Hilarious or Pathetic--You Decide

     Lest this blog become all wheelchairs/all the time, I thought you might like an update on the world back at home as I remember it, because in truth, I could not be here were it not for the friends and neighbors who moved in like a swat team so that I could be here with my brother as he goes through rehab for his spinal cord injury...
     Never was a point more driven home than last night when I received this picture on my phone just about the time I was taking Roz for her last evening stroll...

     <----In case you can't tell, it's Hix (brother of Rosebud, uncle of Roz)...sitting high atop a couple of nailed-together worker staircases, once used by builders completing my barn loft, (and later removed and reassembled as a goat playground...thanks to Builder Eric who spotted: "Hey, I bet the kids'll love this!" (thus hammering two ratty-tatty sets of worker steps together as a climbing euphoria for my 18 pygmy kids) Leave it do Digital Dave to snap the pic end of week as Hix surveys his kingdom. (Clearly Hix ain't sharing his thrown with no stinkin' goats.)

     [For the record, people stop to pet Roz non-stop throughout the day here in Atlanta, whether we're in dog parks, restaurants or hospital corridors. Those very same people marvel when I tell them  a) she's only a puppy (7 months old),  hence half the size she's gonna be and b) we got 4 more just like her back home...First of many "hilarious or pathetic" options...We'll let you decide...]

     Funnier yet...our same Saturday night, with Roz as my dinner date...(she, having scarfed a bowl of puppy chow, me, sharing my pizza with the security guard who let our delivery driver in)--Ed's wife Kim had arrived earlier in the day, leaving me with a happy brother and a mutt to share my evening with...the ultimate girl's night in!) My last "to do" before pulling out the monkey jams and slathering a mud mask on my face while curling up to a mindless Lifetime Original) was to head out one last time with Roz, to the corner lot where they leave pink baggies for your doggie's poo...

     The night is still young....a perfect sunset (they come later here). The sky was this hazy, pastel pallet of pinks and blues. As it turns out, Roz was in no mood for pooping (no good way to paint that picture...sometimes she's in the zone...other times not...This time, there was too much to distract her...from trains on trestles, trafficky street noises and a karaoke bar just across the way...)
     I check in with home, prompted by the hilarious Hix picture on my phone...just as Roz decides to become part of the perfectly manicured horticulture surrounding the statue in front of our rehab place. "No Roz...Not there!" I'm whispering loud enough for fellow passersby to laugh...(She's not pooping, mind you...She's plopped herself smack dab in a sea of ground cover and begins to wallow as if swimming...Something about the ivy tickling her butt, I guess...Now I'm tickled.)
     "You gotta see this dog" I say to the other end of the line. (Being inept at the techy stuff, my counter, staying with Rosebud (Roz's mama) et al, will have to FaceTime me, lest we get disconnected.)
     As I reverse the camera, so Rosebud can see what her silly girl is doing, Rosebud (on her end of the line) flips upside down and sideways, (I guess thinking belly rubs come with the voice...how to do that via phone lines, we're still working on) ... A second couple passes by.... (Are you getting this picture? It's not me doing FaceTime...It's Rosebud and Roz...one wallowing, one belly up... The humans holding the phones, are the pathetic idiots here..albeit it, laughing ones)
     Hilarious or pathetic? Will let you decide...As for me and my fam, thank God for technology...And thank God for people who are as nuts about animals as I am....Though perhaps not as good as a real-time hug, "I'll hug mine on this end...You hug all the rest..." is our last communique with the family back home.
     Another day in paradise...(be it farm...be it rehab center)
     We do what we do... The conversation may be virtual, but the love is for real and streaming in spades as are the tears of laughter rolling down my face...
                                 To the right----->
is Roz, after her walk and before final goodnights.  (The duties never end.) Ever ready for the hugging, she scarfs up her Aunt Kim's hugs just before calling it a day/a week. (Everybody needs a battery recharge. Pretty sure that's why God made dogs...and the hilarious/pathetic people like us who are nuts about 'em...)
   
   

The Cost of Caring: When Innocent Creatures Suffer

   

     Goats are God's definition of joy in a critter body. Minutes after they are born, they are up on their little goat feet and within their first hour they're doing that happy little sideways dance that makes for endless Facebook posts and darling YouTube videos. In a nutshell, goats embody love. You can't look a goat in the face without smiling...(I double dog dare you.)
     As lively and fun as the little buggers are, your heart breaks when one goes limp, which is how I found April last night.
Last check of the night and all was not well. Things you don't want to see include lifeless eyes, a goat flat on its side (or back, even worse) or a worried mama goat, trying to nurture her baby back to health. The other goats instinctively gave distance. Like all nature, they know when something is wrong.
     Born to the smallest goat in my herd, April's mama was a surviving twin, born TO a twin on the coldest night of the year before...(That polar arctic thing was dangerous all the way around, and doubly hard on a mama giving birth as it's hard to keep one baby alive, much less two, when birth fluids freeze instantly, which is what happened to April's twin brother before I could get to him; talk about a sad night.)
     Anna Karinina, April's mama, was one of several given Russian names, as they arrived opening week of the Russian Olympics.  Anna (AK as we call her) was tiny. So tiny I decided to have her fixed, as Heff, twice her size and twice as determined, was no match for her. Sadly, I got her to the vet too late; she was 3 months pregnant (gestation on goats is 5). A baby taking on Heff's gene for size could've been deadly. Fortunately, AK inherited her mother's gene for size and color and came out fine. (We've have lived with the tragedy before when the first goats I purchased were bred by a brush (goat) billy...For the record, NEVER pair a pygmy with a standard size goat; 2 mamas of my initial herd had tragic births with babies' legs longer their mothers, making for emergency surgeries costing life and limb.
       Pygmies are tiny on a good day; April was teacup size at birth, and even today is more akin to a Nigerian Dwarf than a Pygmy. Fully grown, today she is now smaller than Cupid's recent twins (Jack and Jill, born 6 weeks ago. Given her mother's small stature, April inherited small genes (and fortunately, not Heff's), but her immune system was challenged from the get-go.
     For those unfamiliar, wattles (those little nodes that dangle from the neck of some (but not all) goats) are sometimes called neck-earrings. Best I can tell, they serve no useful purpose...They're just cute...again, not all goats have them, but April does.
   

