Cull cattle: a reminder of why farmers don't carry sidearms.

Dad and I loaded up five cull animals today and took them to the stockyards. Good times. It was all that truck wanted to do to pull that trailer with a 1400 lb cow and four 800-900 pound feeder calves. That’s at least the very approximate eyeball figures Dad and I guesstimated on the way over. It was sad to see one of my older cows go, she was, I think, a third generation of mine out of the first two cows I bought back in 1998 or 1999. But she lost a calf two or three years in a row and we just flat didn’t have enough hay to feed her fat ass again. She eats more than the nursing mommas do and is twice as mouthy. I usually feel worse about selling them right after than I do when I get home and look at whose left and realize how much better the herd (and we!) are without the culls. And after this year with freezer beef, plus the eight (count ‘em eight!) up and coming feeder calves for 2010-11, the last thing we needed was those three annoying steers eating us out of the house and busting gates. Hopefully we can build up some beef clientele over the next few years and sell directly to buyers instead of sending calves across the scales. Anyone interested in grass-fed freezer beef feel free to contact me! :-) Gotta get my plugs in where I can, right?

I’ve been down kinda sick today, stomach thing again. This is getting really old. It would at least chap my ass a little less if I could get some work done while I feel like shit. Hopefully I can get some pages tonight. I started A Lick of Frost by Laurell K. Hamilton two nights ago. It’s really good. Of course, can we expect less? Dana is encountering Anita Blake for the first time (second time?) in The Laughing Corpse. So far, the anti-horror girl is entranced. One thing about Hamilton, it might seem gross to those of us not into horror, but the characters keep ya comin’ back for more. I’ve kinda got a weird backlog of half-started books right now. Since the writing is going so piss poor, I ought to take some time and give one or two a decent start. We’ll see if I can concentrate better tonight now that I’m no longer writhing on the couch wimpering. (Yes, I’m well aware that that deserves a good (cough) pussy! Bite me. And have a nice day.)