It rained and stormed and blew hard all Saturday evening and night. We had another calf born in the pasture over night. It's pretty difficult to tell when beef cattle are ready to calve to get the cows in the barn. Their udders don't always swell up or bag until just before calving. So as a result, we had another trip carrying a calf followed by the always attentive mother and Peter the god father. This time Jim got the honors.

The whole entourage walked down into the barn and we got them settled. The calf is a really nice 57 pound heifer called LBF W06 for now.

The sun came out and Sunday was a really nice sunny but cool day. Monday was back to rain and cold.

Tuesday, we woke up to snow and icy roads. There were lots of minor accidents in the area. Chores are still pretty minimal as we have everything pretty much ready for Spring field work.

We had a really good lunch today. Over the last number of years, lots of Mennonites have moved into the area and bought up farms. They are terrific workers and have established several farm related businesses. One of them sells seed. Today they had an open house for farmers to pick up their orders. They provided a lunch that used to be called "hearty fare." Lots of good food and conversation.

Today also marked the end of kind of a milestone in my life. Back around 1980, my firm was a subcontractor on the building of the Buffalo Subway. Part of our work was to remediate a problem allegedly caused by another contractor. This being America those folks and the owner all sued each other. This has been going on since then. We had a false start last summer when I was called to be a witness. It was put off until this Spring.

When you are called to be a witness, you receive a legal summons to appear. These summons are typically brought by private firms called process servers or the Sheriff. Apparently our testimony was requested by two firms so we've had a process server and a Deputy Sheriff visit over the last few weeks. Most often a summons indicates that you have a problem such as you are being sued etc.. In our case, we were simply asked to be a witness. Both delivery folks indicated that people are usually much less enthusiastic than I was about receiving a summons. For whatever reason ours each included a check although I don't think $65 would get me to Buffalo and home.

This afternoon I got an email from Buffalo that after all these years the case was settled without a trial. I imagine the money spent over more than twenty five years of legal wrangling could probably paid for a subway car or two for the folks in Buffalo.

We've got some stock in a pasture across the road that have been sold and the owners are ready to receive. The problem is that the laneway leading to the pasture has become a complete quagmire. If it doesn't dry up soon, we'll have to put some gravel down so we can get our cattle trailer into position.