Blog Therapy

Its been a tough week.

Saturday a single chick hatched a day early. She lived for about a half hour then died.

Sunday we celebrated my grandfather's 90th birthday (a good thing) which meant we weren't going to be around for our other chicks to hatch. I found an "egg sitter", but no eggs hatched at all.

Monday the internet went out. Try as I might to get it up a running, nothing worked. I didn't have the ambition to sit on the phone with Bright House for an hour while they went through all the diagnostic stuff that I've already learned to do to get it working again so I left it. Later during the day another chick hatched, but no more after that.

Tuesday we started a second, adjacent paper route. This, again, is a good thing as its helping us with some extra finances, but it made for a late night as we're learning the route.

Wednesday night (after getting precious little done on account of trying to recoop from a lack of sleep due to the paper route) we came home, again rather late, to find our chick was dead. I really thought since she had made it this long that she was in the clear. Didn't quite know what to do with a single chick, but we had some ideas. But, alas, she died.

Thursday my in-laws took Gloria for a day. She and they had a great time. Right before my "quiet moments" were about to end I called Bright House... and my internet was working. Not at all for almost 4 days then, viola, no problem. A huge thunderstorm came through. I unplugged the baby goats fencing so they wouldn't get shocked through wet ground then we left for the evening.

This morning Randy went out to take the garbage out and noticed the goat kids were still unplugged. He also only saw one goat. He looked closer and found 2 down. He came in and got me and we discovered Carob either freshly dead or totally comatose and Cocoa listless, but responsive. To make a long, sad, story short, he ended Carob's life if there was life to end. Cocoa is doing better now, after lots of rubbing and babying, but is far from normal. She's acting drunk. She staggers when she walks (but she's walking). She'll only drink milk from a bottle (but she's drinking). She wobbles over to a corner and sticks her head in it and stands there. The assumption we and everyone we talked to is that the storm, a normal Florida thunderstorm, put them into shock. Lightening probably struck rather close, maybe gave them a jolt. Neither of them were in a sheltered spot when we found them, though shelter was totally available to them. We don't know what happened. I'm really upset over Carob and just wondering what to do now for Cocoa. Wednesday is fine. She's back with the mamas as another storm is supposed to come through today. Cocoa is in the porch giving me ample evidence that she's not sick (poop pellets are everywhere). I'm supposed to be mowing the lawn, but frankly, all this has set me way behind schedule and mowing will have to wait... I needed a dose of blog therapy. Now I get to clean my house and try to get more milk down Cocoa. Maybe clean up a few of her puddles. I'm glad to have puddles to clean... just wish I had Carob's puddles too. She was such a sweetie. I miss her already.