The Great Wheatlage Debacle of 2017

CA and I argued over the best way to utilize the wheat that we planted just to keep the hillside from eroding over the winter because the beans didn't come out until almost October and everyone said that that was too late to plant grass seed then. Well, except for my dad who didn't chime in on the subject until after it was too late to plant the grass seed and use the wheat to protect it. Which was brilliant, and would have worked SWIMMINGLY, but we didn't know. 

Dad also suggested using a slit seeder to plant the grass over the wheat, but no one that I could find had one big enough to plant 40 acres with; but that was okay because Mark (the professional farmer who rents my parent's row crop ground) said that what we really needed to do was frost seed it anyway. Which was great, except that you do that in January, and it was February already; oh and BTW, didn't you know? You really need to plant grass seed in August, not the spring. And definitely not just disk up the wheat and plant it in grass like I had discussed with him in the fall.

So, CA and I are staring at the lovely wheat field with tiny baby grass and clover being choked out by the foot high wheat and we get the idea to hay it since using it as pasture would hurt the new grass. (Which I have to baby the shit out of because it was planted too late.) So we think about, and agree that haying it is the way to go. Even though neither of us has ever seen anyone bale wheat before as anything other than straw. The farmer's hereabouts usually either let it go and harvest it or spray it with a desiccant and plant over it.

It is April and too wet to technically hay it, so we will have to rent or borrow someone's equipment to "haylage" it. Which is where you take wet grass and bale it, and then wrap it in plastic wrap to let it ferment and become silage. It requires heavier duty balers as well as a special bale wrapper. So I call up Mark and ask him if he knows anyone who might be able to rent our their equipment or possibly just pay to bale and wrap it.

And wouldn't you know? According to Mark wheatlage is great for cows and the dairy he used to work at always made wheatlage. But he hadn't shared that information with me previously, I guess presuming that I knew with some innate farmer wisdom in my blood that wheatlage would be cow crack. I didn't spend weeks thinking I must be crazy, because I had never seen this done before. No, not at all. That didn't happen.

You know, everyone talks about the barriers to entry of farming and they always talk about how damned expensive it is or how hard land is to get, and that is 100% true; but sweet mother of God what about this awesome pool of knowledge that isn't being shared? 

I read articles where authors are chastising my generation of farmers for treating permaculture and other farming practices as things that they just discovered and I get it. We are a bunch of egotistical millennials. Perhaps we do have a lofty idea of ourselves, but do you want to know why we feel like we just discovered the best farming practice ever? That we must be the originator? Because no one is telling us about them. In many cases we are having to constantly reinvent the wheel, and we shouldn't be.

I have grown up on a farm. I have great mentors and resources at my disposal and I still feel like I am having to pass some sort of weird initiation where all these older farmers are testing my farming instincts in order to give access to their knowledge. I can't even imagine how hard it is for my peers who haven't been blessed with that background. It seriously wouldn't surprise me if I happen to slop my way up a mountain sized pile of cow manure to talk to some old timer about my sea kelp research only to have him tell me that it is great and he has been using it since 1975. Well h-e-double hockey sticks, why didn't I know that already?

All humor aside though fellas, I know you're not doing this on purpose; but please realize that "you don't know what you don't know" and the next generation of farmers needs you to teach us. Desperately. Yes, some of us (myself included) have weird a$$ ideas about grassfed, and organics; but those things don't change the basic knowledge that you can share. We need you to have a conversation with us. When we tell you in September that we want to plant grass seed, instead of just saying that it is to late, tell us about cover crops that could work. Or try something like, "Hey, you know cows, but you don't know much about row cropping. You just said you are worried about erosion, have you thought about this annual crop (corn/soy/sudan grass/freaking rutabagas) that we could plant after the winter wheat; but have out before August so that you can plant the grass for your future hayfield in the best time frame? I know you want forage for the cows. How about wheatlage? Cows freaking LOVE wheatlage."

And you guys and gals, the next generation, my generation? Don't discount others just because they're using Round-Up and spreading nitrogen. Don't turn off your ears the minute you hear row-crop. They have been doing this a long time and just because they don't farm the way you and I do/want to doesn't mean that they don't know what they are doing, or that all of their knowledge is somehow flawed. It is time that we all stepped up to the table and swapped stories. The agriculture community as a whole will be much better off because of it if we do.

Me? I think I'm going to start hanging out at the local Farm Bureau's pinochle night, or maybe Hardee's at breakfast, and hope that I might overhear something new. If nothing else at least the great wheatlage debacle of 2017 did do one thing. It showed me how much I don't know.

Happy National Agriculture Day!

Apparently this year's National Ag day theme (Yes. It has themes. Who knew, right?) is "Agriculture: Stewards of a Healthy Planet."

Fitting. That pretty much sums up why Captain America and I are raising our cows the way that we are. 

Would it be cheaper to fatten them up on grain? Yes. It takes a lot more grass to add a pound of weight than it does corn, soy, or industrial food byproduct. In fact, grass fed beef cattle frequently take longer to mature for this reason.

Would it be easier to dose with preventative medicine? Yes. Feeding them a few rounds of antibiotics to prevent infection (or just promote weight gain, because that is a common use of subtherapuetic doses of some antibiotics - usually penicillins and tetracyclines) in with their feed ration, also known as medicated grain, would be much easier than monitoring them and then separating and working the sick animals to provide them with individualized veterinary care based on what illness they have. 

No one who hasn't worked cows in a head catch without a squeeze chute can truly appreciate just how much anger a 1,500 lb animal can manifest. Watch your arms folks. They can snap them easily while you're giving injections. Sometimes I think rodeo cowboys have nothing on farmer's reflexes.

Would it be better to do that? For us personally the answer is no. There is a place in the world for that model - I'm not throwing any shade on the family farms that have to do things that way to stay afloat here. But for Captain America and I the choice is simple. Before he and I even met I started asking myself the tough questions.

How do I do my part to help prevent super bugs, or keep bee colonies alive? How do I reduce my carbon footprint? Is row cropping really the only profitable way to farm the land I have? Could there be another way to be able to afford my property taxes? Is all that round up runoff really safe? How would I have to care for an animal to not feel guilty about eating it if I were to be haunted by its ghost? How do I take the best care of the land that I have? 

For me, and for us, the decision to create 200 acres of rolling pastures out of some pretty severely ditched up farm fields in order to support a thriving herd of grassfed cows was the perfect solution. 

