Ain't I Pretty?

Ha. Okay so the title is written tongue-in-cheek, and with a heavy load of sarcasm wreathing it.

Today I look like I got in a fight with someone. My left hand is swollen, my palms are torn up, and I have a whopper of a bruise on my left eye, complete with broken skin here and there. No it hasn't completely swollen shut yet, but I'm waiting for it to. 

Believe it or not, I was actually NOT fighting with someone (but hey, don't mess with me when I'm mad, and don't say anything negative about raw milk in my presence. Just a warning. LOL.). The plan was simply to put my goats over on the neighbor's property this morning. Simple and quick. You would think I would have learned by now that goats go by contraries. If you want them to stay put, then you need to make them think that you want them to escape. But then, they would probably just escape anyway...

So you're probably getting pretty close by now in guessing that the goats did NOT stay in their brand new pasture where I put them. You'd be right too. I had all five girls on leashes (correction: Lily and Ivy, the two ring leaders, were on halters so I could handle them), we somehow managed to get across the road in one piece, and two of the goats were put in the new paddock when chaos erupted. Lily and Ivy suddenly decided that they would rather be in their old, barren pasture more than anything else in the world, so they ducked through the electric fencing and bolted. 

Jupiter, Trigun, and Metty followed suit and began scrambling back towards the road, leaving me with almost 1,000 lbs. of panicked goat in my hands. I honestly thought I was going to leave plow marks in the ground from my heels. After going 20 feet I managed to heave the girls into a halt (just call me SuperWoman) and then I had to figure out what to do next. Noticing that Ivy's leash had gotten caught beneath her front, left leg, I leaned across Lily to fix the problem and prevent possibly injuries. Lily was wound up, frantic, and fed up with everyone and everything. as I leaned over her, my face parallel with her's, she flung her head back and CRACK! The back of her hard skull hit the side of my face. I don't remember what happened next, or how I even got them back to the barn. I don't think I did any swearing but one can never tell. ;) I just remember wanting to put my hand to my face but couldn't since I had leashes and lead ropes wound all around them. The girls had pulled the ropes so tight that it was cutting my hands and it felt like my pinky finger was broken. 

Once we were back in the barn pen, I let the girls go, leashes and all, and sat down on the straw littered floor; holding my hand to my face. Who knew such a small animal could give such an impact? After a few minutes to calm everyone down (including myself) I unleashed everyone, fumbling horribly in the dark building and trying to only use one eye to see. 

I came inside and looked in the mirror... Wow. It's an impressive mark that Lily gave me. I groaned as I remembered that I have someone coming tomorrow for a farm tour. This is going to be loads of fun telling them that my sweet and gentle milk goat just about made me need plastic surgery. Hehe. Thank heavens it's only Monday; maybe my war wound will be gone before Sunday comes around. It's one thing to tell one person why you look like you've been in guerrilla warfare, it's a whole 'nother thing to tell it to an entire church.

So the goats are back in their old pasture now. Maybe I need a stronger fence charger? It's tempting to invest in a monster like THIS CHARGER, which has 10 joules. Now THAT just might keep a goat in. Over here on our property, I have a charger that is only 2.5 joules and you can hear it pop from across the property when a goat accidentally touches it (you can also hear them yell when they touch it!). I can't imagine what a 10 joule charger would do... 

But after today's adventure, I was just about ready to put $2,000 worth of goat meat in the freezer. I'm sure I'll laugh about this soon enough, but today it ain't funny. 

Goats... Gotta' love 'em.

Oh, and NO, you do NOT get to see a picture of my war wound. Nope, no pictures of this farm girl until my black eye heals up. ;)