Sunday, April 27, 2008

It's not been a good week around here and only got worse.

I have been at orientation for a " last ditch " psychiatric hospital ( the hospital is state run and takes in patients that have been deem incompetent to stand trial, are child molesters,rapests, and patients that have such chronic psychiatric disorders that they have been shipped there as a last resort ) and have been taught how to " take down " a patient that is totally out of control.

Things were going fine until we did the hands-on take downs with the instructors and, lucky me, I got one who said ( out of one side of her mouth ) " we are not trying to hurt you " but, would laugh and smile like a fiend when someone got hurt because of how " rough " she was acting . Now, I'm not afraid of patients and am not afraid of being hurt in the line of protecting the safety of one of my patients, BUT I do draw the line when someone who is supposedly teaching me a way to remain safe and not injure a patient deliberately goes out of her way to cause injury to us and thinks it's funny !!!

I felt a pop in my left instep ( which was ignored when I said so ) and way thrown into a solid cement block wall because this chick wanted to show us ( we were in groups of three ) what a patient can do to you. And, if that don't beat all, because of her actions every instructor was concerned about her getting the wind knocked out of her at the same time I hit the floor with my bad knee and couldn't get up!! Thank goodness, she works days and I will be working evenings/nights.

AND as if that wasn't enough to frost you're cookies, I get home on Thursday and was met by my a#^h*le neighbor stating if I don't do something with my sheep he's going to shoot them.

Now, my babies are between 3 months and 4 weeks of age and I was getting ready to place ads on one of the Shetland lists I'm on but because of this threat I had to call a friend of mine and ask him if he could help me catch the sheep on Friday so I could send them to market on Saturday. We caught eveyone of the little buggers - which if you've ever tried to catch a wild slippery youngster who doesnot want to be caught you know what I mean.

Saturday morning, I got up and caught the sheep I was going to keep ( my 2 border Leicesters, 3 adult Shetland ewes, 2 yearling Shetland ewes and the baby of one of the yearlings. ) Total sheep kept = 8. Total sent to market = 19 babies and 19 adults.

Needless to say, yesterday wasn't a good day. The 3 adult ewes spent the entire day calling for their babies and running all over the pastures looking for them. It was heart breaking. One of the ewes had horns and it broke off in my hand as I caught her and before I could get a halter on her - so she won't have anything to do with me ( can't say I blame her ).

Today, the ewes aren't calling as much but everytime I walk out the back door, they want me to come to the gate and let them in the backyard. The lone baby is now spoiled because when she cries for her mom she has 3 other ewes answer her and come to her to see what she needs.

I can only hope that my sheep and their babies went to good homes - the man that took them to market for me ( I couldn't go - it was all I could do not to cry as I sent them off ) that the babies will probably sell for more than the others because they are little and can be made into pets easier than the adults.

At least now, I hope , they will go to people who can give them all they need. After last year's drought and even though we did have a lot of rain this spring, my pastures are just about shot to pieces. I hope that with just 8 sheep, the pastures will have time to re-coop and do better. But , it still was very hard to get rid of my old girls and some of my favorites and only keep the ones I did. Truth be known, I cried along with the ewes - it was heart-breaking.

Hopefully, tomorrow will be better.