By planting a mixture of endophyte free fescue, orchard grass, and red clover all over the hillsides not only will the cows have good forage; but we will stop sending so much topsoil down to Louisiana every time it rains. Plus, we won't have to worry about spraying it with pesticides and herbicides that could wind up in the waterways along with the soil.

Unless we get a creeping buttercup infestation. Then they shall be purified with fire, 2,4-D, the wrath of God, whatever it takes to get rid of those toxic little suckers. Damn buttercups... not even goats can eat creeping buttercups. Ugh.

Anyway, the clover will also feed bees, which will help out the local colonies and maybe even pave the way for a hive or two of our own one day.

Isolating our herd on our acreage and using rotational grazing not only is better for the grass it helps to reduce exposure to some pathogens and will help keep the cows healthier, so even if we do get a bug coming through it should be easier to monitor and treat. 

Basically what all of those decisions boil down to is CA and I doing our part to live this year's Ag Day theme: "Agriculture: Stewards of a Healthy Planet." every day. I encourage you to go out and think about how you could improve your stewardship. 

After all, just a pot full of flowers could help a bee or butterfly, and just buying from a local producer could help a small farmer pay their property taxes and keep working to be a better steward himself or herself. 

Healthy planets are better with healthy grass, which grows some pretty healthy cows!

Make sure to follow farmingfoible on Instagram to see more of our daily adventures.

This is why I can't have nice things.

That is what my legs looked like at the end of Friday's feeding.

Why?

Because the ole gals have been chatting around the hay feeder and decided that the new fangled birthing options out there sounded like they'd be great to try. Here's a hint, cows shouldn't have water births.

They should also not have births close enough to the lake that the calf could fall in and make it look like a water birth.

They should also not ATTACK people who happen by on the tractor in the nick of time, strip their shoes off (because I have lost boots by wading in lakes before), and jump in valiantly to save their newborns from hypothermia or drowning.

You'd think they'd be grateful, instead I'm nursing a few bruises and pulled muscles from running away from an angry momma. Fortunately my dad heard all my yelling (something along the lines of: "You stupid witch! I'm trying to help! I'm not the one who decided to have a baby in a f-ing lake!") and interceded with the four wheeler and a big stick. 

Everyone is fine, other than me with my lower back which was twisted in the getaway - or by face planting because I didn't put my boots back on (which really, look at my feet, you wouldn't either) and slipped on the "cow mud" by the feeders. 

Friday was not my day.

This is why I can't have nice things...

But Saturday was. Isn't he the sweetest? Really, who needed a decent pedicure anyway?

Redneck Love Poem: New Holland's missed marketing opportunity

My Valentine's day poem options to accompany this lovely water color I did for Captain America (also known as this is what happens when you say I can't buy you anything for V-day, ha):

Our baler is red.

Our tractor is blue.

I'm so lucky,

That I found you.

The baler is red.

The round bale is tan.

I am so glad,

That you are my man.

Balers are red.

Tractors are blue.

There's nowhere I'd rather be,

than haying with you.

Balers are red.

Tractors are blue.

Oh hell, the cows got out.

No one I'd rather curse with than you.

The balers are red.

The tractors are blue.

I think New Holland missed a marketing opportunity.

Don't you?

They make me crazy. *Explicit*

Last night I went a little crazy.

A few years ago I was with my friend V at a bar in Florida. We had been talking, drinking, and having a good ole' time when one of the guys we were chatting with did the unthinkable. He made V's cousin cry. As soon as she found out my hands were thrust full of a purse and I was watching, mesmerized slightly confused and definitely a little bit mortified, her run/hop down the boardwalk removing her heels as she went. She got in the guy's face about not making her cousin cry and I was pretty sure she was going to stab him with her stiletto. For the record, V is half Mexican, and we frequently joke about her going "Mexican chick crazy" on the guy. Also for the record, she didn't actually beat him to death with a high heel. He backed down and apologized. I have always been a little in awe of her passionate side.

I tell you this story so that you understand where I'm coming from on this one. Last night I went "Mexican chick crazy." On a cow.

For the last three feedings the cows have gotten out when I have begun moving them hay. The first time they banged against the gate and it came open accidentally. The second time I noticed that the tractor had a flat and they escaped while I was backing it up to try to fix the tire. I swear, there was nary a cow in sight, but as soon as the gate was unattended it was like a Goddamn military attack. "Alpha team: go, go, go!" "Beta squad, flank! Now! Go! We've rehearsed this people!" I hopped off the tractor to see a stream of black pouring out of the gate. Both of those times I kept my cool. After all one was an accident and the other was my fault. Plus, they both happened on Saturday mornings when I had help to put them back in.

Oh, but last night. Last night they ran out of the gate while I was trying to get the tractor through it. Note, they still have had hay in their feeders. They are just (rightly) convinced that there is a smidgen of grass in the yard (since, you know, eating it Saturday morning). They would rather have that than the icky old alfalfa and grass bales. Also, they are a bunch of jerks and just kinda suck.

So last night I decided to use the tractor with a cab because I mistakenly thought it had better headlights. Turns out that it has headlights that point directly on the hood of the tractor, producing glare the likes of which you cannot even imagine. Add to that a dusty tractor windshield and I already am cranky because I can't see worth a damn. By the way, the cows are black. So it is perhaps the worst combination ever for not running them over.

Anyway, I open the gate and run back to the tractor to lift the bale, put it in gear and move forward, which admittedly takes longer than it does with the cabless tractor by a few seconds, when like a bunch of ninjas the freaking strike force pours out of the gate. Ten cows run out before I can block the opening with the tractor. I wedge the gate closed on one side, blocking the rest of the herd between it and the tractor so cows can come in, but not out - hopefully. Then I run around the barn and start screaming like a drunken sailor banshee.

I am certain that if anyone had heard me I would have been committed. I always joke about farmer's cursing, but this, this was the pinnacle. I wasn't being clever and calling them "line breeders." BTW, that is when you breed a son to a mother, thus making him a...I think you get it. Or shouting "Son of a Brisket!" I was shouting something along the lines of: "WhatTheFuckAreYouDoingOut?! YouStupidSonsOfBitchingCows! GetYourAssesBackInTheGoddamnFence! RightNow!" and  running at them. Note that at this point I am just pissed. I haven't crossed the line to crazy yet. Then Twoface's daughter turned and stopped. She looked right at me like, "Yeah? What are you going to do about it?" I charged her and pulled the knife out of my pocket that I use to cut off the bale strings while shouting, "You wanna go? I will fucking cut you, heifer!" She turned and fled, but that right there is when I went "Mexican chick crazy." I'm pretty sure I leapt at her with a knife. Yup. That happened.

