I do not consider myself a violent man. Overall my temperament is fairly even keeled. Although there is bit of shading or room for interpretation in that statement, I’ll stand by it. Yet there have been moments on the farm where Cindy has restrained me from getting my 30/30 and dropping an errant and dangerous bull. And the toolbox on the truck has a nice dent where I felt that the locks refusal to open required the use of a crowbar to persuade it to submit. But that is all to this confession: just the odd desire to bash or occasionally throw things about.

Usually I go serenely about my chores. The odd irritation brushed off as irrelevant in the big scheme as Mr. Aurelius teaches. So when the damn lamb spends every f-ing moment outside the paddock bleating incessantly, I smile and think, “Spit-roasted BBQ in the autumn?” Yeah, that’ll be nice.

It is a nice trick. Eat those that irritate you. Works well on a farm as anger management. But perhaps you should not try this at home.

Inclinations towards violence aside this has been a good weekend. We got two hundred garlic bulbs cured and trimmed and ready for storage. Cindy has spent a fair amount of time photographing puppies. I’ll leave it to her to describe the challenges of corralling puppies and dealing with the website. But Becky had ten puppies a week ago. You can see pictures on the website. And Caleb and I spent six hours in the sun and heat laying out erosion mats where the pond is no more.

After three years and more money that we would care to admit we had the big pond filled. It simply never held water. Dozens of know-it-all experts and neighbors each had their own opinions and we tried them all.

But when faced with spending $10,000 to line the pond we capitulated and filled it.  After all, the pond was too big for me to throw about in a tantrum. It took 100 dump truck loads to fill.

So we stretched out straw erosion mats yesterday and put down staples and spread grass seed. Now we wait for it to return to its previous state as an attractive pasture. A hard lesson and one we will pay for if I can ever find where I threw our checkbook.

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Reading this week: Restoration Agriculture: real-world permaculture for farmers by Mark Shepherd.