These dang goats are kind of like a marriage.  You spend a lot of time not wanting to be around the other party.  But, you know that you have to do your part or it isn’t going to work.  Throw in some kids and you can feel the responsibility.  Everything has to be done right by all parties or the kids won’t turn out right.  If the kids aren’t right, nobody is right.

Every year at Thanksgiving, I am reminded of this fact.  My parents were married on Thanksgiving in 1970.  I came along in 1971.  They are now nearing 50 years of marriage.  They have raised 3 boys and are now enjoying the grandparent’s role with 5 of those beasts ranging from 26 to 6–Kela, Duke, Jaycee, Kevlee and Jett.  

There are numerous times that all 3 boys can get upset with dad.  However, he was obviously a great teacher, by example, at one thing–marry well.  Not for money. Just marry a woman that is better than you.  All 3 of us meat-headed boys have married well.  Good looking, hard working, great mothers that have enough temper and patience to put up with our crap.  All 3 of these wives have taken cooking lessons from mom–wicked smart move.  

In today’s society, it is hard to stay married.  I’m not judging others if it didn’t work.  I’ve seen plenty of times where there needed to be a parting of the ways.  Trust me.  I am surprised that I haven’t been kicked to the curb yet.  I don’t make many big mistakes, but I can be a pain in the ass to deal with.  I’m sure that my brothers are in the same boat.  Congrats to JQ and Deb for another year closer to a milestone.  And, more importantly, for 3 for 3 sons following the same path.  The combined years of 3 sons married plus mom and dad is starting to near a century.  

I hope that I get rid of the goats before the Dragon Lady gets rid of me.  

I haven’t watched much football.  Just a bit of the Michigan/Ohio State game.  Then I caught the ending of the Penn State game.  I was at Penn State in 1991 when meats judging for Okie State.  We practiced at the Penn State meats lab, which at that time, was just across the road from Happy Valley, Beaver Stadium or whatever else they call that cathedral of college football.  It was several days before a home game for Penn State, but there was already a pile of RVs parked in their spots and lots of people there, getting ready for whatever big game they had that weekend.  Things kind of seem right with Penn State having a good football team again.

I am not in the mood to hunt deer.  I haven’t been for several years.  But, I am in the minority in this part of the world.  I was on a tractor Friday evening.  It was 5 pm.  I was driving just west of the house, right next to a waterway and a fence line.  A big buck jumped up out of the weeds in the waterway and headed East.  I had a great view from the tractor seat.  Really, really good buck.  He ran East for about 10 yards, then decided to jump the fence to the south.  I wish I had a camera.  He jumped, but his front feet caught the top wire and flipped him ass over head.  When he hit the ground on the south side of the fence, he landed on his back.  It was one of those rare nature scenes that you just don’t see very often.  He rolled over, got up and hauled ass.  I just laughed, thinking about all of the hunters, (my family included) that hadn’t seen this buck and didn’t get to see what I saw.  

We had a great Thanksgiving Day.  My parents, brothers and their families converged here south of Fargo.  We also had a few non-related “family” members attend.  You can’t have too many friends and family.  Tammy noticed that her hens didn’t lay as many eggs on Friday.  I think it was the nephew chasing the hens.  I kind of “egged” him into trying to catch a chicken.  There is lots of sidewalk art on the driveway from the nieces and nephew drawing with chalk.  

I will give more thanks when this dang wind subsides.  This has to be the windiest year on record in NW OK.  

I am giving thanks that there is some decent programming on tv.  Lots of college football, another airing of Die Hard, another airing of The Hangover and whoa, wait, there we go, the National Dog Show is on.  I think that I will watch these dogs.  And as I am watching these dogs, I watch the handlers as they trot the dogs around the show ring.  I’m pretty sure that most of these handlers don’t jog very often.  Have a good one.  

I may or may not have mentioned to a person that I would like to get some NuFlor to give a pig.  I know, I know that it isn’t labled for pigs, but it works when Draxxin or Baytril have failed to knock the “barn cough” out of one.  This friend may or may not have mentioned a way to get it.  He told this story.

