Snow and birthday parties and walks in the woods

Happy Valentine's Day!  As you can see from the picture, there is not much farming going on in the fields right now.  We had just a spritz of winter weather this past weekend.  It actually started Friday night and the wind howled and the snow blew around.  Saturday morning I got to drag the water bucket through knee high drifts on the way to the barns.  Mike asked me how much it snowed and I could honestly answer "I don't know" even though I had been working outside for a bit.  Some spots the wind had scoured the lawn almost clean of snow and in other spots there were those knee high drifts.  When I left to go to work at the clinic, only 1/2 of the road was plowed.  OK, is this some kind of Murphy's Law corollary or something?  It seems like 80% of the time, the half that isn't plowed is the half that I have to drive on.  Fortunately my new miniSUV seems to be handling the snow just fine although it really hasn't been tested all that much this winter. 

The wind died down just a titch by Sunday morning.  Enough so that I could snowblow the driveway without it drifting all back in although I did look pretty near to a snowman by the time I was done with all the snow blowing back on top of me.  Then I took the dogs for a quick trip around the "yard" but there were no bunnies out and about for them to sniff out.  The snow was just too fluffy and deep yet.

After that it was off to a birthday party for my niece's 3 year old daughter.  If any of my family reads this PLEASE don't take this the wrong way, but there is seriously a reason why Mike and I have no kids.  The best was when one of the other kids (who I did not know her or her parents at all) walked up to where I set my plate of pizza down on the coffee table (I was sitting RIGHT next to it) and just started picking the pepperoni off MY pizza on MY plate.  Hello???? Parents???? Your kid has walked over and is eating off MY plate!!!  My insides were wanting to scream "get your f'ing hands off my plate" but since I don't use the "f" word, I just sat there to see what would happen.  I looked over at my niece who was watching all this and the two of us just busted out laughing.  FINALLY the parents woke out of whatever coma they were in and retrieved their kid and escorted her away from my food.  Fortunately I am about the least germophobic person when it comes to my food and the little fingers that had been playing with my food didn't seem to affect the taste at all.  mmmmmm!  And so it was fun seeing everyone, but I really don't want to make child birthday parties a regular event.

Monday is my regular day off from the clinic, but this Monday was my monthly date at the local animal shelter.  I worked about 4 hours in the morning doing spays and neuters on dogs and cats.  I think we got about 13 animals done in those 4 hours so that wasn't too bad a morning's work.  Then it was home for lunch and to get the beagles out of the house for a long run.  Having ANOTHER blue sky day to play outside was an unbelievable treat.  There are two more weeks of rabbit season left and so I did take the gun along, but didn't load it right away.  The dogs made their obligatory stop at the burn pile that never seems to get burned.  This thing is a fortress for rabbits and groundhogs to live in.  Someday we will actually burn this pile and those critter will have to find a new home.  For now, there is no way for any predator to get in there so the bunnies have a nice safe haven.  The beagles do love to climb around on it and sniff though.  The dogs and I finally made it to the back of the field.  Right on the edge of our property and our neighbor's property are a bunch of tree tops that are laying down from when our neighbor's logged out their woods a couple years ago.  GREAT rabbit habitat.  The dogs ran over in the tree tops and I set my gun against a tree and decided to go get them.  I spent a good 30 minutes or more crawling around in those downed branches.  It was great exercise, but I had the feeling it might be just a tad too much exercise.  I must be psychic or something because every muscle in my body is sore today.   Well, after a bit, the dogs did find a rabbit.  It took awhile to get the rabbit moving out of the tree tops, but finally it ran into our "swampy area".   I had extracted my body from the tree tops, found my gun, loaded it and found a nice place to stand.  I played a couple word games on my phone.  At last the rabbit came by.  No shot the first time.  I was more ready the second time, but just because I was more ready doesn't really mean anything.   I took one shot and of course missed.  The chase continued a little while longer, but eventually we had to head home as the sun was setting.  We were probably out and about for close to 3 hours. They were REALLY sleepy last night, but are back to normal today.  I on the other hand am moving quite slowly.

As you can see there is way more playing than farming these winter days.  Mike did spend a good bit of time this weekend sitting at the dining room table staring at seed catalogs and punching the keys on the calculator.  Every so often he would sigh.  It is a challenge figuring out just how much seed to order.   He needs to order enough to cover demand, but yet too much would be a waste.  *sigh*  He does this every year.  *grin*