Midnight on the farm. Day spent on daily chores and tearing rosebushes out of fence lines. Saw a lot of good birds btw.
Cell phone rings on the head board. Liz has a rejected load of milk and has to go NOW to pick up a sample to get the producer back on the truck. She has to stop here to pick up some of her stuff....head's up so we won't worry when the truck pulls up the drive.
Ah, I love that panicky, heart-slamming-fear-moment when the phone rings at midnight. I feel bad for her, but she is on salary and must do whatever they tell her to. I sort of begin to fall back to sleep. I will wake again when she comes in the house, but it will be okay....sort of...
Then the other phone downstairs rings.
WTF? and no I don't mean Wednesday, Thursday etc. Rush downstairs, but not fast enough to pick up. However, they leave a message. Of course they do. It is another milk company in an area code very far from here calling ME because Liz was on another call and they had to leave a voice mail.....and they want to be very sure to get a hold of her to tell her about the rejected load. She is already on the road, but evidently someone needed to spread the panic around.
I was thrilled. You know you can usually get back to sleep after one middle of the night awakening, but after running downstairs....forgeddaboutit.
I returned the call and apprised the nice gentleman from the other company in the other area code about the status of the crisis and I think I was even reasonably civil.....for midnight at least....I suppose someone had awakened him inconveniently too. I did ask him to take my number off their listing though. I have fielded milk company calls before and not minded. Sometimes she is out of range with the cell and they have left messages for her with me.
But at MIDNIGHT!!! On a dairy farm!?! Ridiculous.
Anyhow, later in the day, after I finish the Farm Side, and milking and chores without Liz, who got back to bed at 6 AM after driving all over the state, I will probably put up pics of our day in the field yesterday. migration is in full swing and we had lots of company.
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7 comments:
Oh my, this is one of those times that I am so glad that I don't have Liz's job and of course don't have to be the mom ;)
As a commercial property manager, I get my share of midnight calls ... but never for someone else. That's not good.
Sorry 'bout your interrupted sleep. :)
Lisa, I am glad too. Worst of it was that someone with common sense managed to set it up so she could have waited until morning to go, except that she was already on the road. lol
Rev. Paul, thanks. they called me off and on all day too when she was out of cell range or on other calls. I have got to get them to take my number off their listing. She doesn't live here any more. lol
Lordy. NOTHING worse than calls in the middle of the night.
Now being a no-nothing on these matters - and only if you don't have to labor over an explanation . . (you need your sleep:) . . . what is a 'rejected load of mild' and what is 'getting a producer back on the truck"? Geeze. Sorry I'm so dense.
Now I'll make a run at it and if I'm close to answer "check". . . . .
Does it mean that when the producer took it to the 'receiving place' . . where it was dip-sticked and it came up with bacteria or banned chemicals . . and Liz has to go get a sample for (the state? county? for legal purposes) so that the owner of the milk/truck can get on their way?
Check? :)
Ahem. That would be " a rejected load of MILK" . . .
Cathy, you pretty much got it exactly. Milk is held to certain bacteria and chemical standards and if a tanker load doesn't meet them it is rejected. Each farm is sampled every time milk is picked up so it is easy for the lab to find who is responsible. The new sample was to see if the problem had been resolved so the next load of milk could be picked up.
Wow. Just amazing the way a product is created, regulated, distributed . .
It really is a little mind-boggling when you realize the human effort behind a product that we take for granted.
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