"What Would I Write About If Nothing Went Wrong?"

You know, there was a moment earlier in the week when I had inspected my last cow pat (more on that later), that an interesting thought crossed my mind. It had to do with the content of this blog and just how I could keep it interesting if nothing of particular note happened. What would I write about if nothing went wrong, or we didn’t face any challenges? Of course, we don’t really want to face too many challenges, or have things go wrong, but we do want to keep things entertaining for all of you. But before I had time to really indulge my catch 22 quandary, fate, the dirty little minx that it is, rolled the dice. And as it turned out, I needn’t have worried.

But first; the cowpats. As previously reported, a pesky cow managed to munch up some string from a bale of hay last week and so we thought we’d better keep an eye out for an irregular looking pile of faecal matter. Not exactly something I saw in my future as a bright eyed child, but not everything goes to plan I guess.

I think this photo of Jo sums it all up really:

I didn't make her do it all of course:

In the end we didn't find anything out of the ordinary.

So we moved on to plan b, which was to do some surveillance:

I welcome your thoughts on what the caption for that photo could be.

Luckily for you (because I would have taken a photo of it), but unluckily for us, there were no bowel movements to speak of.

We decided that we were probably (or hopefully) overreacting a little bit because the cow is still eating and still doing what cows do. And something has to be making all of that mess.

So that was Monday. And it wasn't until Friday that things went particularly pear shaped.

All we wanted to do was go and check on the animals, making sure they had enough water and grass to keep them going for another couple of days and then go and have our lunch. Happy with how things looked, Jo and I stood around taking it all in and feeling particularly smug about what great farmers we were. Which was right about when Kupe took off after the lambs for no particular reason and scared them so much that they ran straight through the electric fence like it was, well, not an electric fence. When the commotion died down, there were lambs in three different paddocks, including one in with the sheep. That was not good. I'm not 100% sure why, but I just know that it's not. Cue the swearing. Lots and lots of swearing.

Our task was clear: separate one lamb from 12 sheep. And 3 HOURS AND ALMOST THE END OF A RELATIONSHIP LATER we succeeded in doing that. We're not so smug any more.

The weekend saw Jo go back to Christchurch for her nephew's christening and me babysit my one and a half year old cousin Samantha. I don't know why everyone thinks looking after children is so hard. I spent a whole 4 hours with her and had nary a problem. The trick? Give them something shiny and then go about your business. In Samantha's case it was a mobile phone and an ipod. Easy. What is not so easy is figuring out car seats. Three seat belts? Who's idea was that? I wasted 10 minutes just to go and get some McDonald's. I would have gotten something healthier, but I needed somewhere with a drive-through, lest I have to contend with the car seat again.

And that's the week that was really. Today I had to fix a water trough that was leaking, but that didn't turn out to be the nightmare it could have been. Mainly because Richard came and did the majority of the work. I did try to do it myself, but it seems that fixing water troughs is another life lesson that passed me by. I did manage to complete half the job, which is better than nothing. At least that's what I'm telling myself.

Now it's time to see what this week has in store for us.

"What's The Worst That Could Happen?"

That is a question that Jo and I have been asking ourselves quite a lot this week. And not in that jovial, shrug of the shoulders kind of way; but in that serious, "I actually need to know what the worst thing that could happen is" kind of way. Why? Well, it all comes down to something a little prosaic, but nonetheless unprecedented for both of us. Please allow me to illuminate...

Cows love hay. That's not much of a bombshell right? But it turns out that our cows love hay so much that as you ride along on the motorbike, they will follow you and have a munch before you have a chance to unhook and distribute it. Even given that fact, things were going fine as I rode out into the paddock and was mobbed by the herd. As I got between them and the hay I took it off the bike, cut the string holding it together and began throwing slices around to disperse the animals. In my eagerness to get them away from the bale, I ended up accidentally tossing out some hay with a bit of the string still attached. A cow and I both saw the piece of hay land. As if in slow motion I tried to react, but because of having twice as many legs as me, the cow made it to the hay first. Like a long piece of stray spaghetti, the bloody thing sucked that bit of string right up into it's mouth before I could get it out.

Now, I'm no veterinarian, but I'm pretty sure that a cow eating some string isn't a great thing. So this is where the panic ensued. I decided to put in a call to my cousin Richard and after leaving a message, paced about waiting to hear back. Jo was comforting, asking the titular question in the former way, while I wanted the answer in the latter way. A little while later Richard called back and the conversation went a little something like this:

Me: Hello?

