And here is Archie- ready to be a big goat now. No hollering for help to the DH as he walks by. No secret code message (there's a bottle in the fridge, we're busting in at midnight, see) being hoof-tapped to the guinea that flew into the goat pen and can't find its' way back out-again, sigh. No crying for the crazy goat lady to just bring a little milk, "I promise I won't ever butt the doe goat or pee on the clean straw." And the neighbors, they aren't turning up their television sets because there is a noisy goat. No, they just really like the booming of the evening news to reverberate through their homes. I'm certain none of them are thinking about calling Animal Control about the crazy neighbor who is starving her goat to death, "can't you hear the poor thing crying over the phone officer?"
Honestly, we've been steadily preparing for this day for the last few weeks. Feeding times had been reduced to once a day and bottles were progressively filled with more water and less milk. So Archie has been handling this day much better than I expected.
And I? I haven't peeked out the window every few minutes to see if his gut has sunk in. Nope, not once did I go into the pen just to tell him how proud I am that he's getting so big. I mean, he's just a goat, right? Right? I'm not sitting here tearing up because it's time to put the bottles away. Not at all.