That's right, V. I'm not always a passionate person, but when I am I contemplate shanking a cow with a bale spear. Boom. Mic drop.

In other news, they didn't get out again and the rest of my feeding went very smoothly. Perhaps cows respect the crazy?

Barnyard Tales Chapter 8: That time Satan tested me with a disc mower

Sweat poured down my back and I wiped my brow with one grease stained hand. This mower, oh, this mower. I was pretty certain that Satan himself had come to life and went to work for Case IH as a disc mower design engineer. The Case MDX91 is his gift to the world.

A single 3/8" roll pin had snapped on Tuesday causing the whole lift assembly to crash to the ground, popping apart like a can of Pringles and shearing the all thread that held the spring on. The mower was neatly immobilized, a beautiful piece of red and white pasture art popping up against the muted browns and greens of the hayfield.

Captain America texted me when it happened. His succinct text messages said more about his frustration than a dictionary of curse words.

I arrived the next day with some spare parts from the local hardware store and watched him attempt to loose the all thread from the cast iron jaws of the now seized spring assembly. It didn't work, and for the next morning neither did I as I hauled the spring to the repair shop. The little old farmers opened the door for me and did their best to reassure:

"Farming is only 5% farming, and 95% fixing the stuff that breaks."

"I'm gonna try to hire her."

"Me? Oh no, clearly I'm just good at breaking things!"

"That's fine." He motioned to the broken PTO shaft in his calloused grip. "I'm pretty good at that too. I just need someone to blame it on!"

"We have those springs too. They lock up all the time. These guys will get it extracted for you."

Guess what, they didn't. One new spring assembly and three days later CA and I were headed out, convoy style, when he pulled the big blue bulk of the tractor off the road and walked up to the door of the truck full of tools. I turned down the radio. I should have known then that this was the Devil's clever design.

"We don't have the replacement bolt for the roll pin. It's in my car."

"Oh, you want me to run to your house?"

"No. My car. At your house. An hour and a half away."

"F."

But that's fine I thought. Silly me. I believed I could just leave him in the field and run to the closest hardware store, only an hour round trip, and wouldn't even have to get dirty. Oh, I was so sure of my plan as I jammed out in the air conditioned truck. He'd surely have it mostly put together when I got back.

And that was how I found myself sweaty and blackened with grease and hydraulic fluid, repeatedly rocking a cast iron piece of metal over its seat over and over, and over again. We tried to beat it on by hand. We beat it with hammers. We beat it with the front end loader of the tractor. I kicked it. Nothing worked. We took it off, and put it on. I stood up and walked my pretty little head right into the bale spear, slipped on a grease gun and fell flat on my back. I couldn't tell if the water seeping from my eyes was from pain, frustration, shock, or laughter. We took it off, and put it on. Off and on. Our muttered cursing melded with the dull thunk of the hammer into a beautiful song about the human condition. The sonnoffawitchingmothertruckinggoshdanged whatchamadoodle kept jamming for absolutely no reason other than to be contrary.

Which is how I know that Case's signature red color shows their allegiance to the Underworld. Crafty, crafty.

I called for back-up. They couldn't figure it out either. There were no burrs, no reason whatsoever that the one pipe shaped piece would not fit over the other pipe shaped piece. None at all other than this being a test of fortitude. A divinely administered trial designed to plumb the depths of our resolve, break our spirit, drive a wedge in our hearts, and tarnish our souls.

Or not. As Heinlein said, the purpose of laughter is to keep from crying. It also helps keep you from killing your mate as you work towards a seemingly unattainable goal on a 90 plus degree day with about 500% humidity.

"Hammer."

"Hammer."

"Block."

"Block.

"You can call me doctor if you want. Punch."

"Yes, doctor. Punch."

After four hours of repeating the process, the incessant beating with the front end loader worked. The part slipped on like a glove. I cheered. I laughed. I cried. I thanked the Heavens. Hallelujah. There is a God and he answers prayers. The disc mower was my Moby Dick and CA and I had just harpooned the crap out of it. Suck that, Devil-mower.

We didn't stop to question why our relationship had needed to be so rigorously tested through heat and frustration, our love tempered by the fire of both. It wasn't until later that the thought crossed my mind that the Devil-mower was a test. It wasn't my Moby Dick, it was a brief blink of our book of Job.

We merely did a happy dance and went to work inserting other pins and adjusting parts and pieces.

We merely lifted the 30lb spring into place and connected it.

CA merely told me to stand there and depress the hydraulic hose button so that I got a face full of hydraulic fluid, not even a courtesy tap. Seriously. But through laughter we overcame even that, and came out the other side with minimally clogged pores and remarkably silky skin. We freaking persevered.

And that is the story of the time Satan sent a disc mower to test my relationship.

What makes a farmer?

I was talking with one of my friends about a fantasy land where we would run away with our boyfriends and live in a cottage somewhere. In the course of the conversation she started talking about farming and how she wouldn't know what to do with herself, so Captain America and I would have to be in charge of it. I tried to tell her that it was easy, but something must have gotten lost in the translation.

How do you sum up the love, the angst, the freedom, and the responsibility in a few sentences? How do you explain the pure exultant joy that you can feel from successfully doing something that felt insurmountable: mowing and baling a field of hay on your own, helping birth a calf, falling in instant love with a baby chick, making food from dirt? Or the heart wrenching despair and loss that you feel when Murphey's law hits and everything that can possibly go wrong does: all the equipment breaks - repeatedly, it rains on your hay, animals die, gardens wither? 

Surely this is what she must feel like when she tells me about music, or other friends try to explain what moves them. It is so frustrating to have something that you love so much, and be unable to verbalize that love to share it with your loved ones. To explain how easy and wonderful your passion is to someone who doesn't share it is exceedingly difficult.

Being a farmer isn't about mechanical skill, ability to build fence, knowledge of livestock medicine, or any of the hundred other chores that pop in my head - though those things do help. But being a farmer is so much less, and so much more than that. It is heart. It is love. It is fortitude.

