The Great Boling Blizzard of 2009

In the first week of December this year, there was more snowfall recorded in Boling, Texas than there was in Chicago, Illinois. What a fun fact! A few weeks ago, on December 4-5, we got 4 inches of S-N-O-W right here on the Texas Gulf Coast. For us, this creates all kinds of pandemonium. Of course, school was cancelled. No one ventured out of their homes to come to work that day, except of course, me, the die-hard RHD'er, and Christa, who was working on updates from home.

In my own defense, I lived in Michigan for 2 years so driving in snow doesn't scare me all that bad. So I braved the very traumatic 4 inches of snow to drive into work that day. By about 10 a.m., everyone at the ranch was calling me to tell me to come take pictures of all the snow at the ranch. Since it was a Friday, I decided to shut down for the day.

As soon as I got home, I started snapping pictures. First, I found it very amusing to see our holiday (a sled being pulled by Brahman bulls) in the snow. How fitting.  And who says Brahmans can't make it in the cold?

Next, I headed over to my house, which everyone said was the cutest, since I had went all out on my Christmas decorations. My little house, key word here being LITTLE, looked like a little Christmas dollhouse.

From there, I got all duded up in my winter gear. Which included at this point a cowboy hat, a Burbery scarf, a puff jacket, and J.Crew muddy boots. I was looking real cool.  My only excuse is that we don't get cold weather that often, so I didn't really have many options.

I headed over to the V8 Showbarn to discuss the day's events with another warm-weather-fan...Matt Karish. He was just as miserable as me. But perhaps, the most miserable all was our herd bull at the showbarn, Mr. V8 380/6. Bless his heart, all the other ladies in his pen were huddled up under the barn, but there was a little heifer in the pen next to his who was in heat. So this guy was NOT leaving his post right by the gate because he was in love. Poor thing, but hey, I guess we all do stupid things for love sometimes.

From there, I was summoned over to the working pens, where it just so happened to be our bad luck that the snow day was the day we were flushing cows and putting in embryos. I thought I was going to just photograph the snow. However, I overheard my dad telling the ET technicians...."Okay me, Rachel and Frank (our cowman) will go pen the other cows and call y'all when we have them in the pen so y'all don't have to wait out in the cold."

What? I have to help pen cows? You should have seen this scenario. Who works cows in the snow wearing a Burberry scarf, Chanel sunglasses and J.Crew boots? Rachel Williams, that's who. And at this point, Frank is thinking his life can't get any worse, because in all honesty I'm not that much help when it comes to working cows. Seems like I do something wrong more than I do things right. Which in this instance, I manage to get my SELF stuck in the muddy lot. As soon as I was running behind the cows to shut the gate I hear my dad yelling at me to stay along the fence because I'll sink in the mud. Too late! I sank to my knees. Thank goodness for those J.Crew wellies I bought! I hear Frank and Dad yelling at me to grab the side of the fence and pull myself up. Nice work. I prefer designing ads in the heated, covered office.

After lunch, and successfully putting in 100 embryos, we finished up for the day, and I headed home to get warmed up in the comforts of my window unit heater. So hopefully, we're finished with snow for the rest of 2009. And 2010, 2011, and 2012 for that matter. I'll take the 110 degree Texas summer's any day over this snow baloney!