Peace Comes Dropping Slow

Well the farmer decided to just leave all the gates open instead of sorting us back to our designated areas. The reason for this is that it gives the FAT MILKERS access to EVEN MORE FOOD.

I am trying to put a subtle emphasis on a few keywords here and there in hopes that someone will notice the unfairness of the FAT MILKERS getting access to EVEN MORE FOOD.

The idea is that now they can go back to the never-ending pasture in the back during the day and eat the lush waist-high grass which is free rather than the newly purchased hay from the Longbranch pastures. But because they are DUMB as well as FAT, they will just sit around like blobs waiting for the newly purchased hay to be brought to them on a platter rather than go out and forage on the free hay. Unless we, the starving classes, show them how to do it.

So the farmer left all the gates open so they could come down into our pasture and we could show them the grass. Sad.

Well, to be fair, Boo and Scouty did go running for the grass at a suprisingly high rate of speed. For those two, any rate of speed is surprising, unless licorice or vanilla wafers are involved.

Anyway, we have been lolling around with the fat milkers for a few days now and wouldn't you know it the turf wars are over. Everyone got bored with them. Everyone agrees Brandy is the Queen. Everyone knows only milkers go on the milkstand. And so now there is peace, if not quiet, since the Nubians are always sighing or singing or snoring.

The Hay

It is time for The Hay.

So I was going to write a new ode to Hay.

But since the Hay is like Forever, I decided to just link to last year's Ode to Hay.

I used the extra time to start writing a song about The Hay. Here's the first verse:

You're in my blood like holy hay
Tastes so bitter and so sweet
Oh I could eat a bale of hay
And still
I would still be
on my feet

Luckily "feet" rhymes with "wheat," so I think I know where I will be going with the next verse, but right now I better take a nap. I get pretty tired watching sweaty red-faced people carry hay into the barn.

Bastille Day

I do not know what day it is where you are, but here it is Bastille Day.

We, the down-belows, led by my daughter Hannah Belle who is an expert at taking matters into her own hands, broke through the lower pasture gate and stampeded the hill and the big barn, taking the fat milkers by storm.

Yes, I said it, they are fat. It is because they get WAY TOO MUCH FOOD. The farmer LETS THEM EAT CAKE while we squabble over little crusts of bread!

Vive la Revolution! (or should it be 'le Revolution'?)




As soon as we stormed them a battle ensued that roiled and surged around the barn and then spilled over into the front pasture.

Even the babies got into the act, with Winnie, Jr. and Jaybird throwing down to see who would be King of the Babies.

Even Penrose awakened from her slumbers to join our fearless band.

Actually, Brandy is getting a little bit angry, so we may go back to our own pasture. Not because we are afraid, but because we prefer our humble peasant existence.

Thank you for your time, here comes the farmer, I must run.

The Basking Society

If you don't die first, some day you will get old. Some of our best friends are starting to show a little wear and tear. Marquee, who is the finest old goat gentleman you could ever hope to meet and the granddad of just about half the goats here, is starting to have some trouble getting around.

Not to mention his other problems, which are too personal to get into. But let's just say that it seems fairly doubtful he will have too many more kids, because the swimmers apparently fell off the lifeboat.

But that doesn't stop him from enjoying the sunshine. Once you are about ten years old, like Marquee, you really get the hang of basking.

And Spenny the border collie now has gray eyebrows and doesn't get all atwitter about fetching sticks any more. She leaves that to Wendell the Pest, who doesn't even really know how to do it. He understands the part about getting the stick, it's the part about bringing it back that has his little boston terrier brain puzzled.

So Spenny basks, too.

And let's not even talk about Tommy the appaloosa. He is the top hound of all the baskervilles, laying flat out like a giant pancake and soaking up all the rays in sight.

Oh well.

The Unbearable Hotness of Being

It is blazing hot today, just like a brick oven, with nothing but sun for miles. How I long for the marine layer, the chilly morning fog in the meadow, the delicious breeze from the West.

Lucky Marquee got a cool bath and a shavedown yesterday and he looks a fright but goodness I'm sure he's comfy. Laddy the nosy Tennessee Walker was following the farmer around like a puppy dog as usual and making it hard to feed everybody but when the farmer turned around and sprayed him with the hose, which usually makes him saunter off to bother someone else, he just stood there basking like a fat dolphin in the hose water.

It's hot. It's way too hot.

Why oh why did I ever get this fur coat?

Summer at Last

Well, we're not sure exactly how it happened but it is almost time to cut the hay again.

And we're not sure how this happened, but a lot of us here have somehow gotten fat, even though we hardly get anything to eat. I for example have to exist on a handful of grain, and it is only because of my extraordinary metabolism that I am still shopping XL. An ordinary goat on this diet would look like a coat hanger.

The horses all look like giant beachballs, and yet every evening they have a temper tantrum when they discover they are not getting grain twice a day. Since it isn't winter. Duh, fat boys.

Only the milkers look reasonably svelte, which is a bitter irony, since they get to eat practically anything they want.

Now that summer is actually here, we plan to start complaining immediately about the heat and too much sun, after nine months of complaining about no heat and endless rain.

Our Man Flint

The last baby of the season has been born and his name is Flint. Lori says his name is Flint, Michigan, but that is ridiculous. We just call him Flynnie. He has very pretty buckskin coloring and bright blue eyes.

He is Eo's son.

For some reason Eo has turned neurotic and been doting on him in a most unseemly manner, possibly because she has never had a single kid before. I think she thinks she had another one but misplaced it somewhere so is taking extra special care of the one that's left.

Or maybe she is just a nut job. That could easily be the case.

I always tell my kids, go, walk around, cross the street if you like, live and learn. But that's just me.

Anyway, it has been practically impossible to get the official farm photographer (Lori) to take a picture of Flynnie, because she is obsessed with the hummingbirds.

"Look," she tells everyone, "look, I took another picture of the hummingbird." And then she makes them look at the picture, the ten thousandth picture that looks exactly like all the other pictures. But anyway during a short break in the endless hummingbird photo shoot she finally agreed to take a picture of Flynnie.