Being a farmer is cow paths that wind through the woods as a child's Yellow Brick Road. It is climbing atop a pile of round bales and serenading a herd of cows like you're a pop star. It is watching a thousand loved ones slowly age and die, or be swiftly executed in their prime. It is holding newborn kittens and helping bird's to their nests. It is standing in a hayfield during a surprise thunderstorm surrounded by 200 freshly made square bales that are going to have to be shaken out and dried again so they can be rebaled without molding, and finding the ability to cry, curse and laugh your way through it again and again. It is being aware and entangled with both the highs and the lows of life; and having so much love for that life, plant or animal, that you get up and keep going even when it feels pointless, overwhelming, and you question your sanity.

I don't know. Maybe it is genetic. Somewhere in our DNA is code for red or green tractors next to the one that determines our eye color. Maybe it is environmental. How could I ever leave my adoring herd of fans? After all they are the only ones who like my singing, and most of my songs were about them and the horses anyway. 

Maybe it is a combination of both that gives anyone the determination to pursue their passion. Heart and fortitude, baby. That's what makes me a farmer.

It's a redneck weddin'!

I’m pretty sure that I’m redneck married right now. If the gun left at my house was a betrothal of some sort we are definitely there.

Captain America and I bought a tractor together. It is a brand spanking new New Holland T105 with a passenger seat! He wanted it so he could pull a disc mower and a big baler for his custom haying operation. I wanted it because, well, it has a passenger seat! And air conditioning! And a sun roof! They called it a “high visibility panel,” but it has a sun roof! Long story short, it is a tractor with a cab where I won’t have to plaster myself pathetically to the outside of the door like a squashed bug. Which pretty much sucks except in the spring. I mean why wouldn’t I love clinging to the door with my fingertips as I watch my dad inside the heated, air conditioned, and dry cab. With this beast I can  actually sit in the cab and not get jabbed in the butt by the PTO button or a lever that I have to contort myself around so that my beloved can actually turn on the equipment. Not gonna lie, it’s pretty sweet.

Captain was pretty nervous about it. It is a lot of money up front, but it should be the tractor that we can use for the rest of our lives. Tractors don’t depreciate the way that cars do. Even though it made sense to spend the money now rather than later he was nervous about it. That is until he used the disc mower. I’m pretty sure I have never seen him so happy in all the months we have been together. We messed around mowing his pasture in the five minutes of daylight that we had left when we got back to his place. In those five-ten minutes we mowed almost a quarter of the pasture, which had previously taken him maybe half an hour or forty minutes to mow with his other mower. I hopped out to open the gate and when I turned around he had his arms full of freshly mown clover and weeds and I guess it could have been a trick of the fading light, but I think there were tears of joy in his eyes. He was probably saying something about “Look how great it mows!” but in my head he was spinning and dancing through the meadow with this big armful of clover singing in joy. The clouds parted. He ran towards the tractor, there was a dramatic moment where the refrain of “Loving you is easy because you’re beautiful” was playing. There may have been skipping, but I’m not sure because I was being shown clover at that point and my head and heart were bubbly seeing him so happy.

By the way, my head routinely makes real life into some sort of Disney cartoon. I sincerely doubt that it is a diagnosable condition, but I blame Beauty and The Beast.

So yeah, I’m redneck married. You can send all wedding gifts as checks made out directly to Davis Farm Supply. ;)

I guess all that is left to do is figure out which anniversary is the farm equipment anniversary. Captain America says year one, but I don’t believe him. I feel like he may just be angling for a new baler...

Take me for a ride in your big blue tractor.
We can go slow, or go a little faster.

GOOOOOAAAAALLLLLS

I would really appreciate someone following me around with a vuvuzela and blowing it wildly anytime I accomplish anything. It would make life oh so much more exciting!

Anyway, goals! Since drunk me decided to blab about my weight loss goals to my boyfriend (see my other blog). I figured I might as well share with you all my gardening and farming goals for this year. Something about transparency and accountability go hand in hand with accomplishment, right?

I want to be able to can enough tomatoes, pickles, and preserve enough potatoes that I don’t have to buy any all winter. Because well, I'm cheap and  I don't like eating pesticides or BPA. Plus, I always played "pioneer" when I was little and I am a little curious to see how hard it would have been to survive only on what I could produce. I'm just ramping up to it. SLOWLY! I’m not sure how it will work out with the potatoes yet, but here is to hoping!

I also want to make several more batches of jelly and herbal preserves. The house I just bought has a crab apple, apple, and apricot tree; in addition to the apple, peach, and pear trees up at my grandpa’s place. So canned and frozen fruit, jams, and jellies should abound! Provided I don’t kill myself mowing all the danged grass. I am so glad that I am going to have a bigger kitchen to work with!

Granted before I can play with that shiny big kitchen I have to gut the bathroom, add a second bath, rip up carpet and refinish floors, and repaint; but by God when I get all that done I will be up to my eyeballs in jelly!

Well, after I still manage to fix fence, get hay put up with Cap, and try to clean and repair the barn and grainery. Oh, and help dad clean out and sort all the stuff in my grandpa's sheds and greenhouse. But after that!

Or it will be next year and I can start my grand plans all over again. Whichever comes first, right? There is always tomorrow!

Stop being a weatherman.

 

I saw this photo on Facebook last Friday, and all I can do is heartily agree. I feel like my life has been a non-stop whirlwind lately.  I have always enjoyed being busy. It is one of the reasons I love living on a farm. I don’t know what to do with myself when there isn’t some chore or project to work on. I’m not big on relaxing with television or movies (to the point that I am pretty sure it drove my college roommate crazy because I couldn’t sit through a show without leaving to do dishes or something else productive). Tis the season for that to shine I suppose. Spring is always a time of growth and rapid change. There is always a flurry of activity that leads into the growing season. This year’s has just been even crazier than usual.

My grandpa passed away in February leaving me with a bunch of outbuildings to clean and rehab, in addition to a LOT more grass to mow, and a ton of exciting (but overwhelming) opportunities. In addition to that, I bought a house. Because, hey, why not compound that overwhelming amount of yard, with another two acre yard. Go big or go home, right?

Right. Check. Got that. Did that. Own the t-shirt. Damn near started a business printing the t-shirt because I just can’t say no to adding more things to my plate. AHHH! Stress is exhilarating!!! Until it isn’t.

Halfway through getting my garden in last week I about had a meltdown. I had already smushed my hand between the rather large lawn mower and a tree – leading me to believe that prayer must work because the accident really should have removed fingers or at least broken something. My guardian angel has got some overtime coming her way! Anyway, in addition to pain priming myself for a crying spree; I had let myself become obsessed with my to do list. Anyone who lives on a farm, no matter how big or small, should realize one thing about farms and to do lists. Farms make NEVER ENDING to do lists.