Richard: I heard you killed a cow.

Silence

Richard: I'm only kidding.

Me (in my head): Oh thank [expletive].

Richard: How much string did you feed it?

Me: It ate one of the bits of strings that ties around the bale.

Richard: Oh, that much (laughing). That makes it even funnier.

From there, Richard just advised us to keep an eye on the cow and an eye out for some irregular looking, you know, cow pats.

Now, Rachael and Kevin, if you're reading this, I just want to assure you that everything is okay. The cows are fine and I am much, much more careful about throwing out the hay. Promise. I really hope you've gotten this far before booking flights home.

So that was a fairly interesting start to the week. Nothing quite so dramatic has happened since. Unless you count having to chase a rooster that got out of its enclosure. Apart from some incredibly impressive swearing on my part, the only other thing that was impressive was how much of a fool the rooster made me look as I was chasing it. 100 f-words later I had it cornered and managed to place it back with the rest of the roosters. Jo found it pretty funny. Thankfully she wasn't taking photos.

In case you were thinking we didn't, we did actually take some photos this week though. Firstly we went out and did a bit of sight-seeing. This is what we found:

We also went to the Franklin Country Market in Pokeno. We found some pretty interesting things there. For beginners, there was this guy:

While I was distracted by the hypnotic power of double denim, Jo was off getting her sugar fix sorted;

It was hard to decide how many scoops to get. There was so much choice:

I've decided that before we leave the farm, I will go back to this market and get a seven scoop icecream cone. After all, what's the worst that could happen?

Graduation

Yes, this week was graduation. I feel the same proud trepidation now as I felt leaving university all those years ago. The ceremony (read: dropping my Aunty and Uncle at airport) took place on Thursday and the reins to the farm were officially passed over. The weight of the keys in my hand seemed as heavy as the responsibility that came with them. For some reason I was instantly reminded of some wisdom from my childhood, and it's that advice that I'll keep with me during my time on the farm. Through every rain soaked delivery of hay; every electric shock I get after forgetting to turn the fence off; every time I wonder if I remembered to shut a gate; and especially every time the alarm goes off at 6am and it is still pitch black outside, I will not TRY to be a farmer, I WILL be a farmer.

To be honest, the changeover had begun for both Jo and I earlier in the week. First it manifested itself in an odd desire to pray for rain as opposed to willing the rain to stop. It seems being in a drought will do that to you. Other things were more tangible, such as our wardrobes. I've already mentioned what is inappropriate attire:

(I was attempting to jump over a fence at the time of the incident. The only plus side it that I looked pretty awesome doing it.)

So we thought we'd better get some proper gear. After all, we weren't going to be the apprentices any longer, we were going to be the masters.

BEHOLD:

Trackpants and Gumboots!!! The wonders will never cease.

Of course, Jo and I still had a few last minute lessons to learn before my Aunty and Uncle took off on their European sojourn. The first of these was shifting the lord of the manor (otherwise known as Andrew):

This is me thinking that it might be best to get out of his way:

It turns out I didn't actually need to worry that much as he's a pretty big softy:

Well, either that or he was distracted by the hay.

As for Jo, she was asked if she would mind planting some cabbages for the garden. She's the first to admit that it's not her favourite pastime. Especially when bloodthirsty predators sneak up on you from behind:

I've yet to tell her about the much worse hairy beasts that tend to inhabit hay sheds. Because of the lack of rain we've had to start feeding the cows hay. To them, we're pretty much meals on wheels.

And now here we are. In charge. As I mentioned last time, we have been into the big smoke a few times. According to Jo's friend Auckland is "road works and little else", which is certainly what we've been encountering. Although they do have an enormous Real Groovy record store and suburbs like Ponsonby, which is just cafe's and shops; something Jo is pretty pleased about.

I also mentioned last time about the clay bird shooting, and it is with those photos that I leave you with. Rest assured that these first few days have been good. While we may not be about to have a complete career change, the clean air and quiet countryside are doing us both good. And I personally think that the trackpants and gumboots are pretty fetching too.

Enjoy:

My cousin Richard in charge of the clay bird thrower thingy. You can tell I'm good with this kind of thing.

This is me missing. One of the many times.

My cousin Joshua collecting the clay birds he missed. Okay, that I missed.

And this is a photo of me moments before I actually hit one. With the weakest gun of the lot. I'm pretty sure that being a better shot with a less powerful gun means that I am actually a great shot. There's logic in there somewhere.