And I thought that the kids gave me gray hair?!

So we are getting ready for tomorrow. Tomorrow holds two farmer's markets for Tim and I (Bayou City in Houston and Sunset Valley in Austin). It also holds the South Central Texas Goat Club Memorial Day Classic Goat Show. So, as we have every year since we got goats, we are showing goats at this show. Seven to be exact. Katarina also signed up to help in an administrative capacity, as a ring secretary. (making sure that the goats are where they are supposed to be, when and that the goats are who they say they are, as proven by the tattoos in their ears, or in the cases of the earless LaManchas, their tails. Don't ask.) Then the girls got themselves volunteered to run concessions. (Buying and preparing and selling the food.) So we found someone from church to come to what is probably their first ever goat show and watch Carlson toddlers. (Yay Nathan!)

Anyhow today is hellish. We are running all over buying food that couldn't be bought earlier due to concerns of freshness. Finishing grooming goats. Baking cookies for the show. Plus regular farm chores on top of Grace's horse needing emergency surgery to sew his eyelid back on and me recovering from what I think was food poisoning.

So I am in the bathroom and an urgent pounding commences on the door. "Grace wants you to come and look at Lightnin', QUICK!" I bolt out and to the barn. I run into the milkroom and there is Lightnin', chowing down her food as normal. This blood line is quite...ah...oral. They are forever eating or carrying things around in their mouths or eating or taking off their collars and twirling them in circles around their heads or eating...she looks up at me and I gasp in horror. On the side of her face, along her jawline is a large lump. I feel it, it is very solid. It seems pretty firm, not easily moved. My mind races...it could be a tooth abscess. It could be an abscess from a thorn or the like. Or it could be the dreaded CL, a goat disease that manifests itself in the form of abscesses, is incurable and highly contagious. It lingers nearly forever in the soil and it is practically impossible to disinfect your property once you have had it. We have never had it, my intent is to never experience it. We test our goats yearly for it and have never had any signs of it. Nevertheless, what is in my dairy right now is truly my nightmare come true.

But wait...she also may have some softer swelling alongside that. A bee sting? A snake bite?

So, while I sit at the computer to research and come up with a plan of action I send Christin with Tim to the dairy with benadryl to administer. While they are gone I read and pray and try to slow down my racing mind and heart.

Tim bursts back through the door saying something about owing him a vet visit. I stare at him, "what? WHAT???"

He holds out in his hand a bright orange bouncy ball with a bite taken out of it.

Seems when he and Christin were giving her her benadryl he decided to take a good look. (I was going to do that too, just once we found a thin piece of PVC pipe to slide between her teeth to keep from being bitten as those back teeth are razor sharp.) Apparently as they were wrestling with Lightnin' she threw herself down and he looked down at her and...the lump was gone! Just as he was about to point it out in wonder to Christin he saw something bright orange in her mouth, did a quick finger swipe and the abscess lay in his hand, a well chewed piece of made-in-China wonder.

Well. Whatever will I do with all my extra time now that I don't have to spend tomorrow doctoring Lightnin'?