Seriously, something is always coming up. There is always a garden to weed, or a fence to fix, a barn to repair, livestock to check, plants to water, grass to cut, invasive plants to kill… I think you get the idea. You will never accomplish everything on the list. Plain and simple. You have to do what you can, when you can, and try to not drive yourself insane by impulse buying ten bags of organic potatoes that were on sale for $1.99/ five pounds and trying to process them during planting season. It does not end well.

 

Though I have found that I can process ten pounds of potatoes over my hour long lunch break, and that Captain America has some awesome potato chopping skills. Yay date night! (Despite this, I still have 10 pounds to go. WHOO!)

Anyway, to summarize: I was trying to mow well over fifteen acres of yard, plant my entire garden, process 50 pounds of potatoes, figure out how to remodel a bathroom, stress about moving things around up at grandpa’s so that the massive fixing spree can happen, and stay on top of my regular chores in the three hours of daylight that I had after work. In three days. Because it was going to start raining Thursday and not stop until this week. Plus, I have plans virtually every weekend. On a side note volunteering at the food pantry in St. Louis Saturday was incredibly rewarding, though a bit disturbing. Who on earth donates opened products (Mm, half used quinoa! Not sketchy at all!) and cans that expired in 1999? Really guys?

I like to call last week my extreme exhaustion challenge. It makes it seem much happier that way. In the midst of it, my mom gave me some very good advice: “Stop spending your life trying to be a weatherman and predicting when the storm will hit. You’re obsessing with when the rain is going to come rather than enjoying the sunshine!” I would like to say that I immediately stopping stressing/crying/working myself sick and really got that statement, but it took me a few days. I was very good about enjoying the little things with grandpa when he was alive. I stopped and admired the clouds and the sunshine with him, but since he has gone I have been (maybe distracting myself from grief?) overwhelming myself with responsibilities, trying desperately to maintain and do things the way he would have wanted. It is the same with the neighbor’s house I purchased, I want to care for it the way Evelyn and Ralph always did.

I want to honor their memory with my actions, but at some point I have to admit that I am just one person and I can’t take care of things the way that three people were able to. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter that the grass isn’t immaculate, because it is just going to grow again. And the land is mine to care for now, not theirs. I need to be a good steward, but by God if I want to rearrange the buildings that are falling down on themselves and have to be rebuilt anyway to suit my goals I should. I shouldn’t make myself crazy over it.

What is the point in having everything to take care of if I can’t stop and enjoy it? If I don’t get in the habit now, I will make a habit of not enjoying it that will be very hard to break. I will always have too much to finish; and this making everything a priority bit that I have been doing lately is only serving to make me insane, and make nothing a priority.

So, here is to better prioritizing, and not making myself sick with guilt when I want a damned pedicure. Ha!

 

Attempted Murder, Barnyard Style.

Ah, spring. It is so welcome here in southern Illinois, especially after the never ending winter we had this past year. The freshness in the warm air stirs up all sorts of desires.

The people are gardening, birds are chirping, the grass is greening, and the bulls are trying to kill each other...  in the lake.

Yes. That’s right. It is spring. Time for Bull Match 2014!

Along with the warming temperatures comes a “warming of the blood” as it were. Usually the two ‘ole guys butt heads and kick each other. It is all in good fun until they are having a stand off in front of your tractor while you’re trying to move hay and you have somewhere to be. Their bellering across the hills blends with the sounds of the birds, cats, and stallions; a distinct song of love and lust and, well, SPRING. It is always a welcome sight, and frankly is one of those things like the return of the robins that lets me know that winter is finally gone.

But not this year. This year it got scary.

So many things fell into place Friday. I was taking the afternoon off to go hang out with Captain America, so I was home to help dad load up calves to go to a farmer friend of ours who will be feeding them out at his house. It was single handedly the WORST calf round-up of which I have ever been a part.

What usually takes us 15 minutes turned into renegade calves escaping to haunt the woods along the driveway, and two hours of trying to sort the remaining bull calves and heifers. We try to ship only the boys to feed out.

 I know that they will have a good home while they are with him, and that it was significantly less traumatic than being run through a sale barn, but it always breaks my heart a little bit when a rough black nose pops out of the trailer window to nuzzle me. Or to try and find a weak point to escape the trailer, but I’m going with nuzzle…

Anyway, we finally got the trailer loaded and I happened to hear splashing in the lake, which was odd because usually the cows don’t start swimming until it gets to be much warmer. I turned and peered down at the muddy brown water trying to figure out what was going on. I couldn’t really process what I was seeing. There were two black shapes in the water. One was barely above, and the other was… throwing itself on top of the barely swimming one? What the hell? I walked a few steps closer and realized that they were the two bulls. Brisket was shoving Dale into deeper water.

“Dad! I think your bulls are trying to kill each other.” I called over to him, amused at the time, not yet understanding that I was watching an actual death match and not just horsing around.

“Get me a gun.” He yelled as he sprinted towards the lake. I took off for the house heedless of my muck covered boots. I almost spun out on the pale hardwood floor as I slid in front of the gun closet and opened the door to find… not a single gun there. I stared at the vacuum cleaner and cursed. I didn’t even live here anymore, where had he moved his cow stopping guns? I slammed the door shut and sprinted into my parent’s bedroom, breathlessly. Surely there were still some weapons hidden in the drawer. I found a gun case and turned to run downstairs, out the door, and towards the lake as fast as my legs could carry me.

I saw dad nearing the dam now, yelling and throwing rocks at the bulls. Dale’s nose was just barely above the water as Brisket tried to repeatedly throw his bulk on top of him to hold him under the cold brown water. Brisket really was trying to kill his rival, and he was smart enough to do it. Knowing that they were well matched on land he had somehow got Dale into the water and had quickly taken advantage of the situation. I sprinted towards dad, heedless of the pain in my side, and got to him just as he managed to get Brisket out of the lake. Dale laid along the shore. His huge chest heaved as he tried to catch his breath. I tossed the gun to dad who immediately removed it from its case and pointed it at Brisket; as the huge bull made a move like he was going back for seconds.

“What the hell, Lauren? You brought me an unloaded gun? What am I supposed to do? Throw it at him?” Dad glared at me over his shoulder as he reached down for a rock to throw at Brisket’s big black head.

