#15. or, you can't reason with a cow

  It was my plan to post something new for DudeWrite this week. I had an idea for the story that i had planned to post. I didn't get it done. I was busy moving cows all week, then i had to get ready to go camping. It was the first trip of the year for us,  so that meant quite a bit of stuff needed to be done to get the trailer ready for that. Anyways, no new story. Thankfully, The swell Dudes at DudeWrite opened up the posting for one more week of older posts. I hope that next week i will have a fresher offering.

  .......and so, I humbly offer you this post from back in January.

  Well, i had a completely different story already prepared to share with you today, but something actually interesting enough happened "down on the farm" yesterday that i decided to blog about that instead. Considering that this blog was somewhat intended to be about things that happen to me "down on the farm" and i can't actually remember writing much about that part of my life, this story sort of took precedence.

  If you know anything about cows at all, they have one unique inherent talent. (other than being tasty as hell, of course) Cows have the ability to turn the calmest, level headed, clear thinking person into a raving lunatic. This generally happens only when you actually have to handle the cows, as in, move them from one place to another or bring them into corrals for vaccinations or something equally farmy. Plus, the level of raving lunacy, is directly proportional to the number of cows you are actually handling. More cows means more idiocy. Also, something just occurred to me is that this condition may be most prevalent in the males of the population. I should do a study on that, maybe i could get a grant?

 So, last fall, we put in a new fence. It's brand new, the barbed wire still glitters in the sun. This fence now splits a pasture into two pieces. There is one gate in the fence, which for now is open and i feed the cows on the far end of the field, so they get some exercise to make giving birth later in the spring easier. It's been raining here, which in itself is odd for the winters we have normally here, plus just cold enough to make the pasture into one large sheet of ice. Cows do not navigate ice well at all and there was about 15 or so cows, that would not come down to the gate to get to the other pasture to eat because that area was visibly more icy. Yesterday, i used the tractor that i was in (ken-inatractor, see how that works.) to rough up the gate area to be safer for the cows. Then, because those 15 or so were still hesitant to cross the roughed up ice, we had to chase them through the gate.

  OK, one tractor, one quad, calmly move behind the cows and gradually suggest to them that they need to move to the gate. Cows don't move, my stupid level goes up one notch. Suggest with more vigor that cows need to move to the gate by driving tractor and quad with increased speed, cows don't move, stupid level goes up another notch. Verbally suggest to cows they should move, in loud voice while increasing the speed of tractor and quad. Cows don't move, add profanity, to illustrate to cows the importance of them moving toward the gate, cows don't move. Stupid level rises another notch. Abandon tractor completely for fear that the speed has now gotten to a point where bouncing across frozen piles of manure is going to make the wheels fall off the tractor. Cows walk in circles and make no effort to approach the gate. Stupid mixes with anger and decide they need to approach the next level. Cows are now along side the fence, quad is racing side to side with dangerous speed on the ice, calf decides to climb though fence, gets leg caught in wire, everything stops while i cut brand new wire to get calf out, cows return to original position, fencing pliers get thrown across the field. Wipe drool from corner of mouth, resume chasing cows at dangerous speed on quad, completely lose control of quad on ice, crash through barbed fence, shearing off two brand new fence posts in the process. Make split second decision on whether to leap over fence while quad is passing through it, opt for under, hit the ground, roll onto back, and slide clean under barbed wire, on back, on ice. Clothes begin to shred as skin starts to turn green.  (you won't like me when i'm angry). Cows eventually decide to go through gate, after more cows come from other side of fence to eat hay bale i had originally placed near the gate to make it more appealing. Spend rest of day in grumpy mood.

...............i am so glad i leave for Mexico today.