Too skinny, too skinny, too skinny, Not Too Skinny. She said.
The last of course, was a finger pointed at Oatcake.
We’d already taken them out for a five point five mile hike earlier without any real incident before the vet’s visit to the house. The goats were good around cars and good around dogs and good in general. The only thing that gave us a real start was when we found a guy wandering around with a leash and no dog and asked us if we’d seen one. We hadn’t, but we sure looked really hard for one after that.
The vet was a kind woman who smiled a lot and had the appropriate shots of selenium and vitamin E booster and vaccinations and knew a lot about Everything Except What We Needed-To-Know.
Like what they weighed. (We don’t have a scale – take them to Carson Valley Vet and walk them over the one they use for Great Danes). And how much water we needed to pack for them per day. (I’ll check with some packers and email you). And how many pounds of hay pellets they need per day in the desert. (Again with the emailing).
But she did their hooves and said otherwise everyone looked healthy. They just needed to eat more. A lot more.
Audrey dropped by right when the vet was leaving. Just to say hi to her boy Oatcake and give him little head scratchies. The plumber was at Mom’s house too.
By then there was so much commotion with the goats and the vet and Audrey and the plumber, we didn’t realize the vet for Daisy had come and gone and rang the doorbell and everything since everyone was all over the place. So he had to reschedule and then the goat vet left, and then Audrey left, and then the plumber left, and then it was so quiet with the wind blowing and the sun sunning…
We untied the goats one by one from the barn with their new fancy leads Sophie had just purchased for them. Black and white for Sharkey, teal and white for Jon Snow to match his saddle pad and bags, tan and white for Oatcake to match his coat, and black for Bosco…because he seems a little goth.
We stopped at Cal-Ranch on the way home to buy some black oil sunflower seeds and calf manna supplements for the goats as requested by the vet. To fatten them up.
So nobody is too skinny by the time we hit the trail.
And that day is sneaking up on us pretty quickly.