The Bunny In The Barn

Right-O! Marigold Holmes here! It has been a looooong time since we've had any kind of a mystery around here. Unless you count why Boo stays so fat. But anyway, on to the tale. Or is it tail?

Well, yesterday evening, the goatmother came out to do her usual nightly chores. Call it the P.M. maid service, if you will. She clomped through the barn in her trusty clod-hopper muck boots, grabbed the shovel and bucket on her way through, and proceeded to our side to clean up. Now this whole process is never quiet and calm. That's just the way it is. For one, the goatmother usually feels the need to sing. Believe me. I don't know why. I tried asking for ear muffs once, but it didn't seem to go over. Anyway, then the goatmother proceeds to bump around the barn singing at the top of her lungs, banging the bucket, and loudly unsnapping hooks off the hay racks. (These are necessary because without them, Ella pulls all the hay out onto the floor. What a wastey-goat. Oy.) Then, of course, Peanut always manages to find it necessary to bounce about trying to butt Watson into the walls. He is kind of the 'Tigger' of the goat world - all bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy. And 'butty'. Don't forget 'butty'.

But back to the tale. With all this hullabaloo, you can imagine everyone's total surprise when the goatmother, heading back toward the Inner Sanctum, glanced over in the boys' side of the barn and saw this:



'So what's the mystery, Marigold? It's just a rabbit.'

Ah, but this was not just any rabbit, for you see, the goatmother owns at least one natural history type book that states there are no rabbits on the Olympic Peninsula - only Snowshoe hares. Does this look like a hare to you? I didn't think so. As a matter of fact, the goatmother and goatfather have never, in the time they have lived here, EVER seen a rabbit of any kind. Well, it looks to me like someone needs to reassess their facts.

So the little rabbit just sat there looking at everyone and munching hay. The goatmother ran (Can you believe this? She ran.) to the house to get the camera. Amazingly the bunny stayed there. The goatmother would have gotten a picture of the whole bunny, but we were all so excited about the fact that the goatmother actually ran, that we simply could not contain ourselves. Peanut started dancing about on two legs due to sheer amazement that the goatmother actually could run. Anyway, with all the commotion, the bunny ran behind the stump and then literally disappeared. Poof. We tried to figure out where he had gone, but he just vanished. Very strange that.

So herein lies the mystery. Where did the bunny come from? Where did the bunny go? Are there more bunnies? I mean, with bunnies, if there's one, there's usually like a hundred. Are we to be overrun as we lie in innocent slumber? Why was the bunny unafraid? Has he lain for months under the barn listening to the routine comings and goings of the goatmother overhead, and simply assumed she was just another noisy old goat?

In the end, it occurred to me that possibly the mystery is really no mystery at all. After all, this Sunday is Easter. Doesn't the Easter bunny bring Peanuts to all good little goats on Easter? Perhaps he is just a tad early. After all, doesn't he have a lot of places to visit? An early start is always advisable. Hmmm ...

What ho!, Dear Watson! I believe I am onto something here. "How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?" - Sherlock Holmes.

Here comes Peter Cotton Tail, Hoppin' down the bunny trail, Hippity-Hoppity Peanuts on their way!"