If It Fits, It Ships!

This morning while I was outside weeding my garden, my almost adult teenage daughter (who was doing the A.M chores) hollered for me to come. I immediately stopped what I was doing because I knew that "something" was up (she never calls for me).  When I got there, she told me that our yearling Boer Goat Buck had passed on over night.

There he was, bloated, feet up, and dead as a door nail.  This wasn't a big shocker to her and I, for we both knew before hand that something had been up with him. He had been listless, and lacking overall vigor for quite some time.  Other then being dull, he wasn't showing any other signs of illness.  Not to mention, all of the other goats are very happy and healthy.

Upon spying my "A.D.D" (All Done Dancing) goat, my initial reaction to my daughter was to jokingly ask "Oh My! How much dewormer DID you give him yesterday??"  After that quick bout of humor, I learned that the drug/dose wasn't anything out of the ordinary. 

Then my mind started to reel, and I started to think: Great, NOW what do I do with him?? He's big, and it's already close to 90 degrees out! *I'm* not digging THAT hole!

And in the near distance I heard my answer...

Luckily, Fridays are our garbage collection day, and on our street I heard the garbage truck approaching.  I told my daughter to quickly run to the end of our driveway and grab the can. And so she went. (Well, er.. about as quick as a 17 year old generally moves - like molasses on a cold winter day!) In the meantime, I started to drag this adult, over 150 lb stiff goat up from the lower field, through the backyard, heading toward the driveway.  What a challenge this was!  Because I was pulling his back legs, every pull by me made his horns plow the earth like a Farrow Plow, creating a drag.  

Meanwhile, the garbage truck was just a few houses away, creeping ever closer with each passing second. My mind was starting to race with panicky thoughts;  If I don't get THIS goat in THAT can TODAY- it will be stuck here another 8 days! (collection is delayed a full day due to a Holiday during the pick-up week)

To ad to my frustration, my daughter came back WITHOUT the garbage can and said; "The garbage man hasn't come yet, so I didn't bring the can" (LOVE the mentality of teenage kids! *NOT*) I of course replied with a "DUH!" (My plan was to get that goat inside of it BEFORE the garbage man came.)  I sent her off yet again to quickly fetch the can.

When she returned empty handed for the SECOND time-she proceeded to tell me that the can was full. ARRRRR! So I said: "Fine! We will wait for him to empty it, THEN we will load the goat into it, and THEN I will drag it across the street and wait for him to come."

And that's what we did! 

That goat was SO heavy that her and I could barely pick it up and put it in the over 4' tall automated garbage can!  Once we finally managed, I wheeled the can across the street. I sat on the shoulder of the road with it and waited....

While I waited, I kept thinking to myself what if he see's that it's not garbage the automated arm is dumping into his truck?  Then I had an idea.  I left the can sit and quickly ran back across the street to the garage, grabbed some garbage and threw it on top to try and "hide" the little bugger, and waited. 

As he pulled up, he looked at me wryly as if to wonder what the Hell I was doing standing on the side of the road with my garbage can he had JUST emptied a few moments ago.  As I looked at him I was instantly wondering how on earth I was going to pull this off?  I kept envisioning feet flying through the air into his mobile rubbish bin!  This is NEVER going to work! 

And so I did what any female with half a brain cell in her head would have done... 

I turned on my CHARM!  Granted, as much "Charm" as I could muster up in the very early A.M, wearing my PJ's, while standing on the opposite side of the road, with a dead goat in a garbage can.

I knew as long as he kept his focus on me, and NOT the flying feet flipping out of my can into his mobile bin, this should go smoothly.  With that, I worked my magic... The first thing out of his mouth to me was; "Didn't I just empty this can?" And I replied: "Oh please take my garbage again. I am SO sorry to make you have to do this a second time. I REALLY feel bad for putting you behind schedule. But with the Holiday weekend coming up, I just didn't want this to sit here a week and an extra day with this hot weather".  

And with that plea (or whine, kinda depends on how you look at it!), he was nice enough to empty it a second time.

Never once did I break eye contact with him and look at the flying goat. A person's natural reaction is to look in the direction you are looking, and if I looked at the can being emptied, so would he. Once the can was safely back on the ground I Thanked him again, and was on my way. 

Whew! That was a close one! Hey, I didn't lie to him, it really DID need to go.  But I didn't offer up any incriminating information either! 

Now I know most of you are thinking how disgusting to throw a dead animal of "larger size" into our local landfill. But in my defense, let me mention a few things.  I had previously checked our County's Waste Management Website just to make sure I wasn't breaking any laws.  There are plenty of things listed that you cannot throw away, but fortunate for me livestock and dead animals were not listed.  Second, this is organic matter. Way less of an evil then most everyday household rubbish. And lastly, the local landfill is where most livestock goes when you hire a commercial hauler. Here in my community dead horses, and cows with antibiotics that cannot be a food source ("food source" for things like Mink farms) get tossed away to decompose at the local landfill.

All I can say is Thank You God for Automated Garbage Collection! .... If it fits, it ships :)