It Ain't Necessarily *Snow*.

Okay. It *is* technically snow, but a goat can dream can't she? If you look below, you will see the 'comparison' picture for the previous shot depicting last year. Oy. This is the end of March, for goats' sake!!! As it is, all kinds of things are in disarray. Take, for example, the trees trying to bloom - not to mention the daffodils. Or how about the hummingbirds that arrived the day before it began to snow. They arrived looking for the feeder on the goatmother and goatfather's deck. It was put out, only to find it's contents frozen the next morning. Thank goodness the swallows are two weeks late and have enough sense to WAIT! I blame those Woolly Boogers for this. After all, I have to have someone to blame.

As you can see, however, neither sleet, nor snow, nor dead of morning can deter Mr. and Mrs. Duck from their appointed rounds. Here you see them waddling through the snow. Uphill. With no boots. Two-hundred feet to the feeders and buck naked! IN. THE. SNOW!

So, we can't get out to look for even frozen, succulent Spring grass. Just gotta' stay inside and be BORED. Well, the goatmother has promised to bring me the New York Times Crossword.

So, in the end (pardon the pun), we all just turn our backs and pretend there isn't any snow. Hopefully it will melt soon. In the mean time, what is a six letter word meaning 'Sacred Snack' that begins with 'P' and ends with a 'T'???

The Winter That STILL Won't Die

I should have kept my mouth shut. Yes, I should have just kept it shut (and around some succulent Peanut). It is SNOWING as we speak. SNOWING, I say! ..................... oy.

The Winter That Would Not Die

Isn't that pretty? See the blooming cherry on the right ... and the plum tree on the left about to break into bloom? Ah, Spring!!! Lovely. Well, guess what? That was LAST year at this same time. What is wrong with this picture? (No, No...that was metaphorical, meaning NOT the picture above...Oh well, poetic license and all that. You understand.)

No, my friends, THIS year we are having the winter that will not die. It just won't go away. We are still having temperatures in the upper 20's at night and it might make it to the upper 40's in the day...if we are lucky. So, sadly we go out during the day foraging for succulent blades of new Spring grass, and sadly we go back to the barn and settle for plain old hay. Oy. Even the ducks in the pond are having difficulty keeping their little webbed feet from freezing. This is depressing. You know, von Goethe said, "Sometimes our fate resembles a fruit tree in winter. Who would think that those branches would turn green again and blossom, but we hope it, we know it." Okay, well, right now my fate doesn't seem to be resembling anything of the kind. Come to think of it, maybe von Goethe was just the Punxsutawney Phil of his time.

Never Invite The Neighbors

It starts out innocently enough. Just mom and pop, spending a night at home. But mom yearns for more. Mom yearns for a bit of social discourse. After all, pop just doesn't have much to say other than the occasional quack in response to her questions - that is the ones he actually hears. An idea takes shape. "Let's invite the neighbor's! Don't you think that is a nice idea?"

"Quack."

So the neighbors are invited. Things go quite nicely - some actual conversation over a good meal.

But soon things take a dark turn. The neighbor's husband says something just a bit over the top and helps himself to just one too many helpings. Pop takes exception. Mom is horrified by the ensuing confrontation.

Things are soon smoothed over, however, and all is copacetic. That is until the neighbors take it upon themselves to invite their neighbors. Four was okay. Six is quite another matter.

Now there are two more appetites to appease, not to mention space to share. And they're not just here for a visit. No sirree! These folks intend to settle right in and stay awhile.

Oy. Pop takes a lesson from the goatfather's sister and comments, "Come on, Mom. Let's go to bed so these good folks can go home!" Mom tries to reconcile the situation, but in the end, the guests depart. Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, "Do I advise you to love the neighbor? I suggest rather to escape from the neighbor and to love those who are the farthest away from you. Higher than the love for neighbor is the love for the man who is distant and has still to come." Mom is throwing Nietzsche's book away.

Frou-Frou No More

Today is my birthday. Happy Birthday to me! However, I would be willing to bet I don't get a Peanut Cake this year. In fact, I think I will be lucky to get fed. You see, 'someone' is leaving the goatmother little time for the finer things in life - even the important things in life - and the goatmother has been in somewhat of a tizzy. I could have told her this would happen, but does anyone listen to the goat? (pause for dramatic effect...) NO.

At any rate, Cabra (well she has a good name anyway) was meant to be a companion for the Mighty Quinn and a frou-frou farm dog. The 'companion' part has gone over quite well. It has gone over so well, that Cabra is inclined to do what ever she sees the Mighty Quinn do...which leads us to the photo above.

You see, the goatmother has been all a twitter because we have a new 'farm' store in town! Now we have farm stores here, but they are not very good farm stores and seem to lean more toward ostentatious suburban living than toward the honest-to-goat, real, dyed-in-the-wool farm. And this isn't just any farm store. No indeed. This store is a division of the famous Tractor Supply Store - the very same one all her southern goat friends constantly wax-poetic about. So when it opened, naturally the goatmother HAD to go there and came home carrying two gooseberry bushes. Of course the gooseberry bushes had to be planted right away.

Now, since puppyhood, the Mighty Quinn has viewed it as his bounden duty to help with any horticultural endeavor about the place. This includes, but is not limited to, the extraction of weeds and assistance with planting. If a weed is even kicked with the toe of one's boot, the Mighty Quinn is on it like ugly on an ape, literally ripping tenacious roots from the ground. Unfortunately, he also deems it necessary to help dig. Taking this into account, coupled with the fact that Cabra must follow his every lead, we are saddled with a sad case of 'doggie-see, doggie-do'. (Oh, Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Doggie-do! Oh, hay!, I just kill myself. Sorry - got caught up in the moment.) At any rate, now you have the facts explaining exactly why the above photographic evidence proves, without a smattering of doubt, that the 'frou-frou' part of the equation has flown the coop. It didn't take long, did it? Well, one simply can not expect a canine to have the same degree of acumen as a goat. Proving, once again, that Albert Einstein was probably thinking about a dog when he wrote, "He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice." Albert simply would not even have considered such a thought about a goat.