Farm Fresh Blog

Behold the future in ranching technology - the drone. Ranchers all over Texas are buying these little rascals to make checking on cows a little easier. (Well, maybe. Or maybe Big Boys just need an excuse to buy another toy.) Other Half has been flying his drone all over the ranch and in addition to finding cattle, it is a lot of fun.  I named it Angry Hornet since it has a loud buzz. (Note: this buzz attracts Border Collies.) He's been flying it often enough now to get pretty comfortable, so today he decided to just sit at the picnic table by the back door and check cows.  It did not go as planned.

Since dogs are not big fans of drones, Other Half had me lock up all the dogs. The sheep put themselves up, but we failed to consider the Norman Factor and as Other Half was setting the drone out on a suitable 'take-off pad' Norm spotted Dad and ran for a possible bottle. Other Half had to run away from the drone lest Norman decide the drone looked like a $600 bottle.

Something about this picture just tickled me.

Norman was quite interested in the Angry Hornet.

So were the dogs. Jury really, really hates buzzards. He is quite certain that Angry Hornet is merely a white buzzard. If he can ever catch it, that will be a dead drone. Note MoonPossum knows that everyone is excited about Angry Hornet but she's looking in the wrong direction, because, duh, she can't see it. She can't hear it either, but even a deaf dog that can't see well KNOWS everyone is barking at something.

So Angry Hornet takes off. And for some reason, Other Half gets distracted and instead of sending the drone up, up, and away, like he usually does, he let it hover over the little pond. And just about the time I quit taking pictures and called his attention to the trees and the pond, Angry Hornet just slowly buzzed into a tree and commenced to chewing limbs.

Other Half commenced to stroking.

And screaming. At me. For help. I asked him later why he was yelling for my help. What was it he expected me to do? He said he wanted me to catch it like a football.

"Do what?"

"You know, like a football!"

"But... but... it has blades. Blades that are moving very quickly.... blades...."

He then growled something about blade protectors on the blades. Okay, whatever. It was a moot point because Angry Hornet went straight from treetrimming to scuba diving.

I'd like to point out that Other Half can still move amazingly fast for a old man wearing bedroom slippers. (We can kiss those $60 sheepskin slippers goodbye.)

Angry Hornet & Angry Man

Who knows why Other Half had a brain fart and quit paying attention. Maybe he got distracted. Maybe he hit the wrong button. Or maybe. Just maybe. Maybe someone put a curse on the Angry Hornet.

"DIE, White Buzzard! DIE!"