Cow Update

Thanks to YouTube I was envisioning the vet showing up with an ultrasound machine to do pregnancy checks on the cows. It turns out that's not how they do things Out In The Country, at least not around here. I'm not sure who was more surprised about this, me or the cows. The reality is that the vet shoves his arm in, feels around and says, 'Yep or Nope'. The results were as I expected, Lily is pregnant and Lucy is not. Of course Lucy is the more skittish and difficult cow to handle. Thankfully both went into the chute when the vet came though I had a moment of panic when they both took off for the back field with no signs of budging just as the vet was pulling into the driveway. But by some miracle I got them back into the holding area and eventually into the chute without too much drama. Then on Sunday Lucy had to go back in for another hormone shot and there was some kicking of heels and resistance but we got her in. She needs to go in one more time for the actual AI procedure and I'm a bit concerned. We've been feeding her in the holding area and yesterday she absolutely did not want to go in. Today she was better but still wary. Hopefully by Sunday she'll cooperate. How much does grass fed beef cost?

I also finally got somebody to haul the steer and heifer to the processor next month. This has been a long drawn out drama for me in many ways. Originally I was going to have somebody come out to the farm in October to do on farm processing primarily because this would cause the least amount of stress to the cows but also because I didn't have a pick up or trailer to haul them to a processor. Then the guy who was supposed to come out became too ill to do it and a friend recommended a processor and said she could haul them for me (and of course I'd pay her). The processor didn't have a date until February thanks to COVID but I signed up anyway so at least there would be an end in sight. The drought this summer was terrible and hay right now costs a fortune. Overwintering these cows has been a huge expense never mind the strain on the pastures. 

Then a couple of weeks ago the friend hauling thing fell through so I've been scrambling to find a solution. It turns out livestock trailers are the new toilet paper and very hard to come by. We did finally buy a pick-up to haul hay but it's too small to haul a big trailer. It can haul a small trailer but of course it's impossible to find one for sale that's small enough and not a horse trailer. Ordering one will take months and it's not a given that one will arrive at the dealer when promised. I called everyone I knew who could possibly help or know someone who could help then called those recommendations. I found two separate very good people to help but of course both were tied up on processing day. Ugh. Then a miracle happened and the original friend was once again able to help. Now I just have to hope the roads are o.k. because it's an hour's drive to the processor in Utah. How much does grass fed beef cost again?

I do love having the cows though. There's something very relaxing about hanging out with them, especially when they're munching on hay. They bring a lot of drama and work to my life but so far it's been worth it. Just.

Is it a Boy or a Girl?

 Mama Lily

The vet comes today to do a pregnancy check on my two mama cows which means I have to pretend I know how to handle cows well enough to get them into their squeeze chute. Thankfully my back has returned to a reasonably mobile state. I'll see how it is after an afternoon of pretend cowgirl-ing. I have a chiropractor appointment, finally, bright and early tomorrow morning so hopefully I'll be set to rights either way because I'm still not 100% and I desperately need to get back to action.

My pasture is dry at the moment, that picture is from a month ago, but we're due some snow tonight and throughout the week so I'm hoping very hard the cows are pregnant, I suspect one is and one isn't. I live in hope though because I really don't want to go through any more AI. That will not be fun in the snow. It's not fun full stop, not for anybody. I wish I could keep a bull here but I don't have the fences or infrastructure or really even enough space. Ideally I could find somebody who would bring their bull over here for a couple few days then pick him up but I may as well wish for world peace. The pandemic has severely limited my ability to make connections related to the farming efforts and I'm in a bind with other issues with the cows right now. Made some phone calls today with people I do know to see if they know anybody who can help, we'll see. I hate asking for help. Hate it. It's the hardest part of my new life here, being so dependent in an attempt to gain independence. An interesting dichotomy I guess. 

Agriculture is a really stupid way for humans to live but here we are and I don't see any way out of it. All we can do is try to do it the best ways we can. I feel like humanity is approaching its n-stage, at least from a health perspective. Too many people to be fed properly and too much disagreement over what 'properly' is and too many people who don't care anyway. 

I had to buy some clothes for my chickens because apparently chicken Mean Girls is a thing. The poor Ameraucanas seem to be at the bottom of the pecking order and take the bulk of the abuse. Here's one sporting her stylish new coat to protect the bare patch on her back from her evil step sisters.