I went to the vet and said, “I need some Micotil.”  

  The vet asked for what.  

I told him that I had a heifer with foot-rot.  

The vet replied, “Micotil isn’t labeled for foot-rot.”

He then asked, “Well then what the heck (not the actual words used, but) is Micotil labeld for?”

The vet replied, “Pneumonia.”

He then said, “Well, this heifer dang sure has pneumonia but she also has a real bad limp.”  

I’m not against paying attention to off-label drug use, but….   Because of research costs, most drugs are only labeled for a few select items.  Banamine is used in all species, by some/most vets, but it isn’t labeled for pigs, sheep or goats. The $s to research withdrawals, etc. in goats and sheep aren’t worth the sales.  These VFD are going to change the way some business is done. No matter what, there will be more paperwork.  On the vet side, feed sales side and producer side.  Huhnh?!  Smells like more government waste to me.  Somebody will have a job checking up on VFDs at feed dealers. Somebody else will have a job checking on Vet Clinics.  Somebody else will have…. I think that I will stop.  I have a headache.  It will be a PITA but we’ll learn to live with it.  Or we will all just end up being Florida alligator farmers.  IDK.

that I have been looking for.  The to-do list is longer than it needs to be and it is now time to take care of personal stuff.  There isn’t much of a chance of rain, but we would take one.  

The only day better than today is tomorrow.  Or the next day.  I have to smoke a turkey on that day.  Can’t wait.  

There are several things around this piece of paradise that are borderline USELESS.  First and foremost, the item that has been useless is a 15 year old son.  He is now working to rectify this problem.  I think back to my brothers at this age and wonder how our parents didn’t smother them with a pillow.  I’m real sure that I didn’t cause any problems.  

I have a couple of bucks standing around here right now, that feel useless.  I’m only breeding a few does at this time and I am in full experimental mode.  So, there are some really good bucks just standing around…doing what bucks do.  

I was recently in a drive through car wash.  I have this pickup that needed a bath and it has lots of buttons.  I am sure that all of these buttons have a purpose, but they are dang neart useless when the operator doesn’t know what they are for.  There is a sun roof in this pickup.  It was part of the package.  I don’t need it.  I occasionally open it in order to chase a fly out.  The only real use that it has (at least for a mental midget like myself) is to watch the automatic car wash pass over the pickup and I can then see the different colors that it sprays.  Right now, as you read this, you are either thinking that I am really retarded (which means that you don’t have a sun roof) or grinning as you know exactly what I am talking about.  I know.  Yes, I know.  I write some retarded stuff.  But you had to click here to get here.  Kind of brings the whole useless term into perspective.  What exactly are you doing with your time?

There are some loyal readers to this web-based location of information. I enjoy getting texts and emails regarding some of this crap.  I especially loved the “Rape Crate”.  Complete with pics of it in use.  If I was watching Law & Order:SVU, these pics would be known as Evidence.  But, nope.  Not in this case.  I am going to use them as a How To Guide for allowing young bucks to not be useless.  I know.  I could schedule an AI date and do some advanced breeding techniques. But that takes time and management.  Two things that I am normally short of.  

Mike Rowe from the tv show Dirty Jobs needed to be filming 3 miles south of Fargo on this fine evening.  I just finished trimming hooves on 13 four to seven month old buck prospects. Dude, they have jizzed on their front legs, their chins, each other and now on my pant legs as I was trimming hooves.  It takes a really good soap to get that stuff off of your hands.  Even though this was a nasty job, I was in a pretty good humour when I got done.  There are some wicked good goats in those pens.  I’m keeping a couple of them, but the best ones may get sold in April. Just because I am already stacked deep in these same genetics.  I need to keep an outcross.  But, who knows.  

There is one that is already named.  I haven’t seen many goats like this one.  I’m probably getting ready to do the Bob Seelke trick of digging a hole and holding the doe in said hole while the little buck mounts up.  That would be an interesting comparison–who cusses the most while performing a task like this–Bob or myself.  I bet his would be funnier than mine. 

