The Littlest Calf

Amongst the Herd

Spring Valley (with cows)

Can you see the rainbow?

Thursday Thirteen

1. Friend: Have you ever had borsht?
   Me: Isn't that the group on Star Trek that forces you to assimilate? (Borsht, apparently, is some kind of Polish or Russian soup. I'd never heard of it. Borgs, on the other hand, turn you into something you weren't before. Resistance is futile.)

2. My new acupuncturist told me yesterday that I am a black hole. I take everything in and hold it, never letting it back out, she said. Black holes in space pull things in but never let them out; it's a gravitational thing. Black holes are so full of stuff that they become invisible. Black holes cannot be observed; they are known because the things that should be where they are, aren't. Or something like that.

3.  She also tells me I think too much. I never know how to respond to that - she's not the first person to say it. How can you think too much? Apparently a lot of people do. Here's a WikiHow that tells you how to stop thinking. Now I have to think about thinking too much.

4. Owning rental property is like that movie The Money Pit. The place is a black hole of its own, constantly creating a sucking sound in my checkbook.

5. My last tenant destroyed a door, left three huge holes in the wall, removed several other doors, shower heads, and the inside of toilet parts, and then made obscure threats to me when I wouldn't refund his deposit (I visited the sheriff about that, in case Mr. Jerk happens to read my blog.) He called his destruction "normal wear and tear." What is wrong with people? I've lived in my house for 28 years and not once put a hole in the wall.

6. Yesterday I saw two coyotes trotting along around 2:15 p.m., too quickly for me to get a photo of them. They went into the woods in front of the house. My husband was cutting hay in the next field, and he saw one of the coyotes stroll in front of him. He said it was a female, heavy with milk. So we probably have baby coyotes around here close by. Cue howling.

7. Officials say that vultures will not harm livestock. Tell that to this mother cow with her newborn:

My cousin came and stood guard over the baby until the vultures grew tired and went elsewhere for their fun. They've been known to kill calves and/or peck their eyes out.

8. I keep a calendar of exercises and pain for my physical therapist. Somehow I got off a week, and didn't realize it until Tuesday. For a moment I panicked, not knowing if it was May 12 or May 19. It was a quick glimpse into how I think a person with dementia must feel. I imagine it is a scary place.

9. I had to learn how to play Soft Kitty on the guitar because no one would sing it to me. Now I want to turn it into a full-fledged guitar song, but will need to sit down and write it out in tab form. I can hear it in my head but can't make my fingers find the sounds.

10. I spied this goose in the marsh. She's nesting. I hope the coyotes don't get her!

11. My beloved came home yesterday with a severe case of gout. I couldn't make him 'fess up as to what he had been eating. Gout is caused by too much uric acid, which gathers in the joint of the big toe. It's a type of arthritis. I know his triggers are red meat, seafood, asparagus, spinach, and mushrooms, among other things. We don't eat those much in my house (kind of ironic since we raise beef cattle, isn't it?). But I have no control over what he eats at the fire station.

12. Bing, the search engine, offers rewards for using it. I've received $10 in Amazon gift cards since I signed up. I use the gift cards for video game play on my Kindle Fire. Other types of rewards are available, like gift cards to Macy's and restaurants. You can even make donations to a couple of worthy causes. I switched to Bing because Google seems to return nothing but paid information anymore. (Nobody paid me to mention Bing, but I thought people might like the idea of free stuff.)

13. I like bacon. That's just a random fact because I couldn't think of anything else to say.



Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while and this is my 396th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday.

New Baby

I love it when they give birth in front of the house and I can watch the whole process. Always a miracle.

Wooo Cow! Wooo!

Working the Cows

My husband corralled the cows yesterday so he can "work" them this morning. Working the cows means giving them the shots required by the state in order to sell them and putting tags on them so we can keep track of them. Some will be hauled off to market this morning, as well. That is how it goes on a farm.

I took these shots last night when we stopped by to make sure the animals had plenty of water. I was using my "car camera," which is a Nikon Coolpix S3200 that I picked up for about $50 on a Black Friday sale several years ago. It's a tiny little camera but very handy for having something to take pictures with when my good cameras are at home.

Cow Daze

Let Me Out!

When Words Fail . . .

Post pictures of cows.

Cows in Snow

Newborn

I looked out the front door Friday night just at dusk and saw we had a new baby calf.

The pictures didn't turn out well because it was so dark and I was shooting from a good distance away with a zoom. None of my cameras work well in that kind of light.

 

I didn't get closer because I did not want to disturb the momma cow while she was cleaning up the little one and working to get it on its feet. It took a few tries but it finally managed to stand up and find her milk.

 

She hid the calf until today; I saw it with the herd not long ago. Very small baby.

Bovinely Autumn

Sunset

We had this beautiful sunset Saturday evening after a day of rain. The sky suddenly burst open with color; I understand there was a rainbow behind me that I couldn't see through the trees.

On Sunday we had a bit of excitement here. My husband and I were in Rocky Mount trying to spend some time together and relax. His cell phone rang and it was a neighbor telling us the cows were out.

We raced home in record time and arrived to find two deputy cars here and several neighbors wandering around trying to round up wayward animals. People were excited and waving their arms. A woman I did not know kept talking about seeing a cow wander through her backyard (there are a number of small homes bordering the farm).

My husband, who was a little aggravated and frustrated by this whole scenario, sent me down the road to open one of the big gates, which I did. I then walked across a field and told a neighbor who had corralled a cow that we could get her through that gate, but he wanted me to open a smaller gate at the loading pen so he could try to put her in there. I opened the small gate and stepped back so he could shoo the cow on into the pen.



Older picture of a cow with a newborn.

The cow did not like that and she turned and charged at me. I shrieked and jumped up and tried to scare her to stop her and get out of the way at the same time. Such shenanigans in an old overweight lady are not to be, and my feet went out from under me in the damp grass. I hit the ground hard but since there was a 1,600 pound cow coming at me I climbed back up on my feet immediately, cursing as I did.

The cow swerved and headed for the road. I made a small effort to limp along after her but it was useless and I did not get far.

This animal was not going to be taken easily, and ultimately one of the neighbors on a utility vehicle and a policeman in his vehicle managed to get her through the gate. I certainly wasn't up to chasing after her.

I ended up with a sprained wrist, a big bruise on my lower leg, and another on my hip. It could have been worse, I suppose.

Ultimately we learned that the report was of two cows out, but we only found the one. My husband counted the cows and said they were all in the field. Perhaps one of them found her way back through the fence without help. In any event, he patrolled the fence and patched the hole he thought the cows went through, and that was the end of that.