GoatNots

We found some young, grass-ready GoatNots for sale, calculated the per pound price, put the stock racks on the truck, and set out this morning to make ourselves the owners of two GoatNots.

When the back straps of the stock racks started flipping in the wind, we pulled off the road to tie them down, and that's when Charles heard a telltale hiss and spied at the top of one rear tire a bit of rock peeking at him. Since this discovery was made a couple of hundred yards from the turn-off for Wal*Mart, we turned around and drove to the auto center for repair or replacement. Were we ever grateful then for those flapping straps, because we would have been in a world of hurt with a flat tire and a thousand pounds of disgruntled GoatNots in the truck.

Yes, this is THE rock.

While the fellows coaxed the tire off the truck, I went inside the store to entertain myself, and I'm really good at that.

I could buy this yarn to make a baby blanket for my friend. Oh, I'll have to buy needles too. I have every size at home. Should I do this? Yes, I should, because they're at home, and I'm going to be in a truck, hauling cattle. Oh, and I've always wanted one of those yarn keepers. I'll get a yarn keeper. I HAVE to have a yarn keeper, if I'm going to knit while hauling cattle. Who ever heard of not protecting one's baby yarn while hauling cattle?

With the tire back on the truck, and I happily knitting like crazy, we were on the road again. Twenty minutes later, we arrived at the ranch and met the young GoatNots.

They were scary.

They were dirty, and they were scary.

They were also scared. They were scared of the fellows who had walked up to the tiny pen for a closer look, so they scrambled to get away from them.

That red heifer saw me. Those boy GoatNots were too busy keeping an eye on the men, but the heifer saw me.

Then the boys saw me. And they stopped in their tracks. I don't know what GoatNots think about, but I was very afraid they were thinking about whether or not they could make it through those bars and TAKE ME DOWN. I was scared. I took a blurry photo. Wait,that heifer is crisp. She liked me. She wanted to go home with me. Those boys? Well, those boys are blurry, because they were moving again...toward me. I think they wanted to RUN ME OVER.

"How much for two?"

"Heifer for $X and steer for $X," each X equaling three times more than we'd calculated, based on the only published price we could find. (What do we know? We've never bought a grass-ready GoatNot.)

"Yikes! We must have been looking at the wrong figures."

"You sure you don't want all four of them?"

"All 4 of them? Mmmm. Hmmm...." Standing in a steady drizzle, threatening to dissolve and ruminating on three times the expected cost, now times four instead of times two, while a sweet heifer and 3 seemingly maladjusted steers stared me down, I suggested we take the rancher up on his offer to deliver and call him back with a decision after we'd ruminated some more.

So we ruminated (that's bovine talk) all the way home. And we decided on a price to offer for one red heifer and three cranky steers. Then we called the rancher. And the rancher didn't like the offer. He said we could call him back if we changed our minds. I don't think we'll change our minds. Maybe he'll change his...before next weekend...when we have an appointment to see some bottle babies. Babies aren't scary.

And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good. ~ Genesis 1:25