"The cow is of the bovine ilk. One end is moo, the other milk." - Ogden Nash

(He's divorced by now.)

Hearing the sound of bleating goats in the house is ... odd. It made me think about the KJV of 1 Sam. 15:14 where Samuel confronts Saul who has just returned from battle with the Amelekites. He was told to destroy everyone and everything associated with that evil people, so when Samuel meets Saul after the battle he asks if those instructions were followed. "Yep!" Samuel then asks: "What meaneth then this bleating of sheep in my ears?"

The KJV is nigh unto unreadable for most contemporary Christians, as unintelligible as Shakespeare's English. But there are some verses in the KJV that are so mellifluous ("sweet or musical, pleasant to hear") that they can't be beat. Our pastor hit one in his recent sermon from Acts 17. Unfortunately, he used a more modern translation and therefore missed the opportunity to read v. 5 where the mob is described as made up of, "lewd fellows of the baser sort." Does it get any better?

Then there's Judges 14:18 where Samson says, "If ye had not plowed with my heifer ye would not have found out my riddle." Now there's a turn of phrase!

From the Good Grief Division of the Whacko News Department:

• An 8-year old child has been dismissed from the Boy Scouts because she/he is transgender. This outrage, of course, presumes that a child years away from puberty has a sexual identity. In a case like this we can safely assign considerable blame to the parents. 
• From USAToday, 2016 was "the most surreal year ever." We've now stripped that word of its meaning. 

We had a scare this morning with Asante and I'm not sure we're out of the woods yet. We put him on Pedialyte yesterday afternoon because of a worsening case of scours (the runs) and he was disinterested in the bottle of it today at 6 a.m. Worse, he was very lethargic, not at all normal for a 10-day old goat kid. I quickly posted on the goat forum, sent a message to Marta, and did a lot of reading online. We ended up giving him a small (6 oz.) amount of the standard milk replacer which seemed to perk him up some. We also started him on a probiotic we had at the ready. Goats are ruminants - animals with multiple stomachs that chew the cud - and if the organisms in their gut die they can't digest anything. 

We followed that 6 oz. with another six two hours later which he took with great eagerness. The consensus from all who I consulted is that this is a little early to put him back on milk but seems necessary given his declining health. We're to watch his poop carefully, increasing his amount of milk in .5 oz. increments, keep pushing the probiotic, and report back. These little guys have a very slim margin; at less than 10 lbs. Asante can get in trouble quickly. So getting things like this turned around quickly is essential.

The preceding paragraph was written mid-afternoon. Since then he's had another bottle, his output is returning to more normal consistency, and his energy is much better. Running and jumping like he was three days ago. We're not there yet, but are certainly headed the right direction. 

I took the truck out again today because it was "warm" (mid-40's) and sunny. It runs very well.

It just won't start in the first 10 minutes after I shut it off. And I expect that time to grow as outside temps climb with spring and summer. I gotta get to the bottom of this. 

Irritating.