You Just Might BE A Redneck.....

...or even a Hillbilly....

Last Thursday, we "loaded up the truck", and headed on over to Missouri for a niece's High School Graduation. It was a comical sight to behold - and a "hillbilly" load.

Since we have three "bottle Babies", and two nanny goats in milk, we had to take them with us. In addition, we had a dry doe that Deb's dad wanted, our LGD pup, another adult LGD for Deb's brother, our two Doxies, and a chicken. All this and the "support" for all of them, and us.

I have a mesh roof for my stock racks , so we ended up tying things on top. We also had buckets hanging from the roof on the inside of the bed. Here is a photo of the divider I built for the trip, since the dogs and the bottle babies needed to be kept separated so nobody would get stomped.



We still had the three goats - and a lot more stuff - to load. Along the way, we stopped at a few places and added more stuff.

That was just the trip OVER there - The homeward trip we had even MORE "stuff"! More on that later....

On Friday, Deb's dad and I took a side trip to Richards, MO, to pick up another LGD "pup". I was expecting this "lovable little fuzzball" that could ride on your lap. I had seen photos online of the pup, but didn't realize that they were several months old. When we got there, the "fuzzball" had become a polar bear...

He was around 90 pounds and a good sized beast. Since we still had the partition in the pickup, we loaded him in there for the trip back to the farm. For now....

When we neared the south side of the Kansas City Metro area, we could see some nasty clouds to the north of us. We could even see some green clouds that told us hail was present. We decided to stop and get the dog into the back seat.

At this point, he did NOT want to move. It was a "tug-o-war" to get him, but he finally found himself in the back seat of the pickup. It wasn't very long after we moved him, that we ran into heavy rain that lasted for 40+ miles. We learned later that the rain gauge at their farm had registered over 5".

Everything was soaked, and the road to the farm was under water. We ended up having to go 30 miles out of the way, just to make it home.

The poor dog was traumatized to the point where he wouldn't eat, and tried to hide. Last word on him was that he is coming around and starting to do his job. It has to be rough on him, but he'll make it.

Kali (the niece) had a nice graduation. I told her before hand to "not be nervous, and loose a shoe or something".

Little did she know that, while her SHOES stayed put, her hat and tassel didn't. They had part of the ceremony where the grads went out to give their mothers and grand mothers roses. Kali hugged her grandma, and her hat got knocked off. She picked it up, then made it all of the way back to the stage before she found out that her tassel was still on the floor! She was shook up by it (in a good way) and was still giggling about it several minutes later.

She was still "flustered" by it when, a few minutes later, she received her diploma, and turned to wrong way after getting it.

It will be something to remember her graduation day by, and ad a little "levity" to the event.

Monday morning, we loaded the truck up, and headed home. We ended up with the bottle babies, one LGD pup, two nannies in milk, a Boer Billy, 4 ducks, two Doxies, three kittens, and us - along with all of the "support items".

We stopped at the feed store and added 4 bags of goat feed. We had a piece of card board to put under it on the "roof" of the stock racks, but found out it was just a LITTLE too small. After we had it loaded and were tying it down, Deb pointed out that Sassy was trying to open one. I looked over and, sure enough, Sassy had a hold of one of the "ribbons" used to open the bags.

It would have been a "gold mine" if she would have kept at it. As it was, the goats went nuts as soon as they smelled the food. We ended up getting some more cardboard and making SURE they couldn't get at the bags!

It was a long, slow trip back home - we had to stop a few places on the way home, too, but everyone was glad to be back once we got here. We unloaded all of the critters as soon as we could, and got our "stuff" into the house.

All of the "home" goats, were glad to see us, and - naturally - wanted fed. The grass had been growing WILDLY since we left, but the small pasture they were in was getting pretty thin. It was amazing, even my brother's yard was about tall enough to cut and bale.

Tuesday, I figured that I better get the driveway blocked off at both ends so they could have some better grass. They all watched me from their side of the fence while I worked. Every once-in-awhile, they would "beg" for grass. I obliged by cutting an arm load, and tossing it over the fence.

It was also my lovely wife's birthday, so I made her steak for supper. Our neighbor's also stopped over in the evening with a cake for her, and a card.

I ended up finishing the driveway this morning, so now I have happy goats. One of them kept "nudging" me as I was trying to open the fence. She knew what I was doing since she saw me start yesterday (she remembered from last year...), and wanted me to hurry.

Here is a photo of some of them - and Yani - on the driveway:



There are more photo HERE.

Now, I have to go MOW.......