How do you fit six years of enjoyment, frustration, anger, fear and sorrow (and, oh yes, six years of fur) into such a small hole in the ground? This year has been a bad one for the animals living with us at the ranch. Starting with all of this year’s lambs and kids dying over the winter and early spring, and now our Siberian Husky (named Zoe), 2008 hasn’t been good to us on that front. No sir, it hasn’t.

The dubious benefit of living on a large patch of dirt in the country is that you can keep your dearly departed pets nearby. For most of this year, the task of digging and burying our dead animals have fallen to The Boss. She’d taken this task upon herself, either as penance or atonement for somehow failing to have brought the animal into the world in the first place. But just last week The Boss gave birth to our son, Baby Max. This means that Zoe’s grave would be my task to accomplish. All mine.

The circumstances of Zoe’s departure from this life were intensely frustrating, in that there was little we could have done to help her. There’s no cure for cancer, just treatment and hope of remission. But given the economic environment, our finances, the new baby and all of the other activities of the ranch, our choices were limited to one. We are not independently wealthy in order to afford several thousand dollars of analysis and chemotherapy. And it sounds insensitive inside my head and my heart when I say that we certainly couldn’t afford it for our dog. All the same, our choice was the most compassionate one we could make in our situation.

For her last day, we took Zoe from the vet, let the kids pet her and say goodbye and took some photos. After dropping the girls off with a friend for a playdate, we returned to the vet, took Zoe out again, and walked her all around downtown Sonoma. One person standing at the side of the road mentioned to us as we walked by, “that’s a beautiful dog you have there.”

He had no idea how beautiful she is.

She looked happy, sniffed wherever she wanted, we’d stop or go where she lead us. This was her walk, her swan song, her coda before the end of the performance. As we got closer to returning to the vet, my heart sank deeper and deeper, my mood darkened despite the gloriously good weather. I knew the moment of truth was approaching, slow and inevitable, step by step. My eyes misted over several times throughout, as my heart swelled with love and remorse for this wonderful and sometimes vexing dog. Of course Zoe noticed none of it, and other than the significant swelling on her left jaw and down her neck, she looked and acted just like the dog we always knew, perhaps turned down a couple notches due to the pain meds and the exhaustion of a long walk.

When the time came to euthanize, it was my hand that signed the papers saying we had chosen this. It was my signature on the line saying that my dog was going to die. It still didn’t seem real, somehow this was happening to someone else, and I was just bearing witness. The Boss and I cried. We hugged, we talked about what a good dog she is. We talked about how hard it was to do this, that it was going to be okay, even though it didn’t feel that way at the time. I finally told The Boss that I couldn’t be there when it happened, so I took Baby Max (barely five days old) and went outside to sit on the porch of the vet’s office and sing lullabies to him, while The Boss was with Zoe in her last moments.

It seemed to take forever, and then The Boss came out. It was done. We went to the truck and opened the back. The Boss said that Zoe was on her lap when she was put to sleep, which squeezed whatever composure I had left out of me. I sobbed. I grieved. The vet techs and the vet brought her out a few minutes later, wrapped in a shroud. I thanked everyone for their help in this, and hoped that they understood that this choice was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.

Zoe was a sweet dog, gregarious, frustrating, taxing, always loving, sometimes hyper, sometimes impossible. She was around for the births of all of our children, barely six months old when Ellie was born, all the way to now. She had the breed’s tendency to run away from you like a shot if she was off the leash and not somehow cajoled or convinced to come back inside the fence. But despite the inevitable and common doggish flaws, she was a sweet soul and an undeniably good dog.

She was too young to go, way too young.

Zoe now rests by our greenhouse in a hand-dug grave that is just wide and long enough, a bit too shallow perhaps, but which will serve as the basis of a flower garden that we’ll place at the site so that we can visit. And remember.

The story goes that this goat barn was supposed to be completed before the rains came in 2007. Then we ran out of funds, and the barn was (at best) a covered shelter that kept the rain off the herd (after a fashion). Then it got cold. Then the sheep were lambing; none of the lambs made it. Then the goats were kidding; none of the kids made it (no kidding).

And so it goes. Now it’s summer in 2008. The barn is still unfinished, we now have child #3 literally just about to show up (we’ve bookmarked the name Sebastian Maxwell — “Baby Max”), but at least the herd’s shrinking instead of growing.

The Boss has finally learned the hard lesson that raising livestock is not a simple, uncomplicated process. It’s hard, unforgiving and only occasionally rewarding (this coming from the guy that watches her and says, “it’s your herd, not mine!”)

Where was I? Oh yes.