It was dang cold in NW OK from Friday evening to Sunday morning.  The phone says that it was 19 degrees on Sat. AM.  Then it warmed back up again.  Sadly, some flies survived the freeze.

Tammy and I attended a wedding and reception in Kingfisher this weekend.  We have known these kids for a long time.  It was a heckuva crowd and the reception was pretty good as well.  I don’t attend many weddings and I hadn’t attended an actual wedding in several years.  But, Kela flew in on Friday night and had to fly back to Cali on Sunday.  Since, she can’t come home for Thanksgiving, this was our chance to get to see our favorite daughter.  

Kela read the scriptures at this wedding.  I love to listen to that kid’s voice.  Between the bride, groom, bridesmaids, groomsmen and other attendees, this might have been the highest concentration of former state FFA finalist public speakers ever.  Several were also national champions.  Unreal set of kids.  Showing, judging, speaking, whatever, this group of kids has been hugely successful and now they are carrying it on into the real world.  There was a lot of proud parents sitting in that church.    

I haven’t had time yet, but the quail bird is on my mind.  

It was 87 degrees just 48 hrs ago. Now it is nearing freezing and the wind is howling like an old-time movie, gut-shot Comanche.  (If I offended anybody with that last statement, click to a different website.)  And it is still dry here in paradise.  Huhnh!  At least it is finally getting cold enough to stop these flies.  There are always some positives.  At least that is what I have been told.  

I clicked on the blog from the other night and re-read it.  Somehow, the last paragraph was butchered.  Huhnh!  Computers.  Oh well, it just kind of makes me look like the dumb donkey that I can be.  Get me that trophy.  

Speaking on things that make you go hunh?!    Without a doubt, Texas is the capitol of the goat industry.  Likewise, there are no arguments that a LOT of the best TX bred goats come to Oklahoma and that the Okies also raise a pile of champion wethers.  I’ve been to the Houston, Denver, Phoenix, Tulsa and Kansas City shows.  It takes a wicked good one to win any one of those.  But, the quality is not always real deep.  I don’t mean this bad.  If you hang a banner at one of these shows, you’ve got a dang good goat.  However, OYE and San Antonio are a different deal.  It takes a wicked good one to be in the top 5 of a class, if not the top 10.  These are the 2 shows that everybody brings their heat.  

I am not knocking the show in Louisville.  Not that I care if I offend somebody, but seriously, I’m not knocking the quality of the winners.  I know that there are good goats from Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, Kentucky, Georgia, etc..  And I have not been to the Louisville wether show.  But if you have been on facebook at all this week, one would think that the world’s best goat show was going on.  Maybe it is.  But dang.  There are LOTS of posts of every class of wether dam, showmanship, wether, etc.  Really all this proves is that there is a butt-load of the next generation at this show.  Posting everything is not always a good deal.  Several things made me go Huhnh?!

No, no it is not the world’s best goat show.  Very few, if any Texans and very, very few Okies are there.  NO premium sale!  I think that every goat shower in Louisville must be required to post numerous pics.  Which brings me to my point.  Why in the heck doesn’t the naile put the wether goats in the premium sale with the other species?  There is obviously good attendance at the goat show.  Kentucky has a fairly strong goat program.  Put them in the sale.  A show of that size should pay more than a couple hundred dollars to win it.  The hotels and the eating joints in that city aren’t cheap.  Pay it back!  Put the goats in the sale.  If you are running this show, why don’t you look at the goat attendance and go “Huhnh?!  We ought to put the goats in the sale.”  Just my thoughts, for whatever that is worth.  

I drained hoses tonight and unhooked the float valves in the stock tanks.  The wethers are wearing several layers of blankets.  With it being cold and dry, we will have to spray wethers for fleas.  

I have had several Huhnh?! moments during the past 24 hours that involved other goat people.  The first was a phone conversation that started with me reading a McDonald’s sign about the McRib to Schneberger.  

Me:  “The McRib is back!”  Him:  So, what, I’m going to Jake’s Ribs.  Me:  Dude, I just left there.   Him:  “Huhnh?  WTH are doing in Chickasha?” 

