And The Hell Continues

 I know it must seem to you all that I spend a lot of my blogging time trashing my husband, but honestly, if he wasn't such a complete dipshit sometimes I wouldn't have to write about him.  I love  him  to pieces but have fallen into this rut where I teeter totter in and out of LIKE with him.  Does anyone else have that problem ?  

I have just realized recently that my skills are horribly under-appreciated...  I went up to the barn the other day to clean the office and make it cozier for Robert to spend his nights in...now, he tends to do everything short of standing on his head to keep me from going to the barn, not because he is concerned for my health but because it is always a frigging pig sty and he doesn't want to get yelled at....  anyway this time was no different....I get there and OMG... there are empty cat/dog food bags laying everywhere, dead flies on every flat surface...still there from the summer... every piece of paper that ever entered the office is still there  but just laying all over, the bulletin board where important things like the list of cows to calf on what day...is so full of tractor parts tacked to it and god damned labels from bags of salt he fed during the summer that the list of cows to calf is just laying on the shelf...with two big coffee cup ring stains on it already and he only took it up there two days ago... there are empty wiener packages laying on the counter...from months ago...empty cans, empty oil containers, nails, crap crap crap...and more crap...so I roll up my sleeves and start by clearing the garbage off the counter...I had hoped to vacuum the dead flies and straw off of everything..but Robert came in started taking things out of my hands...and generally whining so finally I just used my arm to sweep all the crap onto the floor...(overly dramatic I know)  set out the tags...and calving book and proceeded to tag the new baby calves...when I was done...I pissily, put my coat back on, grabbed my gloves and said, "fine, live like a pig ...but just so you know...this is how hoarders get started"....and walked to the house....so the barn is still a sty and it drives me insane every time I go up there but it has now become a point of contention between us...and I refuse to waste even one more breath complaining about the mess....(I never said I would quit blogging about it though)  hahaha   I have considered putting up a sign, a disclaimer, stating that I have nothing to do with the state of those premises.....It is just typical of his entire life I have come to think... he is so scattered and unorganized that everything around here is half ass done...  I can't help but feel though, that it is partly my fault...because it really became more evident since I got sick... without my pair of hands out there to help he is floundering...badly...he wastes time doing stupid shit that could wait..and the important things don't get done or he just jimmy rigs them...

We lost another calf today, that makes three now...and unlike the first two where there was a legitimate reason for them dying this one is solely to blame on work not getting done... so, even though I feel like crap and am having a horrible winter, I have decided to drag my sorry ass outside tomorrow and try to help with the work...I think I will get him to fire up the CAT for me and push some snow...God knows there is so much of it that even the cows don't want to walk in it.  The cow that calved today layed on her new baby...because it was the only spot that the snow was trampled down...it has been years since we have had a cow lay on her calf...and it really pisses me off.  No excuse for it other than the snow needs to be moved...so the cows have more room to lay around.... See, we keep them up in a corral near the barn at night...but during the day while Robert is putting fresh straw out for bedding and putting feed in the feeders he lets the cows out into a pen in front of the house...but since we had all this bloody snow....the only place the snow is packed down is where he has spread a bale of greenfeed.  (baled oats) otherwise they have to wade through four feet of snow. 

So snow removal is my plan for the morrow.   Now Robert has decided to take a twin calf that another cow had last night and transplant it on to the cow that killed her calf...hopefully it won't be too big a battle to convince her to take someone else's calf.  some will take one no problemo and others fight till the bitter end and Robert loses patience with them and puts the hobbles on...so they can't kick... I feel bad for the little calf...one minute he has a loving mommy and sibling and the next he's put in a pen with a bitter, depressed bitch that wants to plaster him to the wall...but in all the years we have been doing this (33 yrs now) we have only ever had to pail feed one calf, that the calfless cow just refused to take...needless to say she didn't get to stay here...we kept the calf and pail fed it and shipped the stubborn cow.  When all else fails we pull out the OLD SPICE aftershave....hahaha   a couple of drops of that on the cows nose and the calf and within a couple of days they are a pair...it's all the cow can smell so she can't tell if the calf in the pen with her is hers or some one Else's.   The only draw back to that plan is that we have to smell it right along with her....yuk...but even at that there is a silver lining...it covers up the smell of cat urine, from the TOM cat spraying in the barn...

On another note:  for those of you who have been to my house...you might recall the dead skeletal remains of a once lovely Ficus tree that I have standing on my deck just outside of our dining room window...the one with the lovely little bird nests in it...Well, I am sad to say that I will be looking for a new crafty display for that area of the deck due to the damned kitten who lives on our deck (question is for how much longer) He takes extreme pleasure in climbing my brittle branched ficus tree and has destroyed the robin's nest already, and in the past few days has broken all the lower branches completely off the tree...and just this morning his mother.....the retarded cat...leapt into her second childhood by climbing the damned thing too and totally stripped the remaining branches from it...the two culprits together then proceeded to shred the two little chickadee nests that were still in the tree....beyond recognition... I might add. So I have had thrust home to me, rather abruptly, once again, why I dislike cats hanging around the house...especially kittens...I had forgotten just how destructive they are..but now I remember.  I have enlisted Robert in helping me lure these cats up to the barn where all the other cats reside.  They get milk and food there so they won't suffer...in fact they will be far better off up there, because if they wreck even one more thing here at the house I am going to pull out the pellet gun... I'll be sure and keep you posted ...on how we make out with that project.