Mia's Stormy Visit

When I look at the last time I wrote in my journal I am astounded at how much happens in the course of just a few days.  Mia arrived Thursday night, too late to swim in the pond but not too late to help me with chores and catch a few goats.  I had been dying to get my hands on half a dozen to get the now-ruined mohair off them and do hooves/worming.  I raise them for fiber so every lock is precious.  With Matt down and no second pair of hands to sit on a stool and hold the horns I can't do much.  In the most desperate situations I catch them myself and tie them to a post, but then I have to lean them against a wall and it's tough to move all around them and pick up legs.  Shots require two people or you are asking for trouble.  Mia is such a trooper and not afraid to get dirty...and she always has a smile on her face.  We chat away while I work about every silly little thing.  I love her.  We slept in the trailer Wednesday night and got a good nights' sleep. Amazing how much more farm noise I hear when I sleep outside.  Screaming roosters at 3 am (they cockadoodledoo at the slightest hint of anything amiss) and quacking ducks under the trailer at 5.  I opened the door at 6 to find sheep grazing in the mist all around us, moving among the overgrown thistles that are now trees.  With spouse still laid up with that rotten foot the 8N has not been turned on in two months.  I don't think I could even get it started myself, much less attach the brush hog.  If I had portable fence I would enclose the goats in the thistles and force them to eat the thorny bushes.  Spoiled rotten goats.  After morning chores on Thursday we loaded up my picked-washed-dyed-washed-dried wool in Mia's Subaru and headed for Staples in New Hartford.  After rolling all the boxes and bags into the store with shopping carts amid quizzical stares we were informed that their UPS computers were fried from the recent storm and they could not ship my wool.  Not to be dismayed we took it all out again and packed it back into the truck.  Mia needed to stop in Old Navy to pick up a few things for her trip to St. Barts and Anguila on Saturday.  I was so happy when she found several things that made her squeal with delight.  They had long, gauzy white gowns, cute paisley sun dresses and shorts, imitation Marquesite droopy earrings, and bikini tops.  She remarked that Old Navy had better stuff than the surf boutique at the Jersey shore where she had previously shopped for her trip.  We motored over to Barnes and Noble where we drank chai tea and perused the latest glossy fiber art magazines and Mia picked up books for her trip.  While checking out Matt called and told us to head home fast as the National Weather Service put out an emergency warning about a fast moving storm coming our way.  We could not go home without getting the truck load of wool shipped so we drove over to the UPS store across the highway by the Marquis Cinema.  It took some doing getting it inside, boxed, weighed and labelled but we got it done.  110 pounds of lovely wool that will come back to me in one pound carded balls ready to spin.  John Erlinger at Frankenmuth Woolen Mill will be gulping some coffee when he sees this load come in on Tuesday.  One green/navy blue/golden yellow run is still waiting for more color.  It is 50 pounds already and I am waiting for Bright Orange dye from Dharma.  Kimmie Cornerstone will be busy spinning this wool for years to come.  As we left the UPS store the wind was picking up.  I saw the Lowe's sign across the highway and asked Mia if we could stop in.  I need a freezer very soon for the hundreds of pound of pork over at Miss Tammy's.  As we looked at appliances we heard a torrent of heavy rain on the roof of the store.  We thought, uh-oh, we better get home.  The adventure really began from there...