this job has a lousy benefit package

When you keep livestock, you don't get to call in sick.

Sunday was unbelievably gorgeous. It was sunny, warm and an altogether glorious day to be outside. At least that's what I'm told, since my husband and I spent the entire day in bed...sick. It was perhaps the sickest we've ever been in our lives, and we discovered what happens around the farm when we're both more or less incapacitated - nothing. Chores go undone, goats go un-milked, everyone goes un-fed. Things go to hell in a hurry. I finally managed to get out and make a half-assed attempt at it around midday, in between evacuations of my stomach contents. I managed this purely out of sheer force of will. The only reason I didn't pass smooth out in the yard is because somewhere deep in my brain I knew I couldn't. I've learned that when push comes to shove, your legs will continue to propel you forward long after your brain tells them to stop.

My dear husband stumbled out later, in roughly the same condition, to take second shift.

Somehow though, at the end of the day, it was alright. We eventually recovered. No animals were irreparably harmed. Farm life goes on. Some days it just goes very, very badly.