We sold our calves on Friday, the market is pretty hot right now and i think that we did quite well so that's a good thing that happened last week.
The auction mart is kind of a cool place. That is of course, if you can appreciate the subtle nuances of cow and wood shavings. You tend to run into a lot of your neighbours there. I'm pretty sure that just randomly stopping there to check on the price of cattle, while business prudent, might in fact be an excuse to catch up on what's going on in the community.
Because all of our cattle handling equipment was lost in the fire, i am now the proud owner of a spiffy new red cane, which happens to be my instrument of choice when dealing with cattle. Not to brag or anything, but i can wield a cane with the proficiency of a ninja or a jedi. That hook on the end works excellent for catching calves or snagging gates on the way past as i run up the alley, closing them as i go to prevent the cattle from running all the way back when they decide to turn. Some cattle farmers are whip people, some use electric stock prods, some used to patrol the hockey rinks late at night for Sher-woods and Titans, abandoned because of a broken blade. Which lost favour with the advent of the replaceable blade, but might be making a comeback with the development of the composite hockey stick. My medium is the cane, and i create masterpieces.
.................I haven't been feeling all that well in my stomach the last few days. A little queasy. I decided today that it might be from the smell currently hanging around our yard. Sort of a BBQ'd rubber boot marinated in used oil and diesel fuel smell. I can't wait until that's gone.
A comment is in order here! Being raised in a small town farming community, I grew up around such places, and yes, a big part of the draw is the socialization, saying howdy to the neighbors and finding out how their week went. I miss those days, now folks all bump into each other at WalMart, which says it all about how our world has gone to hell!
ReplyDeleteyes, it is sad. There's this thing that happens here. My mom and dad kind of started it, people just show up for coffee around 10:00. It's pretty neat. Sometimes they bring donuts, or cookies. At least 3 times per week, somebody just stops by for coffee and to catch up on things.
DeleteJosie beat me to it! I wanted to be your first comment on here lol... but with all my Internet outages I don't have much control. I've never been to a cattle auction - the only cows I've dealt with are in the local dairy. We used to go there and milk the cows for fun as a kid :-)
ReplyDeletei have plenty of other commentless posts, take your pick! :)
Deletei hear the ones we have here pale in comparison to ones they have in places like Brazil. But i haven't actually seen that.
Lol, maybe I will! Point me out to the ones about you and your wife... they interest me deeply ;-)
Deletei will have to look back. I'll give you a few but i haven't really talked about her too much until just lately.
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