Hours later, he called back.  We talked goats for several miles.  Then he asked, “How’s Sander’s daughters goats look?” Me:  “Huhnh?!    Him:  “What?”  Me:  “Dude, I am just west of Seiling right now.  If I turned my left turn signal on and turned south, I could literally be at their pens in one minute.”    Coincedences.  Huhnh?!

Tonight, I was telling a story to Tammy about a text conversation with Tolson from earlier in the day.  Shattuck plays Alex in the football playoffs.  Some of the boys told me that Alex has a turf field.  Beings as how Mr. Tolson is one of the higher up administrators at Alex Public Schools, I texted him at noon and asked if this was true.  He replied, “Nothing but the best for you, Clark.”  (great line from a great movie)  As I was talking to Tammy this evening, I was telling her about Alex having a turf field.  At that moment, Tolson texted me a pic of the opening kickoff showing off the turf field.   Perfect Timing.  Sometimes, you just got to go Huhnh!?  

Have a great weekend.  We are.  We’re going to go see somebody cool.  Huhnh?! Wonder who that could be?

P.S.  Jason Spence’s facebook rant regarding American Airlines is classic.  Very creative hastags.  

In the show goat industry, this title would belong to me.  There isn’t a close second.  Without bragging, this title is mine.  

I had some windshield time today.  No XM radio, so this left me to the thoughts in my head.  Then, I got home and I started to go through 2016 income/expense info for taxes.  (trying to be early for a change).  Then, I started going through breeding records for the past several years.  I guess you could say that I started taking a survey of Kelln Livestock…again, but in a different form.  

It was with nostalgia as I was looking over show results of wethers raised, purchased, sold, etc.  Lots of premium sales, lots of class winners, lots of grands and reserve grands at district, state and national shows.  I would have been well advised to have hired somebody to make me advertise over the years, but I didn’t.  I’m not saying that it is the best list, but there are very, very, very few that have a better list.  Did I have help?  Sure.  Everybody does.  But, it is hard to argue the consistency of show to show, judge to judge, year after year after year. All while dealing with fewer and fewer numbers.  

I have had the honor to help numerous families.  Some hit every goal.  While others hit some of their goals. Others supassed their goals.  While a few, just kept adding goals as they kept winning.  Some won more than they should have.  Some didn’t win enough.  

I look at my own kids’ successes.  Some think that they should have won more.  They’ve won more than most.  And Tammy and I are proud of the kids that we have raised in this program.  It is really hard to argue with the results.  Some think that we should have kept the best wethers for our own kids.  We haven’t, but it is hard to argue that this was a mistake. We’ve had some really good families have success with these goats. My mistake is that I did not have enough of these types of wethers, year in and year out.  It isn’t easy raising wethers that can win district shows, class winners, premium sale wethers and goats that will be in the hunt at OYE.  Yet, we have consistently done it, year in and year out.  All while selling 10-25 wethers per year.  Bragging–no, not when you can back it up.  Compare our few to others that sell hundreds and hundreds.  

As I reflect back on all this, I have mostly happy memories.  I have thoroughly enjoyed working with the kids. And dude, we have dealt with some great kids.  I love good livestock–regardless of species.  The Dragon Lady will tell you that it is an addiction–the love of looking at good livestock.  We have developed a vast array of friends and contacts.  Some of the breeders in this industry have been unbelievable–not only in business dealings but as friends.  And some have done things for my kids that are immeasurable.  I can only hope that Tammy and I have done the same for others.  If not, this has been a waste of time and money.  It hasn’t.

       While looking at my expenses for the year (depressing), I decided to dig into a seperate pile of envelopes.  I know that I can be an A-hole but I have been known to be sentimental.  I have a pile of every Thank You card ever written to us.  Why?  They motivate me way more than an EFFING $ ever will.  Most are from the kids, some the parents, and a few from grandparents.  Some have notes from the kid, the parents and the grandparents all written on the same card.  

