It is a well-documented fact that I hate the big male turkey on this farm. He stands around fluffing his dumb feathers any time I am outside. But more than him, I hate his offspring.
The Dickhole Twins.
These poults follow me. That is not paranoia. THEY ARE FOLLOWING ME
EVERYWHERE. I go to water the garden, there they are. I go to water the
pumpkins, THERE THEY ARE. And they are total assholes about it too. I
will leave the gate slightly ajar, and they will come right in. I have
tried to think of ways to deter them from following me into places they
are not allowed. I have kicked them in the tail feathers, sprayed them
with the hose, and made wildly unattractive flapping motions with my
arms while going, "Caw! Caw! Fucking caw, get the fuck out of here you
poult bastards!"
And nothing. Not only have they not left
me alone, they have started being more aggressive. Now, instead of just
one big turkey fluffing feathers at me, I have these two little shits
fluffing their feathers too. It is effrontery of the gravest kind, and
there is something seriously disturbing about it. I feel like I am back
in middle school, and some kids are following me around making fun of
me, but I do not know what they are saying, because they are turkeys,
THEY ARE TURKEYS GOOD GOD LEAVE ME ALONE YOU TURKEY TWATS!
My point being, the first thing I do today is water the plants.
I had made up my mind to never talk to the squash again, because they were mean to me and did not offer proof that I am the most amazing garden grower to ever grow a garden, which is ridiculous, because I am amazing at everything. Unfortunately, my vow is short-lived, because I have to go water them. At least I have my one good squash to console me.
NOOOOOOOO!
Why can I have nothing good in this life? Honestly. The one good squash
that I planted and that actually looked like squash instead of the
scrotum of Prince Charles, and it gets scratched up by chickens. The
chickens are lucky that this is not my farm, because if it were, it
would be less of a farm and more a historical site of the Great Chicken
Genocide of 2014. People would come from all over and ask, "What happened here?" and there would be a person who would look grave and say, "The chickens fucked up."
My spirit is defeated, so I figure it is a good time to take a break and play with all the animals.
"How did you know I trade my affection for bribes?"
I force feed Ruby and Coco apples so that they will love me even more
than they already do, and it works well because ponies love apples like I
love ponies. Basically a lot.
Then I turn my attention to the goats. Only, this is going on, so I immediately rescind all my attention from the goats, because it seems like I have walked in on some weird goat chant that I should not listen to.
Baa ram ewe.
The only goat I give attention to is little Siddhartha, because he is not being weird, he is just making this face, and that is okay in my book.
But if he starts grunting, I'm out.
Next up is probably one of the worst jobs I have had on the farm thus
far. Lauren wants to lay some rubber mats down in one of the stalls in
the barn and turn it into a classroom where she can teach people about
goats, orienteering, and why her life is much better than theirs. I am
all for that idea, but given that this is a sustainable, she wants to
requisition some of the mats she already has. The trouble is, they look
like this:
Picked this up at the flea market over in Hell.
I cut 13' off of that mat, which is essentially a big flat tire. In the 87 degree heat, it is a big flat tire that gains sadistic glee from punishing me with reflected hotness. To make the whole picture better, the implement that Lauren gives me to cut through the mat is...a small, serrated kitchen knife.
While I admire her craftiness in procuring tools to get jobs done, she is not the one cutting through this mat of hell. At many points, I ponder if it would be easier to just stab the mat repeatedly and tell her that I am sorry, but I accidentally mutilated it and there is no point to cut through it. But that seems like more energy that just cutting it, so I finish in record time because I hate the mat so much I want to get away from it as quickly as possible.
Don't rest in peace, assholes.
We leave the barn after making the glorious floor you see above, and I rub my arms, which have no feeling in them because I have burned my hands pulling hot rubber all the way across the farm. Insanely heavy hot rubber. Offhandedly, I ask Lauren if she has ever considered using her big fat goats to haul shit across the farm. You know, just in case there was ever a job like that.
She replies, "Funny you mention it, that's exactly what we're doing next!" I congratulate myself on being psychic. I do not have time to think about how to use my newfound powers for evil though, because before I know it, we have Ajax saddled up.
"Are we doing something fun? Guys?"
Ajax does not know what horrific exercises in lack of humanity we are
about to visit on him. He is a fat goat, and needs
to work that fatness off, so we attach him to a piece of fence to use as
a harrowing tool out in the pasture. Harrowing flattens the fields and
tills a bit too, an important job that is just the thing for a fat goat that has blubber spilling over the straps of the saddle.
It goes okay.
Ajax does not like the piece of fence trailing his butt. He runs like a maniac across the pasture, and the other goats shun him for the fence-ridden leper that he is. It is comically tragic, watching this big fat goat trying to run as fast as the herd, his blubber rippling in the wind, trying desperately to join a herd that is avoiding him like he is a hooker with herpes, bleating at the top of his lungs as if to say, "GUYS! GUYS PLEASE HELP! PLEASE I AM JUST LIKE YOU!"
He settles into it eventually, due entirely to the fact that he is so exhausted that he cannot run anymore, but just dejectedly walk around with the torture fence bumping along behind him. At that point, we take the harrowing thing off, and not a moment too soon, because as exhausting as it has been for Ajax, it has been equally exhausting for me. Just getting the thing on him took all my goat-wrestling skills, and then my goat-chasing skills, and then my goat-cursing skills. Thankfully they are all well-honed.
Now that we are done with Ajax, though, it is time for me to go into town to buy ammo and a saddle pad. I feel suitably country in my quest. When I get to town, everyone is talking about the snow that fell the other day. It is, literally, the talk of the town. At one point, someone mentions the snow to me, and I respond, "Oh it was crazy, we were having trouble with drought, now our crops have to worry about frost too." And the person nodded and agreed, as if I had any idea of what I was talking about.
Country Small Talk Achievement unlocked. Fuck yeah.
When I get home, I go inside to drop off my haul, and see this right inside the door.
"Could you give us some space, we're trying to have a moment here."
The cat knows that she is not allowed in with the chicks, but this
turkey was the only one to hatch out of the last round of eggs, and he
is lonely. So the cat is keeping him company. The turkey baby is still too cute for
me to loathe with the vehemence that I reserve for his older brethren, and also, there is a cat hanging out with him, so it is just too much cuteness for me to feel anything except warmth. Then I realize I am standing too close to the heat lamp and go back outside to ride Coco for a while.
By 6pm, it becomes apparent that I did a lot of physical labor today. I am incredibly tired, and being so tired, I decide to just document animals.
"Do you ever get the feeling you're being watched?"
"Dude, you have no idea."
And to end the day, I decide to invent a first-person shooter game, only instead of shooting people, you will get points for petting ponies. This is what it would probably look like:
GOAT OF THE DAY: Pandora
This is Pan's sister. She does not like anything. Seriously, she is the most skittish and shy little goat, and she mostly just likes crying for her mom.
"You're not my mom..."
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