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Thursday, January 14, 2010

From Whence I Came III

Recently my mother sent this email to my sisters and me, reminiscing about some of the bucolic joys of farm life.

Besides the cows, horses, and kids, I forgot about Junior, the bane of my existence. Junior was Katy's bull calf from the previous year, possibly the ugliest and most obnoxious animal we ever owned. He was of mixed Jersey, Tarantais, and Shorthorn lineage, with the worst traits of all. Red coat, both brindle-striped and roan, crooked horns, Jersey eye-rings,  sleigh feet and ham-hocked.


 I wound up in the hospital overnight with an intestinal problem and had told Granny, when I dumped you kids on her at 5:00 am, to call Lee to look after the livestock, since he knew the routine.


At the time there was a California doctor who had a herd of registered Hereford cows pastured across the road by Coffey's barn. The next morning I was much recovered and wondering if I could parlay the hospital stay into another day of R&R when Lee came in, glared at me and said "I'm gonna kill that Junior, he was down there bulling in the doctor's cows." Junior had squat-jumped our five foot fence, got in with the registered Herefords, and, well, you can imagine. Lee and Mike Baker had spent a good part of the day getting him out, and they were both sore at me, as well as him. Anyway, I freaked out, jumped out of bed in my hospital gown (to Lee's maidenly distress) got dressed and signed myself out of the hospital. So much for R&R. Junior was safely in the freezer by the time the doctor moved his cows, but I always wondered how his calves turned out.Lots of hybrid vigor, no doubt.
love
Mom

Later, Mom sent an addendum.

Speaking of Mike, he had a real grudge against Junior, so when we had him butchered and the slaughterman asked me if I wanted the testes dressed out ("It's a real delicacy" he said) I said No at first and then Yes indeed, and duly presented them to Mike. He was pleased and said they were excellent.

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