Poverty Is Not an Accident

Poverty Is Not an Accident
Nelson Mandela

Thursday, February 03, 2011

My poor goats!

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They're in that back bedroom and the space heater is on. They pulled down the drapes I had over the windows and they leak.

I went back there before 6am to check on them. They didn't move. Chili is standing on the mattress I put on the floor. Nilly is curled up on a sofa cushion in a corner. Willy is on a sofa cushion in the closet. Nobody made a sound.

So, it took some work to put the drapes back up. I had to take off my gloves. In just a few minutes, I could feel the frostbite returning. I was wearing dry, fleece-lined shoes, but my feet are slightly frostbitten. I wasn't in there more than fifteen minutes!

Chili has frost on the whiskers around his nose.

I have no idea if they've suffered any permanent damage. It won't even be daylight for two more hours, and I don't know if the sun will shine then or not.

I closed the door to try to keep as much heat in as possible, and I left the ceiling light on.

It's minus five Fahrenheit, with a wind chill of minus fifteen. They have no wind, but it hurts to move at all out there.

It's not warm in the house trailer, either, even though 2 heaters have worked all night and I turned on the propane oven for an hour this morning, finishing cooking the chicken. The cats' and dogs' water dish, sitting on the kitchen floor, was frozen on the bottom.

I can't cry; I don't want my face to get wet. I can't wash my hands.

It would have been MUCH worse, if I didn't have the house trailer and was still in that mobile home.

Electricity flickered off for about a second last night. I immediately woke up when the heater fans stopped. I sat here a beat, thinking what to do, when everything winked back on again. That happened at about ten pm last night. If it hadn't come back on, we all would have died: dogs, cats, goats and me. not to mention that poor, angry fish in a bucket in the bathroom.

Temps predicted not to get beyond 20 Fahrenheit today: well below freezing, but it sounds warm, compared to this.

My heart is breaking and I am SO SCARED! 

1 comment:

This Brokedown Life said...

Drink some hot liquids -- tea is good. Eating something raises your body temp as well. Got soup? I am over in the high plains area and it got to 20 below here last night in my little village -- 17 below in Tucumcari-- with all the predictable outcomes in terms of pipes, vehicles, power losses etc. Shramming cold. I did not lose power, so that's a big relief. I enjoy your blog and am glad you are back again posting. Am enjoying reading about your fixup of the new trailer. Stay as warm as you can, Leslie H.