“You’re lucky I could even find one!” I yelled back, exasperated. “I don’t even live here anymore. I don’t know where you guys keep your guns!” Yes. I managed to find the ONE unloaded gun in the whole damn house.

Brisket let out a few short bellows followed by a long one. From the body language I could tell he was taunting Dale. After dad stung him with the rock he sauntered up the hills towards the herd of cows. Three of the girls made moves towards Dale, but as Brisket strode past and talked at them they eventually turned to follow him. At that, Dale finally had the energy to heave himself up onto dry land again and dad and I started the journey back around the lake; herding him with words and well placed mud clods as he bellered and pawed out his anger.

Many times as we walked I wondered if I was going to survive. There are few places quite as dangerous as walking ten feet behind an already pissed off 1,600 lb animal and throwing things at him. There is something very scary when that said animal turns towards you pawing and rubbing his head in the dirt, snorting; and all you have is a handful of dried dirt to protect yourself with. Sometimes I question my sanity.

Eventually we got him locked up in protective custody with our remaining heifers. His calls of discontent are echoing off the barn walls now. They are not the happy sounds of spring that they once were. I can only imagine what would have went down if dad and I hadn’t been home. I don’t know what we would have assumed had happened to him (I'll take Brisket in the library with the candlestick!), but I can guarantee that we would have never thought murder. It was almost the perfect crime.

So begins the hunt for a new bull. Can’t have Brisket throwing his psychopathic intelligence to the next crop of calves.

Seriously. He’s like the bovine version of Gacy.

My abusive relationship

I think I am in an abusive relationship with our cows.

We are oddly co-dependent. Even though I know that they're just using me for hay I keep going right back. I can't say no. I can't stay mad. I can't bring myself to stay away.

They stalk me. I can’t walk outside without them coming up to the fence and watching my every move.

They are verbally abusive. They expect me to drop everything and care for them with no regard for what else I might be doing or feeling at the time. If I don’t drop everything and serve their needs immediately they begin verbally berating me.

 

If I enter their pen without doing their bidding they have been known to become physically abusive on occasion. Sometimes they have assaulted me even while I have been caring for them.

They are mentally abusive. They will play mind games with me for hours on end until I cave. I was cleaning the barn this past weekend and they were huddled around the doors, watching me. For six hours.

 

Seriously, have you ever tried being stared at by an entire herd of cows for six hours? Stephen King should write a novel about it.

"Cowmunes" and the difference between a small farm and an industrialized one

Perspective is everything. Growing up it didn’t seem weird to me that we left our cows alone and only medicated them if they were sick or injured. I didn’t realize that on other farms people would feed them things other than hay, grass, and trace minerals. Okay, and sweet feed to the bull that one time when I was eight and my mom had a heart attack because I was petting him and hand feeding him his “treat”  and I never did it again because she yelled so much. Of course, that was also the year that I learned I shouldn’t share my bologna sandwich and sugar cookies with my horse, despite her love of them. But that is a whole other story. Growing up our cattle operation went something like: check them, count them, and leave them be until round up day.

Apparently that is progressive. I’ve been reading a lot about the benefits of grass fed beef. Not only is it more nutritionally sound than what you would buy at the store, but it also is better for the cows. Go figure. That’s the way we have been doing it my entire life.

We joke amongst ourselves that we have a “cowmune.” The momma’s share calves. Any calf can walk up to any cow with milk and nurse at their pleasure. Heifers “babysit” groups of five or seven little ones while the mothers go for a swim in the lake. I have to walk up and poke the cows to get them to move out of my way when I am bringing them their round bales. The old gals live out their lives surrounded by generations of their daughters and sisters. Most of them have never been vaccinated, eaten anything other than a grass derivative, or required medical treatment. They wander at their will through woods and fields munching on whatever tidbit that takes their fancy. They come to the barn and moo their displeasure with the grass hay until dad or I go up in the barn loft to throw them a few bales of alfalfa hay, or let them in the yard so that they can munch on the grass on the other side of the fence.

Seriously, if cows could play drums, there would be a circle going. Someone would have found their spirit guide by now.

Even our two bulls don’t fight much. Instead they bellow back and forth like two little old men discussing the news over their coffee cups. Give them some tie dye, because this is not what a “farm” is supposed to look like.

At least not the industrialized monsters that raise most of the cows that wind up on super market shelves. Line those babies up and run them through a squeeze chute because when you are being finished in a feed lot you’re going to get sick without a bunch of vaccines and antibiotics. Preventative medicine is where it is at when you are cramming everyone on top of each other. I get that. Cows eating candy instead of grass? (If you don’t believe me check out this article on CNN. This practice has been happening for awhile. I have even heard of them being fed leftover tacos!) That I have a harder time with, but I guess even the big time farmers have to have their margins so that they can eat too. Right? Where is the balance between doing what is right for your animals and land, and making a profit? Land prices are outrageous, and the taxes on them aren’t cheap. Even with the subsidies that the new farm bill gives to large scale farmers. It lays out plenty of hoops that are expensive to jump through too.

That’s one of the reasons why grass fed is so much higher in the grocery store. Not only are grass fed animals slower growing, usually, you are paying more to help a small scale farmer survive without selling out to one of the big boys. After reading about everything that happens to cows in industrialized feed lots I started looking into grass fed operations where we could sell our cows. I found that all of the local operations operate on less than 500 acres. Which is pretty freaking cool. Small scale farms are slowly disappearing from the United States, and with them the other “cowmunes” of the world. I love our hippie cows. I’m pretty psyched about doing my part to help them survive. Are you?

The sucky part.

When I got home last night I found Pearl down on a hillside. Her hind legs were straddling the lowest of the boards on our white vinyl fence. Fear gripped my heart, causing my stomach to drop lower than my knees.


It immediately took me back to when my baby boy, Mac the Tennessee walking horse, used to lay down and be unable to stand up again on his own. He had that problem for years and I got to be quite proficient at flipping him over and bracing him so that he could get up again.
 
I did my best to soothe Pearl, and her blind best friend Cabernet, as I slid the boards out and tried to use the skills Mac taught me to roll her over. I struggled against her weight and gravity unsuccessfully. Hoping against hope that she was just laying down and not getting ready to transition to the next stage of life. At her age transitioning was likely, but this was the horse that snuck out to try and graze while I was moving her hay on Saturday. Spry and persnickety are her hallmarks. I called my parents to come home and help me, and then I got to work praying and trying to get her up on her sternum.

