Farmer in the DELLusion

Mark goes through these strange tantrums from time-to-time.  Among the many recurring ambitions to seize hold of this otherwise sane man are these alarming ideas:

• Threading his way up the Amazon on a jet ski
• Sailing his way around the globe-with his family as deckhands
• Owning a huge ranch in the middle of Montana-no-where
• Competing in an Ironman triathlon

But the one that has recently reared it's ugly head once again is his delusions of being a FARMER.  Suddenly, he got up one day with a renewed and invigorated hankering to be a farmer.  Go figure.  His "farming fantasy" would be amusing if we were city people living in concrete neighborhoods and could really do nothing about it.  The real pickle is that we actually live on land, land big enough to farm and raise beasts upon.  So when Mark gets these homestead hankerings, whooa!  We're all in trouble.

It started with him bringing home the baby chicks that I recently posted about.  Little did I know that was just the tip of the silo.  Since the chicks showed up his plans have escalated prodigiously-like rabbits, but think bigger in terms of animal size.  Quite suddenly, he has schemed up elaborate garden plots and even brought up the subject of cows.

Cows!

At this point I must confess to you that I am openly against pets, livestock, or anything animal whatsoever.  This shouldn't come as a surprise.  It's not that I don't like animals mind you. I had a dog growing up after all...oh and a couple of cats.  I even liked them a lot.  What I'm against is being responsible for an animal, because quite frankly I'm the mother of four children, which, let's face it, the duties of parenting verses raising livestock seem indistinguishable at times.  Both children & livestock need feeding, watering, shots, and corralling.  In other words, I'm already a farmer so to speak, I'm trying to domesticate children and therefore have no energy left to domesticate animals too.

My other animal theory (a confession that is both frank and somewhat gory) is that you never want to have a pet bigger than a hole you can dig.  Because if something should go wrong you're gonna have to bury the evidence that clearly proves you were really not cut out for animal ownership--the carcus.  I'm not kidding.  Which, quite honestly, puts me OUT of the cow market thankyouverymuch.  This is also why I've only momentarily considered bludgeoning my husband in an attempt to put a stop to his crazy ideas.  He's safe as long as there's a  back breaking 6' x 3' x 6' deep hole to be dug. (Yes, I measured once when he was being particularly insane I thought a moment too long about putting him out of my misery.)

So as of last count, I've got one cat, three kids, four chickens, and one delusional husband who dreams of being a farmer. I'm hoping it will stop here but I caught him researching electric fencing last night when he said he was "Facebooking".  And right now, as I type this post, he's outside tuning up the rototiller. 

For the record, I'm  drawing the line at overalls and a corn cob pipe.