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I was finishing up a newsletter I help put out and was writing up a story on our adventures during the Brush Creek fire. I got to thinking what the critters thought about the whole event, so I asked one of my bucks, Wilbur, to tell things from his point of view...

"It had been a pretty good summer so far for me and my buddies. Days were nice and warm and we enjoyed basking out in the sunshine and nibbling on a little hay. It hadn’t been raining at all for weeks and weeks and we really liked that. Our human servant kept us fed and gave us fresh water, so we were pretty happy. Who’s the servant? Oh, she’s an older human doe, way past breeding age. We figured that’s why she was put to work serving us -because she can’t kid anymore and doesn’t have much in the way of udders anyway. She also gives us our pedicures (which we really like because we get cookies then) and gives the fuzzy goats their haircuts. There is a human buck helping her sometimes, but he doesn’t usually have cookies for us so we like the doe better.

"Well, like I said, things were ok. Then the air started smelling real funny, and we didn’t like it much because we couldn’t smell the does hardly at all. The sky was a weird color, too, but we still were served our food and water so weren’t too concerned. Then one night when we were trying to settle in and sleep, a big ruckus started. There was noise and lots of light at night and then humans we didn’t know grabbed us and started dragging us into a little house! We were pretty scared! Then the house started moving! I bumped my head and cracked one of my horns a little bit, but didn’t think too much of it at the time. After what seemed like forever, the house stopped moving and the door opened. We were chased into a new place that smelled and looked different! We saw lots of other critters that looked kind of like us but didn’t smell like us. And they talked different, too. They were fuzzy like some of us goats are. I guess they were called "sheep".

"Needless to say, we were pretty upset. Then we saw that they had brought our human doe along to serve us. She gave us our food and water, so we settled down a bit after that. It was a really a nice place! I was there with my brother, Orville, our friend J.T., and five of the fuzzy bucks: Isaac, Holy Moses, Joey, Amos, and Andy. After a bit, one of the llamas we knew was put in with us. His name is Siam, and he was pretty annoying for a while because he kept humming something like "Where are my babies!?" all the time and didn’t want to eat much at first. Then one of the sheep told him that his "babies" were in another pasture with their moms and everybody was ok. So he was better after that.

"At this place, there were mostly the sheep, and our does were out of our sight in another pasture. But when the wind shifted one day, we caught a whiff of doe perfume! Well twist my tail and call me Stud -there was one fine looking lady! All white with perky ears and a way of wagging her tail that drove us wild! We knew her because she visited us before, and she was the only goat that lived on this ranch. Her name was Annie. Her tail started wagging when she saw my buddies and me, and next thing you know we were banging heads to impress her. All of a sudden there was a "crunch!" and I got the most terrible headache! It was the horn I had cracked in the moving house! Then the human doe came and started chasing me around and spraying my head with nasty smelling stuff. I bet even flies wouldn’t come near my head after she put that stuff on me! Yuck! My nice horn fell off, and I was pretty sad about that. It took me a long time to grow it.

"To amuse ourselves when we weren’t trying to get Annie’s attention, we looked around for ways to get out of our pen. It was pretty solid, but my friend Andy bet me a cookie he could get out. Escaping is one of his favorite hobbies. I think it’s a fine hobby, but it makes our human doe pretty mad for some reason. I guess I owe Andy a cookie because he found his way under some part of the fence and taunted us by munching on fresh grass just outside the gate. But our human doe was upset with Andy and hauled him back in with us.

"Then just as we got nice and comfortable in our new place, the humans came and stuck us back in the moving house and we went home again. The air didn’t smell quite as bad anymore and since we were back in our own pasture we weren’t upset. I don’t know why we went to the other place for awhile -who knows why humans do what they do? But I guess everything is fine because I still get cookies and that’s what’s really important after all!"

1. My mom reading the daily news paper. Nothing unusual about that. 2. My sister Thea (6) painting outside. 3. My other sister Marit (15) watching TV just after our restrictions are over. 4. Thea painting inside - it started raining after a while. 5. Just another photo of a sunny day outside. 6. Thea painting inside. 7. Marit watching TV again. 8. Me practising my develloppees in the mirror. 9. Me painting with my sisters outside.
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DESCRIPTION:
I confronted my mom about maybe trying out a TV- and Computer free day. I was surprised how well my two little sisters Marit (15) and Thea (6) responded. Eventually, being bored and all, I invited the two of them outside to paint. I gathered all my acrylics, brushes and canvases - got them the biggest one - and we painted together in the garden. In steamy heat from the sun. This also lead to the tree girls of us helping our mom making diner, which we normally barely do because mom prefers doing this kind of work alone. I am sure TV and overusing Facebook affects how we meet people around us, and also like shown very specific in this experiment: how limits force creativity and pleasure in action. I limiting these kind of activities can bring people together again. Not only in small families where it's more common to sit by the computer or watch TV than to make dinner together, but also seing a greater social picture. I've been discussing this with a lot of friends and family lately. And I would like to quote on quote something my mom read in the daily news paper today:

Most of us have lots of friends. Until the power blacks out.

Should you take a tech free day? Some later time I will take it further and even turn my cell phone off. Maybe you could go for a walk in the forest, put up a tent and stay there for a while. Try writing e-mails (or even hand written letters?) instead of chatting or short-messaging on Facebook. Do something, there is so much power in action. Be present, the now, the now, the now, never comes back. One moment, and you will never have it again.
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Most of these photos are a lot better separate than clashed together like in this silly montage. I do think I will upload some of them separately for a better view.

By the way, the subtitles on the TV down to the left (pic #7) says: "Det foles ikke riktig nar familien min ikke er seg selv"
- "It doesn't feel right when my family isn't itself"