Tempest: violent and windy storm commotion disruption hurly burly. I can not take photos of wind even as it blows sideways at 40 MPH. It takes more than I know. It looks like a sunny day with smoke along the ground. Wind wakes me up at 4am rattling, breaking like waves against the house. Scout and Al the Dogs do not whine to go out. While Tony and I drink coffee with the bed covers up under our armpits, I talk about retirement. Seven years here and right from the start I always said: I'm not retired yet. Seventy I will retire and make at least one more choice: Western Washington, giant trees, rain and beaches. I foresee Tony with a walker, Beau dies by 30, Scout the 16 yo lab mix no longer with us, maybe not even Al. That iss too painsful to think of. We buy a woodshed that looks like a mini-barn and fill it with tools, a small pen for 2 pet goats and straw for our Pyrenees that are past middle-age by then and we string an invisible fence up. Kansas is 21. If Kaly finds a good home at 7 we will sell or if not I will be long-lining at 90...I have to snap at Tony to get him out of bed. Sunrise did not bring the wind down. By the time he has finished his breakfast drink, I will be done at least one stall. I am up and out. March 1: no physical restrictions starting today. Hernia repair will hold. I am even on both sides of my belly. Just this has made me 10 years younger. I carry outside goats 4 flakes of compressed timothy. Ellensburg has internationally renowned hay and here the big hay sheds sell seconds. The goats pile out of their shed but I walk on top of snow to the lee side and spread hay on clean snow. The stalls go fast. Badger lays on top of a 2 tier hay stack. Jaci Chan spreads out in the hay on the floor. They do not go out in this wind. Liz the chicken and a rooster cluck for layina. By the time I've mucked Kaly's Tony is in the barn. He pries the boot on Kansas shoeless right front then we slowly walk her through the barn. I hold Kaly back and her mom joins her in that stall with turn-out. Two big flakes of Dave's timothy go on clean snow outside. Tony wrestles Beau's boot on his shoeless left front, feeds him inside and I finish cleaning stalls. On my way to the m anure pile the wind picks the heavy rubber bowl out of the wheelbarrow and turns it upside down with molasses cob grain intact on the ground. Quick I let the nubian, cindy, out of the goat pen and she gobbles grain. The baby goats and their mom, the pregnant ewes get compressed hay I set in a line in the lean-to. I string up a rope between the 2 turnouts to give the goats a safe, windless area away from Kaly in case she decides to chase them again. Maybe today fighting the wind will be enough for her. Tony fills the inside water buckets and I fill the outside. The sun is shining. The wind is screaming and up my nose. It is so good to be able to carry, lift, move. Back in the house, homemade bread with broiled cheese. I sneeze and sneeze. I say: I will not be ready to leave for 5 years. I say: You and I know so much now. We know how to work with the weather and around our own limitations and we can almost work together. And then there is what this place will give the 3 grandson; it is so precious.