The barn is the merest framework of a building. Ten uprights holding a corrugated metal roof, as well as subfloor on a split-level layout. The ramp leading into it is cobbled together. There’s a sheet of plywood on one side, masquerading as a wall. Mr. Handy was kind and tied on several huge tarps to attempt (and largely fail) to keep the weather out of the “barn” footprint.

Now, The Boss is a bit more realistic. With still no funds to really finish it the way it needs to be finished, I will ultimately put in some basic framing, then nail on some plywood siding. Windows will be roughed in, and hinged shutters will be used in the meantime to allow for ventilation (until we can actually get some windows to put in).

There’s supposedly room for a second floor that can be hung on the posts. I figure we’ll get that roughed in in the most basic way as well.

All in all, it’s a plan that doesn’t please anyone, but keeps the animals protected in the winter months to come.

Now all I have to do is make it happen.

However, we have gotten better with the fake Internet than I think we could’ve possibly imagined. It all began with replacing the P.O.S. (code for “ultimately inadequate”) Kyocera KR-1 router with (of all things) a Mac Mini running OS X 10.5 (”Leopard”). Our uptimes went from minutes between reboots to literally days and days between network disconnects. Add in that the Mini doesn’t need to be restarted pretty much ever, and it’s the best $600 I’ve ever spent.

It cleared up all the difficulties I had with VPN into work, it’s perceptibly faster than with the KR-1, and it damn near never disconnects, no matter how hard I pound the connection. Suddenly, YouTube was not a ridiculous notion. I even managed to download a rental movie from iTunes over the connection. I won’t say that I’m thrilled with the throughput. But hey, the fact that I can run BitTorrent fills my heart with peace, such that I feel no desire to run BitTorrent.

Sometimes, just being able to do something allows you to let go of the desire to do it. Other times, you probably go ahead and binge on downloading DVD sized ISO images.

The Boss, uttered just before hanging up the phone with me while I was returning from the lumber yard this afternoon.

No, not that kind of kid. One of her Nigerian Dwarf goats is pregnant and about to give birth. So, The Boss is hustling because we just can’t seem to keep Mr. Handy engaged in building the goat barn.

Oh, see, there I go again, getting ahead of myself.

Let’s recap: seven goats (soon to be eight), six sheep, a baker’s dozen of chickens (even though our Siberian dispatched another hen and The Boss sold off four roosters for $14 — trust me, I’d rather have the $14), two rabbits, two guardian dogs (welcome to the family Loki), two cats, and two dogs as pets.

It certainly looks like a ranch. Kinda smells like one too.

As part of this, The Boss has been on me since the beginning of the year to get a goat barn put up. Of course, here we are in October, the goat barn is about 15% complete, and it’s getting tougher to keep Mr. Handy engaged on it, for whatever reason. Of course, it’s built to withstand the ages (i.e. it’s overbuilt), hence it takes longer, involves a fair bit of timber framing (okay, post-and-beam, but who’s really checking) and is now expected to be twelve feet tall.

Honestly, it looks like a tower over on the far side of the yard. Of course, there’s trees all around, so you almost can’t tell, but it’s still going to be tall enough that we will be able to put a loft up above (for hay and grain storage — yes, this is a real barn, I’m telling you).

But in order for it to minimally work for us, we need to have the roof up and floor put down. The walls can be tarps for now, until we’re able to get siding (or boards and battens, depending on how rustic we want this sucker to look) up on it.

Yup, The Boss has a plan, yessiree.

The other interesting thing was that the youngest goat, named Happy by our kids, is (or more pointedly, was) a buckling — a young male goat. Now, considering his genetics, or lack thereof, The Boss decided it was time to wether Happy. That is, considering Happy was going around molesting the lady goats with his little winky hanging out in the breeze, and he doesn’t particularly have any traits or qualities that are worth propagating, his <ahem> nuggets were no longer considered mandatory equipment.

So, Happy has now become Un-Happy (The Boss jokes that he — or “it” — is now Anti-Happy, but that implies a gender change, not the same as being emasculated). Of course, I find it deeply troubling that a fellow male, however genetically distant, suffers genital mutilation, even indirectly, according to The Boss’ whimsy.

Note to self: keep The Boss happy, lest I become Un-Happy.

At any rate, my major concern is that I don’t totally suck or do something completely embarrasing with nobody else around to keep me in check. The biggest issue is that I’m not a winemaker or even in the wine industry (except that I’m married to a grape grower, and I’ve just finished my first class over at Napa Valley College having to do with wine).

This will definitely be interesting.

The Boss gets chickens.

My sister moves in.

