I did it.

Yes, I did. I was collecting sap just now. And out of pure curiosity, I tasted it. Got a little on my fingers and stuck them in my mouth. And I have to say, it wasn't bad. Like sugary water. Which is what it is of course. I'm not replacing my coffee with it though.

Which brings me to this next story. It happened thusly:

About 20 minutes ago, I was on the north side of our home site giddily looking ahead to see how full our sap buckets were (5 gallons already Dan!). What joy. It's going to be fat syrup eatin round these parts this year. As I poured some of that liquid candy into our 5 gallon pail, I noticed the air smelled sweeter. A little flowery, a little earthy, a little bovine dung-y. I thought that was odd because the wind was coming from the north, and there's really no cow/steers that a-ways. No matter, on to the next tap. Hmmm, I thought. That's an odd looking rock. Moist. And green-ish. No matter, on to the next tap. There's one! Across the little field I spotted an almost full bucket. Sweet! I trotted over gaily.

Midway to the tree and bucket I stopped. Hoooooo! That's definately poo, I thought. I looked down and holy expletive. I was standing in a field sprayed generously with cow/steer poop. I had already traversed a good 20 feet over the ... well ... you know ... sh*t. And I had to trod at least another 20 to get away from it.

Apparently, one of our neighbors forgot to turn off their manure spreader while traversing our field to theirs, or they didn't think we ever used ours and just didn't turn it off. Either way, I've got some seriously affected shoes and jeans. And I JUST DID LAUNDRY THIS MORNING. Next time I get excited about sap, I'll have to remember that no matter how great it is to see a bucket full of sap at the foot of a tree, I must watch where I walk!