that sucker across the street, and dumped him out in the ditch beside a wooded area. He slithered off and we congratulated ourselves for having compassion, and for being brave enough to conquer our fear of snakes long enough to conduct a less-than-thorough investigation.

Well Friends and Neighbors, in the world of law enforcement we have a saying,

"In God we trust, all others we run NCIC."

(criminal background checks)

Yeahhhhh....

You see where this is headed.

What we failed to notice was that the snake bit one of Mindy's dogs. Poor Whiskey's head swelled right up. Suddenly our enlightened, green, snake-hugger behavior didn't seem as admirable. In fact, it seemed pretty damned dumb. I'm not sure what her husband said, but my husband threw the proverbial shitfit. He was less than amused when he heard Mindy and I had prodded a water moccasin into a kitty litter bucket, carried it across the street, and dumped it out.

Words like "$10,000-12,000 hospital stay" were screamed.

I had no defense. None whatsoever.

A vet was called and fortunately Whiskey survived her encounter. Mindy and I now have a new motto,

"When in doubt, shoot it out!"

Yesterday I accidentally stumbled upon a bit of wisdom that everyone knows but we all tend to ignore. This world is full of people who burn the candle at both ends. None of us has time to be sick but it's a guarantee that if you juggle enough plates, they'll all come crashing down when the eventual illness creeps up. Such was my case. After two days of trying to sleep it off, I was still ready to kill my husband and everything canine that kept me from sleeping. I emerged on Sunday morning, still physically and emotionally exhuasted to find that the rescue dog had crapped all over his kennel because surprise, surprise, just like everyone else on the farm, Daddy expects Mommy to do everything and failed to calculate that dogs need to go to the bathroom.  grrrrrr......

(That pushed Mommy over the edge.)

So I packed up Lily the Border Collie, and a truckload of soap, and I left.  I left Other Half with EVERYTHING. I left him with a hungry barnyard of animals. I left him with a crappy kennel in the living room. I left him with 7 hungry, happy dogs that needed to be fed and exercised. I left him with a dirty house and an air conditioner that didn't want to work. I just took my dog and LEFT it all!

Lily is better at math than I am so she's my bookkeeper!

Lily, my headache, and I drove off. It was liberating. We drove straight to a convenience store for a frappuccino. (HEY! Don't judge me!") Soon caffeine was coursing through my veins and I was headed off to deliver my first soap order of the day. There is a joy to selling soap. Not only does it smells good. It brings friends together and makes new friends. And that was where I had my epiphany.

Friends are good medicine. Friends are good for whatever ails you. Ladies, whatever goes on in your life, take more time for your friends. There is something about having "girl time" that is remarkably healing. Old friends, new friends, friends you just met, they are all a salve for your soul.

Friends re-calibrate you.

Thank you, Shari for the wonderful, but all-too-short visit. We need to do this more often. Thank you, Jamie for letting me play with your Gypsy Vanner horses! There is nothing like playing with a 'highly-expensive-I-could-never-afford-it-so-just-enjoy-it' foal to brighten your soul. And God bless you, Mindy. We don't get enough time together but it's always memorable. There is nothing quite like battling a snake and playing the "is it a cottonmouth or not" game. Kudos to you for being bad-ass enough to put the snake in a bucket. You are my hero!  And Dorothy, thank you my new friend. From the moment we met, I knew I'd found another sister. And Jeannie, dear, dear Jeannie. What would I do without you?

And at the end of the day, after seven hours of girl time, bouncing from soap order to soap order, and friend to friend, I felt better.  My headache was gone. I was ready to go home and tackle the happy, bouncing, needy farm, to coax the sullen air conditioner back to life, to convince the husband that he really needed to buy me fajitas and a strawberry daiquiri.

And the world was a better place.

So the moral of this story is:  When things really look dark, when you feel like crap, when you are convinced that if one more person or animal demands something from you, a murder will occur, that's the time to dump everything, pack up your dog, and spend the day with girlfriends. It's the best medicine in the world.

Oh, and thank you, Lily for being both my doctor and my bookkeeper!