I need to upgrade phones, but I don’t want to lose some of these text messages.  There are some text messages that I don’t want to copy as my mental midget mind doesn’t want to degrade the original form in which it was sent.  I know, dumb. This is part of the same rationale that I don’t like to be in pictures.  I don’t need a picture of the moment.  I already have it captured in my mind, and it can’t be improved upon.  Even if it is photo-shopped.  It won’t be better.  

All good.  But, as I am an A Hole, it becomes apparent that some don’t write thank yous.  I put this back on the parents.  Which in turn, gets me to thinking!  Oh crap!  This could be dangerous.  Dang neart every problem I have with my journey down the past year or two involve adults. There is a bunch of Shake My Head, kick rocks, cuss a little then a lot and wonder What In The Hell goes through some people’s minds?

On second thought, I’m not the dumbest. The only thing that I did that was dumb was not charge for the knowledge, effort, skill, coaching and babysitting. Tammy told

me that I was dumb. She was right. Go ahead and just give me that trophy. I knew that I was dealing with some dumb ass parents.

And speaking of dumb—it was 87 degreess F in this part of paradise on November 16. Too warm, too windy. This winter doesn’t look good.

It should have been a Monday.  It felt like a Monday.  The day started early and then it went downhill from there.  First and foremost, I am not happy with my wife’s son.  For numerous reasons.  But, that will work itself out.  He’s not happy that he doesn’t have a fun anymore and hunting season is on hiatus until we are happy with him.   At one point today, the plasmacam, the chop saw and one of the mig welders were broke down, all at the same time.  (they are all pretty new and I got them all running but…).  

Then I got home.  There were supposed to be a couple of does in heat.  The two that were supposed to be weren’t.  But there was a hot doe.  Ready and willing.  Good, except that she was supposed to be bred already.

Then, for the 2nd time in the past 10 days, Law & Order has became aggressive with me.  I don’t know why.  It is one thing to have a nasty dang buck rubbing on you, but completely different when they become aggressive.  A stern discussion took place.  I bet he keeps his distance.  If not, I heard a story at the feed store this morning about some 80 year old lady that put a nose ring in a buck.  She uses a a chicken hook to grab the nose ring and lead the buck around.  I’m kind of liking that idea.    

I saw a post commenting on the protesters against the Trump presidency.  It mentioned something along the lines of “4 straight nights of protesting but not having to worry at all about work the next day.”  

Saw another deal that read, “If you are going to fight, then fight like you are the 3rd monkey in line on the ramp going up to Noah’s ark.  And brother, it has just begun to rain.”  

If you want to watch a cool video, check out the $11 vs $306 steak comparison.  It makes me hungry to watch, but it’s cool.  

Speaking of cool. Congratulations to Blake Foraker on a great livestock judging contest in Lousiville.  I like to see good kids succeed.  I look forward to Blake judging some shows.  

Here’s to a day that is done and a great day tomorrow. It could be worse, but it is always going to be better.  

I have known that we were caught in a circle of Not Getting Much Rain area for quite some time now.  After driving to San Angelo this weekend, I now realize that we are in a very isolated area of no rain.  Man, the dryland cotton looks wicked good. Cecil Book told me that they have had 15″ of rain since August 1.  That is almost a years worth in 3 months!  

The 1/4″  that we got last week has perked the trit up, inspired some to drill some seed and did not bring the no-till back from the dead.  We depend on grazing for this little herd, but there is a reason that we keep a stock-pile of hay.  

The Lone Star Elite Jackpot was really good.  The #s seemed down a bit, but the quality was way good.  Duke and I weren’t really ready to show, but we needed to go.  Glad we did.  This is one of those shows that everybody should attend if you have a goat from an eligbile breeder.  Well ran show.  

The worst part of this weekend was the drive home. Okie State was playing Texas Tech.  We only found one station that was carrying the game.  And it was a Tech channel.  What a bad ending to a game. It sounded bad on the radio, but the tv replays confirm that it wasn’t fun to watch.  

The showpig buying season is nearing the end. Thank goodness.