All Things Goaty!

I'm back!  Oh my word, I know it has been a long time since I have blogged.  In fact, some of you may be crying, or even gnashing your teeth with anxiety, wondering what I have been doing.  I, Lucky Nickel, have been organizing things.  Oh yes, it is one of my special talents.  I have many special talents of course, but I can inspire other goats into action.  As it happens, I was visiting a favourite goat blog - by Millie at Eden Hills - and she said that there was "a movement across the goat farming world" and of course, I had to be a part of the movement.  It's possible I started the movement myself...I mean, I'm such a trendsetter...sometimes I start things without even realizing it.  Anyway, I needed to be more involved, since I am a model for other goats.

Yes, so this movement is apparently about goats standing up for peace.  I asked my lady, "Standing up for a piece of what?  Pie??" and she rolled her eyes at me and said "Lucky Nickel, not THAT kind of piece."  Then she furrowed her eyebrows and said "In any event, you are too fat, and may not have pie."

Can you imagine?  She called me fat!  I am not fat!  I am fluffy!  In addition, I have to live outside, or at least in the barn, and the winter is coming, so I need to be well insulated.  Fat....harrumph!!!

I felt it was my duty, then, to have the rest of the goats on the farm all stand up for a piece of pie, errr...I mean, stand up for peace.  So, I told them to do so, and they kind of stood around in a confused group, not being sure what to do.  Sometimes, I really wonder about my fellow caprines.  What is so difficult about standing up for peace?  I had to show them the picture of Marley over at Eden Hills, doing the stand up thing.  I had to stand up myself, even, to show them how to do it, because there was a deep-seated reluctance in the group to do anything at all other than eat and sleep and produce goat berries.  Not the saltiest peanuts in the bag, these goats...

After I did some more explaining, finally, the little goat brain light bulbs began a slow but sputtering glow.  The only way I could manage to encourage them was through the use of some strategically placed attractant.  Here you can see, from left to right, Lotus, Horton and Coffee standing up for peace.  I am in the very front of the picture, just a little bit (accidentally of course) because I had to coordinate the whole event.

After that initial success, we had multiple standing up for peace moments.  Coffee and Horton were really good at it.  My lady said Horton was looking fat too.

Then Lotus managed a semi-standing with Coffee while Horton took a rest.  She can't get as tall as Coffee because Coffee has long gangly Nubian type legs.  Not really something I covet, but she does stand well.

Horton did another stand that I thought was really very energetic and possibly even verging on goat ballet, kind of like Isobelle does, but my lady said "Look at his belly!!" and ruined the artistic moment for me.

Then Misky became distracted by Horton's lovely fybur (yes, that is the correct goat spelling) and there was a loss of focus on the standing matter, and Horton just wanted to show off.

So he pranced about wiggling so that his fybur would look extra curly and special.  That of course made my lady get distracted from the standing too, because she went all googly-eyed over Horton and his fybur and started mumbling incoherently about socks and knitting needles.  I know Horton doesn't want any needles because they are pokey.  If you look at this picture below, and click on it, it will be bigger, and you can see his little curly bits.

So by that point the whole group was off balance and nobody was standing properly and my lady had to go see to the llamas.  She said she would be back in a while, and I had to sit around supervising the other goats because they were so wired about standing and fybur and eating pie and everything.

My lady spent excessive amounts of time cooing over the llamas and giving them neck rubs and other unfair attention, because really it should be lavished upon me, but that is another matter entirely.  She finally came back and I saw her coming over in the oncoming darkness, and I alerted her to a non-conforming behavior.  She was a little confused as she stumbled over in the darkness, nearly tripping on blades of grass and other great distractions.

As she got closer, she saw the infraction for herself.

Misky and Larke were standing on TOP of the goat hut.  Definitely not a sanctioned activity.  The more astute observer would see that they were not alone!

Indeed, they immediately blamed the interloper, and said that he had coerced them into this folly.

At that point, he looked rather affronted and flew out of the goat pen.  Misky and Larke just stood on top of the hut, which is only covered with a tarp, looking sheepish.  Well, goatish, but in a sheepish way.

At that point, Horton and Lotus had to distract my lady by standing up for peace again, or at least doing their best to stand up for something.

Opal got so excited that she couldn't figure out what to do (she gets confused easily) and started doing neck rolls for peace instead.

It's so embarrassing when I am the only smart goat on the farm and I have to watch this sort of thing.

My lady said she thought we'd done quite well with our standing up, at which point I was the one rolling my eyes because she really doesn't have very high standards if she thought this was sufficient.

So I'll be back in the barn, laying on a hay bale, available for consultations or anything else you might need.  Just don't ask me to organize a group of goats.  They're not worth the trouble.