TGIF

Well, this post was started on Friday... but life as we know it took over. So, how about we call it TGLWIO. Thank God Last Week Is Over.

This last week and weekend has been a little busy. Just a little. I feel like a 50 year old woman... tired, cranky, menopausal.

Ok, maybe not the last one, but my body does feel like it's been through hell.

Last Monday came and went just like every other day here on the ranch. We branded. Sorted. Checked preg dates. The weather's starting to get a little warmer, so my Texas man is slowly melting...

Tuesday turned into a semi busy day. It started out like every other day. Started branding in the morning, and I went to lunch smelling like cow flesh, smoke, and manure.

Mmmm. Sexy.

Later in the day, my mom got a call from a broker who we know from auctions. He had a buyer coming out from Pennslyvania.

The pair was supposed to arrive at our ranch at 2 p.m. that day to look at some cows. 

2 p.m. turned into 5 p.m.

 5 p.m. turned into 6 p.m.

And they finally showed up around 6:30 p.m. 

Everyone on the ranch was anxiously awaiting the arrival of the cow buying pair, even these two -

Once the fellas arrived, everyone worked out in the pens, going thru cows until dark.

 And after dark.

Pennslyvania man told us he'd be back Thursday to pick out two loads which is approximately 76 Springers..

Springers are Mama Cows for those who have not been following along... :)

We all had an auction down south in Hanford to go to the next day, so that's why they told us they'd be back on Thursday. In the dark, we all headed back to my mom's house for some pizza and a cold one. Or two.

Little did we know, the week of madness had just begun...

Wednesday morning came a little early, more specifically, about 5:20 a.m. I jumped outta bed all bright eyed.

Ha, sike!

After a few cups of joe, I could at least pretend to have my eyelids open.

The herdsman and I filled up the trailer tires with air, packed on 14 Springers (see: ABOVE), picked up my momma, and we were on our way down to Hanford. A nice little three hour jaunt with the cowsies. I drove. I love my new black beast.

When we finally made it to the first livestock yard, we unloaded the mamas, including my own mama, and I got to drive around the auction's little 4 wheel drive cart otherwise known as a "Gator". Since we now had a 30 foot trailer attached to our truck, we couldn't just zip on back to the corrals where the potential new cows would be located.

After looking at the first auction's cows, we headed on over to the next auction down the road. Quite literally, a mile down the road. We checked out what they had to sell over there, and then we giddy up'ed back on over to the first auction which always starts first.

The herdsman and I sat through the sale there to watch our Mamas sell, and then we waited on my phone to ring to know if my Mom bought any cows over at the second auction.

And we waited.

And we waited, for what seemed like eternity. Especially since we drank all the water in our truck, and the auction's kitchen had closed up.

Finally, we heard from my mom, and my uncles dropped her off at the auction we were at.

We didn't bring any new baby cows back, but we did buy the Gator.

Ha, sike!!! We didn't buy the gator, but we did buy 106 new little heifers to bring back home.

So, being that we brought the new rig, and 106 little cows a little bit too much to pack on one semi truckload, I brought some back in our trailer.

So, the madness begins.

It seemed simple enough to pull up to the chute to load the cows. I was, of course, nervous to back up the rig for the first time somewhere other than our ranch in front of a bunch of auction workers..

but they had to make it even more difficult on me by having me back up first in one corner...

and then decide I needed to back up to another corner...

and when they finally decided that I was in the right part of the yard...

they forgot that they had mixed all of our cows together...

which caused a headache because we had to separate 106 of them again...

before 20 of them could be loaded on my trailer...

and the other 86 on the semi...

Ay caramba!

So, after an hour dillydallying around the auction yard in Hanford, we headed back home.

Three hours later, we were all very excited to be back home.

Back home in the comfort of a lighted house, pipes full of water, and dinner on the table...

Ha, ssssiiiiikkkeee!!!!

Texas and my little sister had informed my mom on the way home that our ranch had lost power.

