and i thought i was nuts...... maureen and alan have a roaring business with "goats to go" (along with a construction type company that is not nearly as much fun....)
they live in gerogetown( next town) 1/2 theyear .. and foroida the other1/2--
what is so strange??? they have 133 goats.... and they take them with them to florida in a double decker bigggg trailer.-- teh whole thing is very similar to crazy acres...they sell a goat cuddle and ice cream for $30 on a sunday afternoon-- and get sold out !! their place is lovely.. with pond and substasntial acres...-- goat yoga.. goat races... a bunch of goofey ideas all fun.
it was reassuring to me to find another kindred soul who has found a need to provice some fun and relaxing atmosphere for total strange nuts......
i knew them long ago ... in our draft horse phase. ....alan was pres of the yankee draft horse association when i was looking for a way to get 200 people from oublic parking on route 1.... to the barn building site about 2 miles away...
long story and i do now have the video... if i could only figure out how to share it...... barn burned early morning in saugus-- i was up early and heard on the tv...horses running loose etc-- so i ran to help-- found an awful mess-- but alot of horses made it out and altho there was fire dept. neighbors , etc all thtre being helpful, the regular world did not know a horse needs attention at least every 8 hours-- hay and water.. if nothing else- when the barn burned they of course lost all their hay and feed... so i ran back up rt 95 and came back with a truckload of hay /grain/buckets/ropes to get them started... i happened to drive thru home depot where i told the manager about the fire...and he picked up on it..eventually providin 100 volunteers and it turned into a huge production with local hot dog company ( neighbor of my daughter gwen.) truck full of sausages onions peppers and hot dogs along with staff to cook it... ambulancew crew.. local carbenters union ( thank heavens-- they were th eonly ones who knew what we were doing.. rex trailer ---boston's tv cowboy lead teh wagon trail of draft horses and hay wagons full of workers....on "goldrush lll" and made a video for us on vhs.. which i now have on my computer(thanks to legacy transfer co) but. i don't yet know how to share it. it is a big file....
maybe a couple pictures...
it was alot to ask of the draft horse owners... get their 2 horses at 2000 pounds each ..plus a hay wagon ( another ton or two... ) and harness all ready to go at 6am in saugus-- thy had to start loading all that about 3am.. but they were all there.... about 6 teams...
you have not understood horse power until you have ridden behind a team of those drafts.. -- they got those wagons rolling with very little effort .. one team even had a baby draft tied to the side of mommie's harness. trotting right along with her.. no problem...
we had a team... dick and duke... once the lead team in a disney hitch.. beautifully trained... you cou dl stop them outside a coffee shop and tell them to stay there.... go have coffee... and when you came back they would still be standing there.. because they were so nice... we inadvertantly bought a very pretty pair of grey mares .. i say inadvertantly.... we were at an auction ?penna??/ and the 2 mares were pregnant-- and teh bidding was $3500-- so teh hammer fell.... we bought them... problem was... when i went to write the check... the secretary said one word i will never forget.... EACH..... i swallowed hard and wrote teh check for $7000 and had to run ome and figrue out how i was goin g to cover that.
they were young and beautiful-- but no wheres near as nice to handle as duke and dick.... they had not spent hours in teh fields with teh amish farmers... this is why when janine comes home with a mule out of the amish auction. we are pretty sure it will be a well trained reliable animal being retired for some ? health issue... with clyde -- the open sore on his withers.. and mo with her "choke" problem.
what finally got us ot of teh draft horses was .. with the 4... we learned about shoes for drafts-- done by the kriz blacksmithing. family. $250 per horse... every 8 weeks.
there was no way to skip teh smithing bill.... or the hay bill either...
experience comes from experience--- not always bad experience- but it was an expensive one.
the saugus barn fire 1987?
