Cooper Comes to Appomattox
Jun 15 '02
The Bottom Line If you have to transport a goat in your vehicle, don't let him drive...or navigate!
Nearly all of the Chief Dragon’s family now reside in Naples, Florida. This used to be really convenient when she lived in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida and could jump on the Alley and be door to door in just under two hours. Now that she maintains The Weyr in Appomattox, Virginia, it is a lot more of an expedition. Instead of being able to pop over for a day it takes more than a day to drive down, 17 hours, in fact. Consequently, visits to the family now require a minimum of four days away from The Weyr. Four day or more during which cats, clucks, horses, and other assorted stock still need feeding and care. Friends can usually be counted on to keep an eye on things but that ol’ demon quid pro quo has been know to raise his head on occasion….
SO…YOU ARE DRIVING DOWN TO FLORIDA?
When word of a spur-of –the-moment trip to Florida became general knowledge, details of the return route were probed and questioned by a good Dragon friend, who, as it happens, raises colored angora goats. Not one to be easily gulled by circumlocution, the CDR quickly caught on that there was an agenda behind this line of questioning. Especially the part that suggested a side-trip to Atlanta might be buckets of fun, providing ample opportunity to buy new crop pecans, enjoy some different scenery on the way home, and oh, by the way, stop in to visit a particular friend who also just happens to raise angora goats. Sometimes these coincidences are just so uncanny!
Atlanta, Georgia never has and never will be on the way home from Naples, Florida to Appomattox, Virginia. It actually represents a fairly substantial detour of many miles and hours of driving time. However, in the interests of insuring that the Gang of Four be fed and watered during her absence and in maintaining a highly treasured friendship of great importance, your Dragon agreed to deviate from her accustomed and direct route to provide transportation for a goat. Said goat was purported to be of small stature and pre-adolescent in development. This proved to be incorrect in both instances.
GO TO ATLANTA AND CONTINUE ON FOR ANOTHER HOUR OR SO
Atlanta is rather pretty by moonlight. So pretty in fact, that it is easy to make navigational errors while admiring the sights. For such a large city, there is remarkably little light pollution, allowing a surprisingly fair view of the heavens. Alas, admiring the crescent moon proved sufficient distraction to account for three wrong turnings and an unscheduled drive-by visit to the airport.
Lungs full of jet-fuel fumes and the correct route freshly memorized, the CDR continued north on I-75, plowing blindly ahead into the dark night, seeking the correct exit. An exit she been led to believe was nearly adjacent to northbound I-85.
Ha! It sure is easy to fool a Dragon, these days. In actual fact she was less than an hour from Chattanooga, Tennessee, when, out of the night loomed a familiar green reflective sign, indicating her destination was only a few miles farther on.
THE EVANS ANGORA RANCH, MIRAGE OR MEMOREX?
By now the directions were pretty easy to follow, it was the woeful lack of highway signs visible after dark that proved her near downfall. Fortunately, there are people who always provide lots of good landmarks with their directions. Stuff like, “turn left on Broken Stump Road (look for the red brick Lutheran Church just before the corner),” or “bear to the right on Rebel Shriek Lane, (opposite the IGA with the huge display of new-crop pecans and country hams out front)” often make all the difference when navigating unfamiliar territory.
In fact, were it not for the large Quick Stop with all the gas pumps out front, your Dragon might still be wandering through north-western Georgia, hopelessly lost and goat-less. The highway sign was neither lighted nor visible, but the Quick Stop shone forth like a beacon and the young man stacking cases of Mountain Dew was well acquainted with the Evans family and their goats. He politely pointed her in the right direction and soon after she was nosing her way up the lane to the goat barn.
A BRIEF WORD ABOUT ANGORA GOATS
Generally they are smallish, as goats go, and covered with very soft and shiny ringlets of fiber, called “mohair.” Mohair is very fluffy and used to make garments that eventually, with much wearing, become large puffs, along the lines of a ripe dandelion seed head. Only the puffy stuff does not fall off when you blow on it, just tickles your nose and makes you sneeze.
