The Goat Of Thunder
I am wearing woolly socks. The temperature has fallen rather dramatically. From heatwave to 10-15 degrees. It even rained yesterday. That’s the Danish summer for you.
Wasn’t too good a day, yesterday. I had some kind of attack of the futility of the same day after day after day after.. I fell into bed and slept most of the early day. And then went to bed early in the evening. Much sleep. When I am feeling down, the bed is always very tempting.
Today was better. I went to the playground and met a new friend. Allow me to introduce Thor:
A beautiful, young buck. I’m not sure how long he will be staying: Kurt brought him. He said that Thor “was going to be made into sausages originally”. But he was too sweet and friendly so Kurt didn’t have the heart to do it after all. Instead he brought him to the playground. He’s going to see if he can find someone to buy him, but if that doesn’t happen then he’ll stay at the playground.
A sweet, little fella. He’s not very old. From September. That surprised me. He’s as big as Vanilje, if not bigger. Having him around will mean more kids in due time as well. That would be something.
As said, he’s very friendly. He does seem to have a bad habit of using his horns a lot, though. He did on me, anyway. Not butting. But just sort of pushing his head against my legs. As I was sitting on the bench.
It’s nothing too bad, though. Maybe he’s trying to gain some respect. He’s the new leader of the gang of course. I’m not sure Magnethe is too happy about that. She complained loudly when he asserted his dominance every now and then. I think she was getting used to being the boss. She’s older and bigger than the buck, but he still takes charge.
There Thor is investigating my bag. The other goats would nibble and chew on it, but he was grinding his horns against it. He seems to like using his horns a lot.
Good scratches.
The trees had been trimmed recently. Lots of nice branches with fresh leaves for the goats. Saad and a couple of other boys were picking big branches from the ground outside the goat fold and then hanging them over the fence. He was proud that he had made a little “secret cave” under the branches, for the goats. It’s not going to stay secret for long though, the leaves will be picked clean soon enough.
Thor coming back out through the hatch. He’s still getting used to his new surroundings of course. Checking everything out.
And using my arm as a foot-rest. Hoof-rest, I mean.
Kurt (and Per behind him) checking on the goats.
So that was nice. A new goat friend and getting to talk to Kurt for a little. Much better for me than spending the day in bed.
June 13th, 2008 at 2:40
Well, isn’t Thor a cute little goat! So friendly, too. Sausages?! How awful. I knew there was a reason I don’t like sausages.
Thor looks like he has some fluffy white back legs.
How’s Kurt doing these days? Did he just bring Thor out to the playground? I didn’t think Kurt was back to work yet?
Hope you’re feeling better today.
June 13th, 2008 at 5:20
SAUSAGES!!!??
Obsolutely not!
So I hope Thor gets to stay at the playground forever.
No one should buy him.
And being outdoors really does help; whether it’s sunny or cloudy, rainy or snowing. I guess being in the big wide outside is the key.
How are you doing Debster with the flooding? I’ve been watching the news and the terrible rains, tornados and the awful flooding that’s going on in the midwest.
I guess that’s the same as the fires we get out here in California.
I swear I think the earth is telling us that it’s hurting and that we should take of it better.
At least Plume and the animals are far away from all the natural disasters we seem to get all the time.
June 13th, 2008 at 22:12
Debster – I’d certainly prefer him as a goat rather than as sausages. Funny you should mention the fluffy legs. We talked about that. Kurt, Crazy Chicken Guy and I. He gets them from his mother. You can’t really tell by the pictures but he’s got a sort “mane” or something, along his back, too. From his mother as well.
Kurt is doing pretty well I think. He’s back to work, but with a limited schedule so he doesn’t get stress again. It’s nice to see him again, every once in a while.
LuisLemmings – Don’t worry, the sausages are out of the question now. If Kurt finds a buyer for him then it will be as a pet or for breeding or something like that. Maybe another playground looking for a buck. But no sausages. And far away from natural disasters. Denmark is a nice place like that.
June 14th, 2008 at 3:26
Plume: I looked at Thor’s pictures again and I did see his mane! What a pretty goat he is. Glad the sausages are out of the picture.
LuisLemmings: Yes, everywhere you look there is water. We had a storm and a little over 2 inches of rain Thursday night. We are okay here, except having to wade out to the goat pen. But the goatzies are all okay, too.
Those pictures of Cedar Rapids are terrible. Some places have 8 feet of water. Cedar Rapids is about 100 miles away from us.
Where we’ve been working at Ye Olde Country Church has been sandbagging in their small town. We all base our bad flooding on 1993 and some of the predictions are getting within a few feet of that.
They’re shutting down barge traffic on the Mississippi River, re-routing some Amtrack train routes (travelers board buses), and hoping some of the bridges don’t have to close over the Mighty Miss.
I think they are predicting the flood crest to be next Wednesday. We’re to get more rain/storms on Sunday (Father’s Day). Good thing we have some inside painting to do. The weather isn’t cooperating for anything outside.