Ansy, when I was younger my father owned his own business. We would go to slaughter houses in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and another state that I can't thank of which one now and buy cow hides and deer hides. My dad was known as the hide man. But we would sell them to a place in Fort Worth and they would sell them to Mexico or other places that would tan the hides. Kids used to make fun of me for it but they just didn't realize how much money that business brought in. And they wonder why I was wearing the 80 dollar jeans. Sometimes we would pick up goat hides but they really weren't worth much then. I used to help my dad though in the summer time. I actually had a lot of fun picking them up. I was even okay with the magots. Gross I know. But with my dad in that business he got me and my sister involed with the slaughter houses.

My sister worked at one in Cleburne, TX for a few years. We even video taped her one day doing a big ol' cow. I hate to say this but I was always so interested on what was on the inside. But I have to say I hated to go in the big walk in freezer and sack up the heads. I remember once when Robin was trying to knock out a huge water buffalo and she thought it was out and when she opened up the shute to wrap the chains around his feet he jumped up and was really angry. I thought he was going to tear up the kill floor. I ran in there with the only gun we had on hand and had to shoot it. And trust me it was hard to do with a 22. Good thing I am a good shot. I could show you pics if i could find them. But some people may not want them to be posted. A lot of the pics of what we find in the stomachs but of course the guts are still in them too. I could also talk forever about it.

Oh yeah, my sister also worked at a place that only killed goats too. I remember when she killed this one goat and found out it was pregnant and she did a c-section on it.  She gave the baby mouth to mouth and swung it around and he actually lived. She brought it home and I got to bottle feed it. I had to sell him though. She turned out to be a handsome little show goat for the local Ag department. Okay really I am done now.