A neighborhood in Boise, ID became the scene of an unexpected goat takeover this week, as “about 100” goats descended on the lawns and gardens of a residential area — to the surprise of homeowners waking up to discover their new neighbors snacking on their front yards.
“They are going house to house eating everything in sight. Nobody has a clue where they came from…” tweeted out local news reporter Joe Parris on Friday morning. The goats came in all shapes, colors and sizes and were snapped meandering around sidewalks and even making a few attempts to climb trees.
The event he coined “Goat-a-Palooza 2018” got many scratching their heads trying to figure out just where the goats had come from. But in the end, the mystery was solved as the animals were herded together and returned to their ostensible home.
“Party is over ‘kids’!” Parris continued to update. “Loose goats have been cornered and loaded back onto a truck owned by ‘We Rent Goats.‘” According to local news, the goats had been stationed on nearby land where they were let loose grazing; herds of goats are often used as a natural form of fire suppression and weed clearing. But somehow this particular group got away from their station and decided the neighborhood’s nice green lawns were more to their taste.
I found her story remarkable. Growing up in Austria, on the eve of World War II, Ms. Ginsberg fled the Holocaust and landed in a refugee camp in Switzerland. After the war she and her husband, Otto Kollmann, moved to Hollywood and built new lives, composing for some of the most popular singers of their generation, including Nat King Cole, Doris Day and Dean Martin.
As Ms. Ginsberg grew older, she kept writing lyrics and poetry, and realized she needed to find new ways to reach an audience. How was she going to gain attention in a society where older women are neglected, silenced and often cast off?
At age 93, she discovered a solution: death metal, where you can shout your lyrics instead of sing them. It offered a new opportunity for reinvention at an age where those chances can be elusive. So beyond the spectacle of her unlikely performances, Ms. Ginsberg’s story is really that of a woman who is finding new ways to be heard.
This stunning bright red tomato frog (Dyscophus sp) was photographed by Beverly Houwing at a museum in Santa Ana, California. Tomato frogs get their names by being rotund, large, and red.
Urocyon's Jaunts 2.0 
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