Don’t worry, I work here

I went up to feed the cows on Saturday afternoon, around 5:00pm.  Normally, this is an incredibly unremarkable experience.  Cows waiting impatiently in the barn for their dinner, bellowing at me as I get out of the truck.  Hay in feeder, cows munch munch huff moo munch, back in truck, go home.

However, this time, instead of cows waiting for me in the barn, I found the corral gate wide open, cows grazing in the neighbor’s yard like it was springtime, and other neighbor Zach waiting in the road looking a little unsure of what to do next.  Apparently, one of the cows (I suspect Abigail) figured out how to unlatch the gate and they had been on a little mission around the neighborhood to find something green to eat.  One of the neighbors, not having a lasso handy and unsure of what else to do, called the Grafton Police Department.  The officer who came up the hill, presumably also lasso-less and not knowing what else to do, went to Zach’s house.  And so Zach told the officer, “Oh, the cows are out? OK, thanks.  Don’t worry, I work here, I’ll take care of it.”  Nice!  Anyway, Zach called Paul, Paul wrangled Dave, and I showed up just in time.  After an hour of pursuit and cajoling, and after setting up some road blocks and temporary fencing, we got the cows back where they belong.  And now there’s a chain on the gate.