Gold In Them Th'ar Hills

It was what we call a 'bluebird day,' sky so blue and bright it hurts your eyes and not a cloud in sight.  This oak in all its golden fall glory was so beautiful I had to go back to the house for the camera.

A young couple of my acquaintance arrived while I was milking.  They had come for another kind of gold--garden gold--otherwise known as goat poop.  I haul a couple of buckets of the stuff out of the barn every day and the mole hill was becoming a mountain.  They "paid" for their treasure with homegrown sweet carrots and baby bok choy.  Lacking a few ingredients, I made pretend pad thai last night for dinner.  Close enough to the real thing for government work and horseshoes, and I thought I'd gotten the better part of the deal.

The turkey for our Thanksgiving had been put in the big freezer out in the second shed.  I will admit to feelings of guilt as I brought it past the local flock that was feeding under the oak.  I muttered apologies as I hurried back to the house to let the big bird thaw.

The run to the feed store the other day was mandatory; I had done the unforgivable and run out of goat chow and hadn't had enough left to set up the bowls for their evening snack.  The thing to do, see, is get the grain in time to take it down to the barn before the goats are let out in the morning.  There was nothing for it but to load the bag on the hand cart and trundle it down to the pen at dusk.  I did manage to get though the gate without any girls escaping, but it was a mob scene getting to the barn.  Even Poppy was shouldering her way to the front, and they had the pull string half-chewed before I was halfway there.  Pushing and shoving, three of the six forced their way into the barn, along with me still pushing the hand cart, before I could get that gate closed.  There is next to no room in the hallway and I needed to get the bag down to the littlest stall at the end.  At one point, Sheila was riding on top of the cart and there I was trying to maneuver the whole thing down the aisle while Cindy and Ruth were squeezing back and forth.  I used up a week's worth of cuss words while laughing.  What else are ya gonna do?  Poppy, also left outside, was bellowing at the top of her lungs, sure she would never eat again.  The girls in the barn were dashing in and out of stalls, looking for their treats, and I was able to slam doors and finally get the grain into the barrel so I could start dishing it out.  All the girls know where they go at night and at last sorted themselves into the correct rooms and peace reigned again.  Frustrating, yes, but this comedy of errors got me past the absence of the boys on that first night.  The barn seemed mighty empty yesterday.