The dogs “play” with the chickens (or at least all but one of them).

The fiber optic shows up.

The enclosure for the media converter shows up.

Things are starting to move again on the Quest for Broadband.

Oh man, what a sweet ride.

Or at least, what a hunk of heavy machinery. 14,000 pounds of steel, oil, diesel and hydraulic fluid.

The hydraulics leak like a sieve, the bushings at just about every pivot point are shot, the seat is completely ruined, the hour meter has never worked (at least that’s what the neighbor said when I asked him about it), and the front loader bucket is bent in the middle.

Isn’t it purdy though?

However, I digress.

Subchapter Two, Continued:

We needed to dig a trench right down the middle of (part of) the road to the vineyard. It wasn’t going to be pretty, either. Just walking the road, you could see the surface of boulders and rocks, almost as if the road had been paved with cobblestones, albeit gigantic ones of all shapes and sizes. Nevertheless, our Solar God thus proclaimed, “get thee a ride-on trencher, and all will come to pass as I have foretold.” Apparently, the kung pao of the walk-behind trencher that Mr. Handy had been using was clearly not spicy enough for the task. So, after much delay (and at least two breakdowns of Mr. Handy’s truck), we had the ride-on trencher delivered.

It took a day for it to break.

The rocks were so big and so tough that even the ride-on trencher was denied. It was so bad, the chain on the trencher came off, shearing two bolts on the arm that holds the chain in place. So, we were left with one option: backhoe. That’s right, time to bring in the heavy artillery. Unfortunately, as Mr. Handy frequently mentioned, using the backhoe meant that we would almost certainly be tearing out a lot of road, because any rocks or boulders that the backhoe lifts out would in most case be wider than the twelve-inch bucket that was on the backhoe.

In truth, I’m glad Mr. Handy was so up front about it. Honestly, I am. Because what my eyes beheld once the trench was dug down the road was nothing short of horrific. I actually thought to myself, however briefly, “oh crap, what have I gotten us into?”

It almost didn’t look like a road, there was so many rocks strewn about on either side of the trench. The trench itself averaged probably 15 inches wide, and it was deep enough that I was down past my knees when I walked in it. Yes, I walked inside the trench.

Happily, the chapter ends on an up note: the pipes and wires were laid into the trench, covered in sand then layered with rocks and road base as backfill. Then we were able to bring in additional road base to help level out the road a bit. In the end, the scar left behind from the trench was analogous to a scar you might see on someone who had been through open heart surgery. Yes, it looked ugly at first sight, but you quickly realize that it had looked much, much worse.

And the work is not done, not nearly. There is still getting all the fittings on the various pipes to join them together. There is ordering and having the fiber optic pulled from the vineyard gate down to the house. There’s burying the rest of the trench. There’s hooking up the electrical and fiber optic at both ends. Only then might we realize the glory of real broadband. I am now absolutely certain that it won’t be real for me until at least a week after the project is fully finished.

But this post is not about any of those sites up there, oh no. This post is about a man. A “shockingly handsome” man. A man who is dedicated to altering the reality of a very stodgy and calcified institution: the wine industry. This post is about Gary Vaynerchuk and his video podcast called Wine Library TV.

I first encountered WLTV some months ago (and I’m sure Gary will gripe that I haven’t given him the love he so richly deserves) while perusing several of the wine blogs I now frequent on an on-again, off-again basis. Originally, I thought that watching wine reviews was not something I was particularly interested in. After all, I’m keen on the growing of grapes (which The Boss and TBB are basically in the business of doing) and the making of wine, but not particularly in the tasting and reviewing aspect. At least, that’s how I used to feel.

That’s the power of Gary and his podcast. He is so charismatic and approachable that you find yourself wanting to believe in what he offers: that wine is fun and easy and uncomplicated. After having watched him for a few months, I have broken out of my red-wine rut and bought wines I would’ve scoffed at six months ago. Pink wines, white wines from all over, French wines, you name it. I’ve bought $20 wines that sucked (at which I shrugged my shoulders, told myself, “well, at least I know I don’t like that,” and moved on), and I’ve bought $11 bottles of wine that blew me away. Most important of all, it has led me to this epiphany:

I now have no fear of wine. It is not daunting to me, and I have Gary to thank for that.

So, thank you Gary, you have opened up a new realm of experience for me, and I will always appreciate that, and I will always appreciate you.

Go to Wine Library TV and get to know Gary yourself.

Some classic episodes of Gary’s that are not to be missed:

• How to train your palate (Episode 148)
• How does the weather affect wine (Episode 182)
• Gary’s latest (Episode 263)