Pearl was whickering and flailing her legs. Cabernet was calmer than I have seen her in years. She is normally a basket case any time her "seeing eye horse" is more than three inches away from her nose. Mom and dad arrived within seconds of each other and we rolled Pearl over and tried and tried to help her stand several times. Dad volunteered to go get the sling and the tractor. Mom backed up and surveyed the situation. "Guys, she isn't trying to get up. That isn't what her legs are doing. She's dying." About that time her breath went arrhythmic and her neck arched back in the way that only means one thing. She had passed.

I went up to the large pasture, praying aloud that one of the horses there would step up to the plate and be a friend for Cabernet since Pearl had passed. Luna was the first horse up to me, and I buried my hands in her coat whispering to her how sorry I was that her momma had gone on while I petted her fuzzy yellow hair. Her half sister, Pissante, came up about three feet away from Luna's head and neighed a neigh I have never heard before directly at her. It was odd. I know the sounds for calling distant herd members, or weaning, or for food, or fear, or anger; but never anything like this. This whole thing was made even stranger by the fact that Luna and Pissante are quite frankly the two hardest horses to catch and work with that we have in that pasture. Luna is known to jump 5' tall cattle panels to get away from me rather than be touched, and Pissante, well let's just say she earns her name. But not right now.

I brought another mare, Zippy, down from the large pasture hoping that she would buddy up with Cabernet. She is one of the lowest horses on the totem pole out there, and I hope that means she is timid. All of the other horses I have tried over the last few months have been very mean to Cab: biting, chasing, and kicking. When I introduced them to each other Zip turned her ears back, which means that she wasn't too happy being sniffed all over by a stranger, but she didn't pin them down or try to hurt Cabby with tooth or nail. I'm taking it as a good sign. As Truly and Grin both went into kicking fits.

However, as soon as I turned Zippy loose Cabernet went to stand next to Pearl, who was awaiting my dad's removal expertise. Cab raised her top lip, scenting for her best friend, and then lowered her nose to the body. Slowly and methodically she started licking and nipping at Pearl the way she did with her foals when she was trying to encourage them to stand. I watched her as she groomed her friend methodically, stopping every so often to nuzzle for a few moments before returning to her licking.


Tears were streaming down my cheeks by the time I had to turn away. I think that horse is capable of more love and grief than I am. My heart breaks for her.
Whoever says that animals aren't capable of emotions should witness what I did. I have seen cows line up for funeral processions, and mares mourn for their foals, but never have I seen anything so heartbreaking as Cabernet licking and loving, and trying to get her friend to stand up.

This is the part of life on a farm that I hate. Frankly, death, even when it isn't tragic, sucks.

Bad, bad, Biscuit.

I have a wonderful homemade biscuit recipe that I adapted from Suzanne McMinn over at Chickens in the Road (The lady is my heroine, seriously, check her out). I make these biscuits for Captain America fairly frequently. He can't get enough of them. They're damn good biscuits.

So, I made them for him Sunday morning before we headed downstairs to work on his basement remodel project. About an hour later there was a very loud THUNK! We looked at each other and nodded briefly. It was like in the movies. That one glance and slight chin tilt held more meaning
than an hour of conversation. I dropped the broom I was holding and made a mad dash for the stairs. I leapt up them two at a time and almost spun out on the laminate floor as I slid towards the kitchen.

There he was, CA's massive black and tan coon hound, Sampson; standing amidst a pile of still warm golden biscuit goodness.

I did what any sane person would do. I ran at him, screaming for him to back away from the biscuits. Believe it or not, he didn't listen and continued to nose around trying to remove the rest of towel that I had covered them with. I made it to him and started trying to drag him away from the pan before all of the biscuits were ruined by his doggie drool to no avail. He wasn't even sorry, or scared, or really wanting to move at all.


I picked up a biscuit that had rolled across the kitchen and threw it at him. It exploded in a golden shower of crumbs that spread all over the floor. The bits of yellow and white made a fine
counterpoint to the golden oak finish. I picked up another handful of bread heaven and started shoving it in his face. In my head it was like rubbing a puppy's nose in the mess he made.


Unfortunately, rubbing biscuit crumbs all over his face did not seem to punish him much. He
still was not apologetic or ready to flee the crazy biscuit flinging lady. So I reached around him, resorting to dragging him away from the pan manually. He is not a little dog, and while he was being removed from his prize he growled and snapped at me.

Growing up in a dog sanctuary, and watching a lot of The Dog Whisperer has taught me that there is one thing to do when a dog begins to be aggressive towards you. Roll them on their back and show them who is the alpha of the pack. I am always reminded of Cartman from Southpark, you WILL respect my authority!

Anyway, so CA comes upstairs to find a biscuit pan on the floor, the kitchen COVERED in crumbs (imagine a biscuit bomb going off mid air. . . it was even in the shelving), and me sprawled out on top of the dog holding him on his back with one arm and rubbing his stomach with the other; muttering something about him being a "bad, bad Biscuit" all the while. Sampson was staring at me like I had lost my mind. He looked up at CA and whined something that I have to interpret as: "Save me daddy! I was just eating some good food I found, when this crazy lady came up and attacked me! I didn't do anything wrong. She came out of nowhere!"

What did CA do? He laughed his butt off. That's what. Great co-parent he is going to be!

Now every time that dog is bad we call him Biscuit. I'm not sure he was smart enough to know what his name was in the first place. That poor thing is going to have a complex.

The difference between want and need...

I hear lots of my friends talking about wants and needs when we are out and about. I struggle with them too. Do I want or need those new boots? That purse? That replacement bale ring for the cows? Then there are the wants and needs that aren't material: more free time, more rewarding experiences, vacations, weekends with friends, or exercising. I'll give you a hint. That last one is probably a need, but I really don't want to!

A lot of times the difference between want and need is painfully apparent when you live on a farm. Fortunately, this week began with them coinciding quite nicely. I wanted to be outside because it was sunshine-y and almost sixty degrees. I needed to move hay. I needed to fix the fence because the cows can easily get on the highway and die tragic bovine deaths.

 

But there are obviously times when the opposite is true and my wants and my needs are opposed. Like when it is -20 and I need to move hay. Or I want to leave for a vacation, but things will starve to death. Then there are times when my wants turn into needs.