COOPER MAKES HIS PRESENCE KNOWN
The goat that charged out of the pen and butted the Chief Dragon in Residence behind the kneecaps in a friendly greeting typical of buck goats was neither small nor pre-adolescent, as promised. Cooper, the goat in question, is a full-grown male, possessing the acrid aroma only produced by rutting buck goats. An aroma that can fell full-grown men at a distance of 500 yards, an aroma that makes its presence know by coloring the atmosphere with a sickly yellowish-brown tinge, remarkably similar to high-sulfur emissions from a coal-burning power plant. The very aroma that caused tears to form in the CDR’s eyes which did not go away until she strapped on her army-surplus gas mask, thoughtfully provided by the Dragon Dad when he heard about the goat detour.
This goat, weighing a whopping 128 pounds and standing 37 inches at the shoulder, was going to be the Dragon’s boon companion for another 12 hours of nightmarish driving. The crate provided for Cooper turned out to be exactly the same size as said goat. By encouraging him to tuck his legs up, it was just possible to fit him into his travel accommodations. As allowing him to ride shotgun was totally out of the question and attempts to fasten the crate to the roof rack were met with stony stares from goatherd Evans, Cooper in his crate was secured in the rear of the Dragonmobile.
GOATS ARE NOT GOOD DRIVERS
Nor are they very good passengers and they have, as a general rule, very poor singing voices, loud, but not exactly melodious. Dragons are not noted for their ability to carry a tune either, so it was a contest as to who could warble the loudest along with Green River and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Cooper won, but only because the gas mask made it so hard to draw deep Dragon breaths.
As the Dragonmobile ate up the miles, clipping along at a steady 75, Cooper continued to make his distress known. He butted around inside his crate and kept poking his impressive horns through the grills. After a little experimentation he discovered that by sort of butting and jumping at the same time he could move the entire crate. Long before Knoxville was reached Cooper was nearly in the coveted shotgun seat, crate and all.
ANOTHER WRONG TURNING, LEXINGTON IS IN VIRGINIA AFTER ALL
Alas, the Lexington that is kept in Virginia is not on I-75. It turned out that Cooper was not any better at navigating than he was at singing. He tried to eat the Garmin positioner, and his noisy insistence that we stay on I-75 nearly convinced the Dragon to go to Kentucky. Fortunately she recognized the error before the point of no return and looped back to I-40 and thence to I-81 and familiar territory, the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Cooper finally settled down with one horn protruding from his crate in such a way that it poked the Dragon in the armpit every time she changed lanes. Rather than wake him and start another chorus of frantic bleating the Chief Dragon in Residence elected to endure the discomfort for as long a possible. Besides, the occasional jabs served well to keep her awake and heading in the correct direction.
FINALLY, THE EXIT FOR TROUTVILLE, ALMOST HOME
It was a bleary eyed Dragon who slipped off of I-81, heading towards Lynchburg and Appomattox. However, home was less than an hour away. A quick stop for coffee and to drag Cooper’s crate back where it belonged generated a second wind and in no time at all the Dragonmobile was tooling down the lane to Shepherd’s Croft and Cooper’s new home.
Cooper, however, had other ideas. He refused to leave his crate until we disassemble it and then he clung to his beloved Dragon’s side like a limpet mine. As he was about as welcome as a limpet mine, no encouragement was needed for her to trick him to follow her into a pen from which she climbed out on a goat-proof ladder.
GOAT LOVE, NOT A SIGHT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART
Apparently the drive from Georgia to Virginia was of sufficient duration for Cooper to form a permanent matrimonial bond with the CDR. Now whenever she visits his home he abandons his harem of beautiful goat wives and moons around the gate until she leaves, all the while expressing his undying devotion with loud bleats and physical manifestations much better left to the imagination.
Copyright 2002 Pamela Matlack, All Rights Reserved
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Member: Pamela Matlack Klein
Location: Appomattox, VA
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