Integrating new chickens into the flock this spring will be interesting and yet another challenge to puzzle through. And there's always the exciting chance that I'll win the Rooster Lottery. I'm shocked I never got one in the first round of chicks. Last spring baby chicks were like toilet paper, I'm hoping this year will be different but nonetheless I suppose I should go see if I can reserve some in advance just in case people go out of their damn minds again. Also seeds! I should remember to get seeds early. I saved a bunch from my own plants this summer but there were some things that didn't grow at all because they really needed to be started ahead of time in the house. I guess I need stuff to do that too, I don't want to rely on other people's starts again. The garden was reasonably successful this past year, about what I was expecting, but lots of room for improvement. Hopefully another winter of chicken poop/cow poop/hay compost will enrich the soil even more and kill off more of the pasture grasses. Last year we took the chickens out of their winter area, which is also the summer garden, too early and the grasses and ants took over too quickly. This year I'll make sure they have a good go at the garden area right before I plant. The ants were horrible last year and they make such good chicken food.

I'm off to prepare for cow wrangling. I'm not sure if the vet can determine the sex of the baby(ies) if there are any but if he can I promise there will not be a gender reveal party.

Twisted Tongues

Unfortunately I can't get in to see the chiropractor until Tuesday so for the past 4 days I've been unable to move properly. The pain is not insignificant but I can deal with it, it's the inability to get up and moving and do my stuff that's driving me batshit. I don't do sedentary. Today I succumbed to actual self-pitying wallowing, pathetic, very off brand. But here I am. I do finally feel o.k. enough to sit in a chair and type and I think tomorrow should see a marked improvement in mobility. I hope. Because I don't do sedentary. I've been going for mile long walks each day which sounds o.k. except they're very slow, gimpy affairs that are hopefully helping with mobility without causing downstream injury from walking funny. I did a bit of weight lifting the past 2 days, very short sessions with only a couple few exercises that didn't seem to involve my lower back. Today I couldn't even bring myself to do those.

But a bit of goodness came yesterday. AFI dropped two new singles which answered my questions of is the band still together and are they still making music. They're both really good and different from each other. So happy to have more new good music.

Twisted Tongues

Twisted Tongues is my favorite of the two, 80's post punk meets 2021. At first blush I was happy to see Davey Havok's lyrics had finally strayed from his all too common themes (obsessions?) of heartbreak and betrayal. And then in an interview he claimed the song was about heartbreak and betrayal. "The dreaminess of the music lyrically inspired themes of unforeseen severance. It is a pining song of being set adrift by those who once feigned to share the same anchors."  In plainer words, one of his straight edge friends must have started drinking or someone finally had to give up veganism or something. I guess.  I love the alliteration in the lyrics. The world needs more alliteration. 

In any case, I love the song, the music is moody, dark and powerful-synths, reverb, bestill my heart-and the vocals are fantastic. On his last couple few albums he was singing in a halting, staccato type fashion that I didn't care for mixed in with the singing but now he's back to pure singing. I can't believe his voice has held up for 30 years, especially given the abuse from the screaming and high pitched vocals in the earlier days. Amazing. And the drums! Holy cats.

Escape From Los Angeles

This one is more New Wave-y and I like it as well. The vocal melody is really interesting and seems a departure from his typical stuff. I love to see bands staying innovative and trying new things. New isn't always good but in this case it's working for them. I'm not sure why he chose such a cliche of a theme for the song but I guess in light of all the people fleeing L.A., high profile and otherwise, it's timely. I fully understand the sentiment, if I lived in L.A. I'd want to escape. I can't even imagine.

Neither song has the big lush, powerful, anthemic choruses. We'll see if they appear in the other yet to be released tracks. For now I'm trying not to play these a zillion times until I'm sick of them. So far I'm failing because I've been stuck inside on the couch but hopefully tomorrow will bring some mobility and I can get up and at 'em.

On a completely unrelated side note, am I seeing what I think I'm seeing?

 

It looks like Davey Havok (2nd from right) has tattooed both arms totally black. I can't even begin to fathom how painful that must have been and how long that must have taken. I think I'll stop whining about my back pain right about now. And the fact that he's rocking my 1985 hair style better than I ever did.

Coming this Monday - Fun With Cows.

Glimmers of Hope

Everyone has their moment from last year when they realized this thing was for real.  For me it was on March 6 when the South by Southwest music festival was cancelled. At that point I knew the Rec. Center, my Crossfit gym and any and all triathlons, Xterra or otherwise, would all be closed, cancelled, kaput as well as pretty much everything else. Around March 17 Goldenvoice and Live Nation, the two major concert booking agencies in the U.S. postponed all their shows. It makes sense that large concerts would be the first thing to be shuttered and will be the last thing to come back online. So when Fauci started making noises on Saturday about concerts possibly starting back up in the fall, I finally felt a bit of true optimism for the first time in forever. Like perhaps that light at the end of the tunnel is for real. The House just voted to impeach Trump, January 20th is coming up quickly and hopefully with it some calm and stability in the days following. January 20th itself is anybody's guess. But hopefully after that the formerly emboldened racists will crawl back into the cracks from whence they came and go back to mostly bickering amongst themselves.

