Solo chores today

Balmy -25 today.  Peter was off to a curling bonspiel in Norquay, Dad on the tractor dropping bales and Chris was on Dexter daycare commute.  I was called up for chore duty.  So as Chris and Dexter headed into town I trudged over to the snow mobile.  With a whiplash roar (it goes from 0 to 20km instantly), I was off.

First, pass by Sam's buffet by the turkey coop, then off through the bush to the hay yard and corrals.  Dismount, pick up the pail of grain to give to the red bull.   Open gate, trudge through snow and head to trough.  Expecting bull to be quite keen on the grain, I looked around to be prepared to for potential nudging out of the way.

Bull is waiting by other trough.  Oops, sorry Bull, my bad.  Head over to correct trough and deposit grain.  Bull waits politely as I exit pen.  Not sure why this guy get extra rations, will inquire.

Remount and lurch out of hay yard and off to two spindly trees on the way to the water troughs.  These are the markers as to where to drop mineral block which have a tendency to look like another pile of poo in a field full of them.  Need a marker to keep an eye on the block so as to know to replace it when needed.  It's essentially a mammoth, 20kg prenatal vitamin.  All the ladies will be birthing starting in the next month or so.

Heave vitamin on the ground, remove mitts and try to get plastic off.  No problem. Reach out to remove paper label.  Turns out it's a very tenacious sticker.  Who STICKS a massive label to a lump of food?  THEY do, clearly.  On my hands and knees picking at stupid shredded label for some time.   Lose interest. Some of the ladies will be getting some extra sticky fibre too.

Roar off to the two water troughs, dismount and for the next 1/2 hour try to get fires lit underneath to (obviously) melt water and ensure the herd staggers through another day.

Clearly, I am not yet skilled at this particular task as I run through a great deal of the diesel and an obscene amount of matches trying to get decent blazes going.   How hard should it be?  Probably not as hard as I'm making it..

Ready to head out when I realize I forgot to chop the ice.  Can't leave it all to my timid little flames.

Forget freaking workout boot camps!  Want a work out...go chop something.  My GAWD am I out of shape.  Just lifting the freaking ax and putting no effort on the descent was exhausting.  Chipping relentlessly away, I finally did it, flung the ax in a drift and headed home.

Back past Sam's buffet, park and dismount outside the shop and staggered inside.

Now here I sit, sporting the latest in towel turban fashions updating the blog.

Must get to work.

Happy day, everyone. :)