Saturday, January 2, 2021

The Breakfast of Champions

Acetaminophen or Ibuprofen?

The cattle-hauler came to pick up the last of Sprite's cattle. He came at first light.

It was not our finest moment. He left with three of the seven beeves. The other four were too spooked.

When the four spooked, three of the four decided I was a nice looking fellow and they went through the panel I was standing next too, pretending to be a fence post.

The panel was an 8' by 5' panel fabbed from angle iron and expanded metal grating. The Captain had fished it out of a scrap pile when an industrial concern upgraded from hard-guard to laser curtains to keep people out of robotic cells.

All of Sprite's equipment is pretty banged up at this point. It was never designed to take the beating that beef cows (and amorous bulls) give fence that is between them and where they want to be.

The fence panel knocked me over like a bowling-pin. Lucky for me the panel was floppy and there were three inches of snow. I went over backwards, ass-over-teakettle.

As a wee-lad I had about four weeks of "Judo" as it was known in the day. I learned how to fall and roll.

And roll I did. Sadly, none of the other guys or Sprite had the foresight to take video, so you are out of luck.

Kill-spots

Kill spots at slaughter houses are still at a premium.

Sprite was petrified that she would lose her seven spots if she didn't get them in today.

We tried for two more hours to get the four calves with wander-lust into the trailer. Two major difficulties were that they were fearful of the trailer (which they had never seen before) and cattle do not like going into dark areas. Primal memories of bears and wolves?

We got close, once. But it was not to be.

Sprite finally gave up. She wanted to go to the neighbor-kid's funeral. Mrs ERJ and I went to the visitation.

The driver suggested Sprite call the slaughter house and ask if she could slide it to next Saturday. They were fine taking three today and four next Saturday. I am 90% sure she is taking them to Nagel's Meat Processing in Homer. I mention their name because they did Sprite a solid by letting her ship over two weekends.

The trucker and I took a quick walk around before he drove away. Sprite has a three-sided building that was used for horses. It is about 14' across and 10' deep. She has the salt for the cattle in that building, so they are used to entering it.

The current plan is to install a gate across the front of that building but to leave the gate open about 6'. Then feed the cattle their grain in the salt shed. Friday night, after putting down the corn, Sprite will simple close and latch the gate, thus containing the four critters in a 140 square feet. 

It should be a snap to move them from the salt shed into the trailer on Saturday morning. Moving cattle from light-to-dark is hard. Moving them from dark-to-dark is much easier.

9 comments:

  1. Good luck with that! Back the trailer as close to the gate as possible....

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  2. Many years ago there was a cattle hauler that worked the Central UP that had two mutt herding dogs that worked with him. He was the first guy the farmers would call hoping they could get him. You would stand back and those dogs would work together and have those cattle or sheep in the trailer in a matter of minutes. He always said that those dogs were so smart that when they got too old to herd he was going to show them how to do his taxes.---ken

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  3. Vitamin "I" for me each morning.

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  4. Bam another 'Best of ERJ one liners'. Quote: 'he always said those dogs were so smart that when they got too old to herd he was going to show them how to do his taxes'.

    I wish we could nominate best of phrases, and Joe have a place for them cause my memory not to good.
    Here were some more from past: Shoot them good enough 'that they stay dead'.
    Or getting harder to kill stuff because of 'old man empathy'.

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  5. Loading my cattle tomorrow early am. I let the trailer sit near the gate hanging open so the are used to seeing it. But like you said, cattle sometimes have their own ideas where they want to go in a hurry. Be ready for anything and wear steel toe boots!

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  6. For " regular" headaches , Tylenol. For Muscle and similar aches...Ibuprofen. Note, those are my preference...and a suggestion. Based on what works best for Me. Not a Dr. Don't even play one on TV and don't intend to prescribe a darn thing.

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  7. John said it well. I prefer Ibuprofen -- it's a great, poor man's anti inflammatory. But it's hard on your kidneys. I've been trying to save both (kidneys and Ibuprofen) for when I'm old, but alas that's right now.

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  8. The medical professionals that I know say to use both Acetaminophen and Ibuprofen as concurrent doses, as they treat pain using different mechanisms and the latter also works to reduce inflammation. When I get dental work done, they send their patients home with a couple of single-dose packets containing both, so maybe there's something to it.

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  9. Ass-over-teakettle... I love it! Thought I was alone in using the phrase down here in Kansas. Monetize this blog. I would do $20 for the entertainment today alone.

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