Yesterday's bit of desert-y goodness.

So I think I may set a loose goal of Xterra Nationals this fall. Which is funny because I can barely move at the moment after throwing my back out on Friday night. I actually felt healed today, I was debating where I should ride my bike then while sitting in the car I leaned over to get something out of a bag on the floor and my back went into an even worse spasm. Which is fairly typical for how this goes unless I finally break down and go to the chiropractor. Who is closed on Wednesdays. I was hoping to avoid it, I have no idea how careful he's being and there's already been one outbreak at a different chiropractor in town. But back pain is horrible and debilitating and leads to a downward spiral of badness so I have to go, it's been about a year which is about the longest I can typically go before having exactly this kind of an episode. I have some N95 masks that I bought years ago for work here around the farm. Back when all this hit I was going to donate them to the local hospital but something inside just wouldn't let me let them go right away. I do need them around here and who knows when they'll be available again? The hospital never became overrun so I felt o.k. keeping them and now that they are becoming overrun I think they have their PPE issues sorted out. So hopefully I can get an appointment tomorrow or Friday. Then I have to decide if I feel safe going back to the pool. Still very iffy about that but I haven't been for about a year and it's already going to be ugly. If I'm going to race I have to start building those swimming skills back up right now. Or at least when I can rotate my torso again.

Feels good to feel a little hopeful again.

That Aged a Little TOO Well

Still feels a little soon to start gibbering about my personal nonsense again so I'll just leave this here. 

2018.  Some all too timely dark humor from some old college friends.

Deep Breaths

Well 2021 headed south pretty sharpish. Deep breaths, turn off news, all the Robert Smith. This is how we make it through. Well this is how I make it through and I highly recommend it.

And I lost a chicken today. Ugh.

Hope Unknown

 Hope unknown. Sometimes just waking is surreal.

 Like everybody else I sit at the start of 2021 unsure of what, if anything, I should plan for. I've enjoyed my year, well my past 4 years or so, of riding, running, swimming, lifting, moving without any particular goal in mind. Last year I was planning to start racing again, at bare minimum I was going to race an offroad triathlon in Arizona in June with some friends who were coming down from Denver. It was to serve doubly as a fun weekend with friends and a reason to start training in some fashion. I like to shift between aimless do what I want moving through the world and focused training and I'd spent so many years in aimless mode. I was feeling fit and feisty and ready to think about racing, even contemplating Nationals in the fall, maybe even the horrific Beaver Creek Regionals which I love/hate but mostly hate. I was surprisingly not that disappointed when all of it was cancelled. My friends still came down to visit and we had a great weekend of riding though they stayed elsewhere so it wasn't quite normal. I love having people visit and stay here, that's been one of the hardest things for me. At least outdoor small group activities seem reasonably safe. I enjoyed socially distanced group rides all summer and fall.

I see some Xterras opening registration - one is supposedly happening in Arizona in February - but I remain skeptical they'll actually happen. I've also seen bands selling tickets for shows as soon as April. I just can't imagine things being back to normal by then. As of now, regular folks aren't due to get vaccinated in Colorado until summer. And summer is a pretty big window of time. Should I think about Xterra Nationals in September? Or enjoy another year of wandering? I know, we're all in the same boat with whatever our passion is. Never mind the folks unsure about their businesses and jobs. I realize how stupid and tone deaf this sounds in light of that. I'm not complaining or lamenting, just kinda wondering aloud. Will be interesting to read this post come summer to see how things turn out.

Yesterday was a break from the snow biking with some desert-y goodness.

Today is a well earned rest day. I had a nice wander around my pasture, a dog walk and some sweaty goodness in the sauna. And I got mobbed by chickens. I'm always getting mobbed by chickens.

We'll likely get some baby chicks this spring. I was surprised Jonny was up for it. I was mentally constructing a case for them complete with Exhibits but he suggested it. It's a good time since we're not tempted to go anywhere. Not that I'm tempted to go anywhere anyway. I finally made it a full calendar year without getting on an airplane for the first time since 1990. I made it 12 months last year but had to go to Ann Arbor in September when my aunt went into hospice. I swore it would be the last time I'd get on a plane. I suspect many frequent travelers will also be able to say they made it the whole year without getting on a plane but none will be as happy about it as me. 

Time to chill out in front of the fire with a Ruby in my lap and some nice synth-y music of some sort on the headphones.