As the storm raged outside, we kept busy eating all our non-perishable snacks and playing board games - anything that didn't require electronics or electricity. The girls pulled out Battleship and Clue from the back of a cabinet, but our favorite is "Speed Scrabble," a fantastically-fun version of the popular spelling game involving all the letter tiles but not the board. Between games we went out to the garage to console the lonely goats...who, we discovered, had also invented their own game to pass the time...
Confined to their improvised hurricane pen inside the garage (warm and dry but frighteningly unfamiliar), Emerson and Elliot apparently spent several hours engaged in a new activity we called "Poop & Stomp." To play this game (not that I really expect any readers to do so...), the goats first deposit their pellets (that's the "poop" part) all over the garage floor, preferably while running in circles for maximum scatter-ability. Then (this is the "stomp" part) they butt heads, rear up on hind legs in choreographed tandem, and bring down their forelegs in a forceful stomp, flattening anything that happens to be on the floor. This can be repeated dozens of times until exhausted. The end result is that, instead of an easy sweep of dried pellets with a broom, clean-up now requires individual scraping of each pile and pressure-washing of the concrete floor. Well, at least they were having fun...
Needless to say, the first chore we tackled once the rain stopped was moving the goats back outside. We still need to pick up some fallen tree limbs and bring out the porch furniture, but that can wait. We have water, electricity and a dry basement - blessings for which we are so thankful. Our prayers go out to those who fared much worse. Yet I beg one last attempt at humor in a serious situation. If there's one thing Sandy taught me about emergency preparedness, it's this - before the next storm, I really need to teach the goats to play Speed Scrabble!
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