The ranch had conveniently lost power during The Texas Man's cooking hour in which he started cooking for us a delicious meal of:

Chicken Fried Deer Steak

Fresh Broccoli

BBQ Jalapeno Poppers

accompanied by Sam Adams Cherry Wheat beer

When our ranch loses power, we lose the phone, light, internet, and the water. The most important of those being the water because not only are we without water, but so are the cows. We may be able to go a few hours without water, but pregnant mama cows can't!

My mom called PG&E while we were on the road, so she could report the outage. Previous outages have proved to be not a problem for our neighbors who fail to report outages, so it's always my mom to be the one to call in. She figured this way the power would be on by the time we got home which would mean cows, old and new, would have water to drink.

Luckily, the power did come on right about the time we arrived home. We put the cows away, and we all went to bed, happy and full of deer steak.

Ha, sike!!!!!

The power came back on, but for some reason, the water hadn't turned back on. While my mom and the herdsman attempted to get the water turned back on, Texas started back on dinner which he was preparing for all of us.

Unfortuantely, the water problem didn't get better. My mom and the herdsman spent a good 30-45 minutes in the dark trying to turn the water back on. At 8:30 p.m., my mom had to call the "water guy" who came out to fix our situation instantly... and he flicked the "reset" button, and the ranch's water turned back on in a flash.

............

No sike there folks.

Apparently, we had a "brownout" which meant the power didn't fully go off at first, so the water pump had turned itself off to prevent damage. It just needs someone to turn it back on or push the "reset" button inside this handy little box by my house.

Everyone called it quits after that aorund 9 p.m., and Texas and I sent a plate home with my little sister to give to my mom after she got done with the water guy.

Phew. Wednesday, check.

Let Thursday begin!!

We expected the Pennslyvania buyer Thursday morning at 8 a.m. to go through cows to buy. Since he only planned on buying two truckloads, we figured it would take him no more than two hours to pick out some Springers. We set up the Brand Inspection at 10 a.m. with this is mind.

A Brand Inspection is needed everytime we sell a cow, whether it be to an auction or to an outside buyer. Auctions hire their own B.I.'s, so we don't have to worry about calling a B.I. unless we are doing a private sale.

Back to Thursday morning. The buyer showed up late again. Fortunately, only 20 minutes late instead of 4.5 hours.

Anyways, the two hours we had set aside to pick cows turned out to be nowhere near long enough. In fact, the buyer decided to buy three truckloads instead of two which means 116 cows instead of 76. The increase in cows along with the fact that the buyer handpicked every cow out of 300 cows led to our long day. Along with the Brand Inspector, we were out sorting through cows from 8:20 a.m. until about 12:00 p.m. Instead of going to lunch, we all ran around like a teeny bopper in Los Angeles, and we got the cows ready to ship out. By 2 p.m., we had sent out two thirds of the cattle.

Have fun in Pennslyvania girls! While the day was much shorter in length than Wednesday was, it felt just as long if not longer. We barely had time to grab a drink of water in those six hours, nonetheless think.

We spent the rest of the day sleeping. Seriously. All day. Texas and I woke up long enough to feed our animals and ourselves and go back to bed.

Thursday, check.

Friday was a little less hectic with my day starting out by dropping off some cows at the auction in Turlock. The rest of the morning was relatively calm. At 2 p.m., we had the vet come out to take care of shots and legality matters for the other 40 head of Springers waiting to ship to Pennslyvania. After an hour of writing down numbers, ripping off tags, putting on new tags, etc., we were done and just had to wait for the truck to arrive Monday.

Dun dun dunnnnn....

I wish I could say I had a nice, relaxing weekend, but Texas and I had friends come into town that we know from working in Colorado. This is a story for another post, but I can leave you with the knowledge that I can still NOT move after dancing my cowboy boots off on Saturday night for the Oakdale Rodeo.

I thought weekends were for getting rest???

To be continued...