     Around 2 months of age, beneath her left waddle a cyst had formed, the size of a small marble. Fortunately it did not have the texture of a marble (i.e. it was not hard, but rather fluid-filled, which was easily enough drained, only it came back....It was drained again, but it is now forming for a third time, leading us to believe it may not be benign.) Time will tell. Right now, the focus is managing the dehydration factor. (I'll spare you the vivid details here, or you may check my earlier blogs on the poop factor, i.e. quickest way to spot a problem in farm animals, and for goats, even more so, given they have 4 stomachs...Suffice it to say, if their poop is off, their system's off. It's the number one tell-tale sign of a problem, leading me to believe that clearly God has a great sense of humor.)
     I'll spare you the details save to say, April made it through the night. (Good sign.) This morning, she ate. (Another good sign.) The others butted her, leaving her flat on her back (Bad sign...Suggests they know she's weak and are counting her gone, but I was there...and will be watching over her like a hawk until the doctor arrives.)
     While yes, this goes with the territory, it's not the part of the territory I like. It's a part of life-- just not the fun part, but it is the cost of caring so deeply.  To avoid the pain of hurting over an innocent critter would mean avoiding animals all together and that's a price I do not wish to pay.
     That said, I DO so marvel at the kind wishes, the thoughtful comments...the prayers I KNOW were prayed. (I felt them.) The tender hearted replies from so many caring people --fellow animal lovers, friends...even total strangers -- warmed my heart and brought great comfort at a time I was otherwise feeling lost and helpless.
     There is something about watching innocence suffer that both bonds us and reminds us of how very fragile life is, (and how very helpless we are at times to do anything BUT pray).  Yet for all the pain felt while watching it, there is a sweet peace that comes with knowing others care. And for this, I am truly...TRULY grateful.
     I'll keep you posted.
     My heartfelt thanks for your precious tender hearts.
     For now, it's an April kinda day.

Rosey 1: Coyotes 0

   

     There are barks and there are barks...and then there are the growls. Each sound sends a message and when it comes to Pyrs (as with any breed you live with long enough) you start to recognize the differences if you listen close enough. Even when they wake you, there's comfort in hearing the sounds a dog makes, especially those hired to keep an eye out for things.
     But let a thing get a lit-tle too close...All bets are off. Intruder Beware!
     Such was the case of Wiley Coyote (may he RIP). I'm sure he was somebody's papa, but on Rosey's turf, Rosey rules. Next time, dude, you might wanna do your prowling elsewhere.
     Graciously she spared me the gory details; my only clue that something was up when I couldn't get Rosey out of the garden a night ago. My first thought went to deer. It is not uncommon this time of year to see deer parts in your yard (gross as they are to find). Some deer fall wounded (more common with bow hunters). Some remains are left behind from cleaning, (leaving guts behind for buzzards is not uncommon in the country...Deer guts, btw, are called "umbles" It's where we get the phrase "Umble Pie" (often mistaken for "Humble Pie" though the phrase origin has to do with deer intestines made into pies for serfs and servants, so as to make use of every possible piece of a slaughtered deer, i.e. the "chitlins" of a deer....Little "I Didn't Know That" moment for you).
     All a part of nature. All a part of life in the country. (Insert your Lion King/Disney tune here.)
     But in the unsolved mystery of "What the heck is Rosey eating?" from a night ago, it was an Agatha Christy moment when by the light of day I made my way cautiously, delicately out to where she was once again, hunkered down over her prey, growling her guttural victory growl, uncertain if I was there to scold or remove or both. (Trust me. I'm not THAT stupid.)
     Definitely not a scolding moment. No, no. Nay, nay. This was a "GOOD DOG ROSEY! GOOD GRRRRRRL!" kinda moment, for Rosey had done what God put Pyrenees on the planet to do: Rosey had killed herself a coyote!
     Let the record reflect (having raised Huskies and wolf breeds in a prior life) I probably would've cried had I witnessed this first hand, after all, this creature must surely have a family of its own given the eerie-baby cries we've been hearing recently...(For those who've never heard this, there is no sound in the world like a bunch of coyote pups howling at the moon...One of the most unique, albeit, spine-tingling noises you'll ever hear.) Why I'm sure Wiley was just shopping for groceries like the rest of us, but (sorry dude) my goats are not your Butterball!
     Thankfully Rosey (and God) spared me the worst of it. By the time I found what was left of the dude, Rosey was paws to pelt, crunching on his head giving me this: "Let me just polish this off" kinda glance.
     Meanwhile, back in the pen were three super impressed (though slightly jealous) relatives and 16 very relieved goats (perched high atop their spools)!