Another sucky day on the farm

Gah! What a day I had last Saturday. Some good, but mostly bloody bad (literally!).

First I went to a stock sale at 10 a.m. Well, at 10:09 ...

I got horribly lost and had to ring Evil Genius Husband and get him to get on Mapquest and find out where in the hell I was. Then I finally got to the microscopic little town and had to canvass the whole place to find the sale. Fortuantely that took about a minute.

Now I normally go to my 'regular' sale which is in Springfield SC twice a month. I love this sale but, since moving over here on the posh side of the lake, I've found it just a wee bit far away. With petrol prices over the roof, it doesn't behoove me to go anywhere in my big, ugly, gas-guzzling Ford pick-up without careful consideration.

Since I wasn't selling and I hadn't been to this new sale (oh, and the Ford suddenly seems to be missing on one cylinder *big frowny face*), I chose to forgo Springfield and check out this new one.

It was a bust. It sucked actually, no offense to the folks putting on the sale.

I arrived late (it started at 10 o' clock, I got there about 10 minutes after), and they'd all but finished selling the meagre number of chickens. They weren't even holding it in a barn - we were in a regular building in 'downtown' Buffalo SC. They trotted out one goat (a small pygmy cross tame enough to wear a collar) and a miniature horse stud. I was on the long road back home by 10:30, cursing under my breath and listening to the Ford's engine miss.

When I got home I was so frustrated at having accomplished nothing (except burning up some of my $2.50 a gallon petrol) that I optimistically decided that I'd shear my two woolly ewes. I'd just purchased a set of hand shears (I don't intend to do more than make them comfy as the weather gets hot) and was dying to try them out.

I snagged ewe #1, my Finnsheep cross, Brunswick, and clipped her. Man, if you want to get some exercise, hand shear a sheep!

After she was done, I tossed out some feed to lure the flock back and got a chance to put my hand on a little doe who'd liberated herself from the kid pen. I grabbed her, hefted her up (Oh, my back! Man, if you want to hurt your back, hand shear a sheep!) and she writhed and snapped her head back. Well, she clocked me right on the side of my fool head and I saw stars.

I staggered with her over to the kid pen, tossed her in, retrieved my shears and the next ewe: my Jacob, Iris. She had NO intention of being handled and grunted and struggled the whole time I was trying to clip her. It was bloody hot, too so I was sweating up a storm.

Now, being multi-coloured, Iris has mottled skin. Since she was throwing herself about, the shears were giving her little nicks and so as I worked tiny specks of blood would show up on her skin - hard to see since her skin is different colours. Finally I paused. Geez that's a lot of little cuts ... maybe I should stop. Then another appeared. And another. I was quite still at the time.

What the hell?

I wiped the sweat off of my chin and my hand came away bright red. DUH! It was me. The blood was dripping off of me. Apparently the little kid's equally small and sharp horns had impaled me when she head-butted me.

When I finally got done and back in the house I discovered that the errant doeling 's horn had actually pierced my left earlobe. The little creep. My left ear already had 6 holes in it (yes, I am a Punk Farmer.)

A lovely end to a lovely day.