 

For years I have wanted to clean up the old barn that stands on my parents’ property. It is a thing of beauty – all hand hewn oak beams and hand cut stone quarried from the property is stands on. Though it is home to six stalls and a great amount of space we really only use it for the hayloft and storing a few wagons. The space has been underutilized my entire life, but especially in the last five years since we started feeding the cats in the newer horse barn. The old barn has not received much TLC. We don’t really go in there unless we have to throw hay to the cows.

 

My grandfather recently passed away, and I am staring some massive barn and house renovations in the face starting around September; so, I have felt a huge push to try and get all of the little things off my to do list at mom and dad’s farm. Some of those things require more than one set of hands. Yeah. I’m talking about you Mr. Corner fence post that is washing away and needs to be fixed before taking the whole fence row down. We are gonna tango mister. Mark my words! Or are made easier with multiple sets of hands like trimming the fence line or replacing white boards in the danged vinyl fence. But one of them that didn’t need many sets of hands was cleaning up some of the trash in the old barn.

 

I mentioned that we used to feed cats in there. I have a confession. I’m lazy, and rather than cutting the weight circles off the bags (you can turn them in for rewards with Purina) I just threw them behind a partition. Out of sight, out of mind. I am really hating myself for that one. I have spent maybe two hours cutting off weight circles so far, and I am not even close to being done with that project. In the course of this though I have found that my desire to clean the barn might not be a want so much as a need.

 

When I took Captain America in there to show off my progress three weeks ago we heard the sound of running water coming from the barn basement. Yup. We had a pipe burst right outside the basement wall. The good Captain got right to work and dug a trench that appeared to go halfway to China before I could so much as blink. He and my dad fixed it, and it was all good. Well, if anything like that can actually be good. However, I had this thought in the back of my mind saying,  “How long would it have leaked if I hadn’t started cleaning in there? If I hadn’t wanted to show it off it could have run for months without anyone noticing.”

 

Then it got cold again, and it wasn’t until yesterday that I snuck away from my desk job and out to fix some fence. I got done in the daylight and decided to let the chickens loose for awhile. I won’t leave them out of earshot anymore since the Great Defeathering Incident of 2013 so I went back into the barn to clean up more feed sacks. I opened one of the stall doors to try and shine a little light on my project and started rocking out on my iPod and cutting out weight circles like a boss. I don’t know what drew my attention to it, but after awhile I looked up and noticed that one of the support beams, one of the support beams that is under the hayloft mind you, was sagging. The oak beams it was sitting on have splintered and rotted into almost nothing.  

 

Suddenly cleaning the barn is not a WANT, it is an EMERGENCY. AGH! So much for wanting to go to Captain America’s house this weekend.

This is why I drink.

We all have those days. The ones where Murphy’s law rears its ugly head and everything that can go wrong, does. But there are some days where things don’t just go wrong. There are some days where incidents stack up like flapjacks and then someone actually hid dynamite in that stack and just as you think you have it under control because you rock at deep breathing exercises everything explodes into a sticky gooey mess. You know what seems to encourage that to happen? Livestock…

 

Don’t get me wrong, the critters are what gets me out of bed in the morning and I love them; but when the wind chills are heading towards -35 I really just want everyone to cooperate. Would that be too much to ask? Would it? Would it!

 

We haven’t had much FRIGID weather in southern Illinois. The last time it was this miserable I wasn’t even born. Winter is always a pain in the butt. It brings challenges like frozen water troughs and blown breakers. Frigid winters bring even more fun like frozen water lines, horses kicking each other away from the bale rings, horses and cows consuming twice as much hay as they would otherwise, being afraid that the chickens will freeze despite their two heat lamps, or my personal favorite: getting so cold that the trough heaters freeze over and you have to chop holes in the lake with an axe like a freaking lumberjack. But I handled all that. I was a hay throwing, trough hacking fiend. I got this. *insert cool chin tilt*

 

Sure. I’m half frozen and bundled in so many layers of pants that I can’t bend my knees. But I got this. I’m a farmer damnit. I will rise to each challenge with grace and dignity and love for all of my charges. I will throw hay to the cows like a queen on parade tossing flowers to her people. I will sit on the frozen lake patiently blowing on the extension cords trying to thaw them enough to be able to unplug one heater and replace it with another with the poise of an ancient priestess breathing life into a flame. I will handle the horses deciding to join the cow herds with calm and compassion…

 

Hahaha. Yeah. Right. I was good ‘til the horses part. When Dandy decided he wanted to go on walkabout away from the HUGE horse pasture (with its own hay mind you) into the small pasture where we winter the cows. I lost my calm and went into a rage. I turned just in time to see him. The lanky palomino gelding wandered through the fence. I leapt from the tractor like a super hero. My ankles ached with the impact of the frozen ground despite the thick cover of snow. I ran after him, screaming like a mad woman. I had to get him back on the horse side of the fence before he enticed his fellows to tag along. The horses chase the cows away from the hay sometimes, and that was dangerous in the cold. He could not be allowed to live with the cows.

 

I don’t know if you know this, but believe it or not; chasing, screaming, and cursing at the top of your lungs is not a good way to catch a horse that has decided to be a cow. He ran. His eyes rolled back in his head with fear and I grabbed a clod of what I am going to pretend was dirt and lobbed it at him. It missed, and didn’t redirect him back towards the horses like I had hoped. He ran further into the cow herd and the other horses flooded into the cow pasture as if I had loosed the gates of hell. I grabbed a tree branch, slipping and sliding on the snow and cow pies. I tried valiantly to dissuade the horses. It didn’t work. They saw the crazy lady with the big stick and scattered like ashes on the wind. I threw the branch at Dreamer. She gave me a go to hell look as it sailed past her and ran straight for the safety of a group of cows.

 

Not only did frustration weep out of my eyes in angry tears that quickly froze to my eye lashes, but it spewed forth from my mouth like a waterfall. Whoever came up with the expression “cursing like a drunken sailor” has clearly never been around a farmer with uncooperative livestock. The words coming out of my mouth were not only anatomically impossible and incredibly descriptive of the mental states of all the horses; they were also creatively drenched in matriarchal slander.

 

I cursed so much, that the horses wouldn’t even come close to me when I went back later with a grain bucket. Pause a second and let that sink in. I had a grain bucket. That normally elicits a response that the Pied Piper would be proud to have. Still, they would not come near me.

 

Maybe I should take up yoga, or vodka. Definitely vodka.