My television debut

by Agnes the goat

Those of you who follow me on Twitter already know that on Friday we taped my first television appearance. The show will air tomorrow afternoon on Paula Sands Live in Davenport, Iowa and the Quad Cities area.  My daughter Marie and I went with my milk maid Deborah, who wrote a book about goats recently. The other goats and I taught her everything she knows, so of course, she had to bring us along to publicly thank me and the other does back home for all of our assistance.

First of all, I have to say that I was really disappointed in the travel accommodations. I was shocked and horrified to discover that we were expected to travel to the TV studio in dog crates! Oh, yes, we each got our own private crate, and they were big enough for us to stand up and turn around, and they were filled with fluffy straw, and we were even given some hay for snacking, but really -- dog crates! We are caprines not canines!

When we arrived at the studio, the farm apprentice Jane escorted us into the building. We were taken in the back entrance -- the one that only the most famous people use! First they took us into the studio, and Marie started to poop on the floor. They asked us to go into a room called the "garage," which I assume is their term for the green room. Being my first time on television, I've never seen a green room before, but I sure expected it to look a lot nicer than it did. It reminded me of the front of the barn at home where the goatherd stores his tools and stuff.

A couple of people walked through the green room and asked what we were doing in there. I suppose this is the most special green room that only gets used for the biggest celebrities, and they wanted to be sure that we were important enough to be in there. Then more people came through and asked if they could pet me and Marie. Before we knew it, there were people having their pictures taken with us, including Greg the weatherman. I overheard my milk maid say that she never received that kind of attention when she's been at TV stations in the past. Obviously, the people in Iowa know true greatness when they see it.

When we went into the studio for the promo shot -- that's when they videotape us as Paula is doing a voice-over saying that goats will be in the next segment -- they asked us to stand on a rug in front of some beautiful plants that didn't smell good enough to eat. In fact, I've never smelled plants like those before. They didn't make me the least bit hungry. How strange! Marie and I both squatted to pee on the pretty rug, and people started gasping. You would think they'd never seen a goat pee before! Come to think of it, I've never seen a human pee, so maybe it isn't something they're capable of doing, which is why there were so impressed. Then we stood up and started to poop, and I heard more gasps and cries of, "Oh, no!" I really did not see the big deal. No one ever cared when we peed or pooped before!

Then they started talking about having us stay on the pretty rug. Earlier they said we would be with Deborah on the main set during the interview. There was a lot of talk about cleaning carpets. What does that have to do with our interview? We're here to talk about the greatness of goats and our wonderful milk, which we share with the barn servants so they can make cheese and soap.

So, Paula sat down with my milk maid, and the cameras were rolling. They talked about the book and our awesome milk. Paula tasted the chévre and showed off the soap that the barn servants made with our milk. Then Paula asked my milk maid about us, and Deborah introduced us but completely forgot to tell everyone how we helped her write the book! I was disappointed, but I suppose I should not have been surprised. After all, humans think they are so smart. Silly people even think they are smarter than us caprines. The simple truth is that my milk maid could not have written that book without us!

As we were getting ready to leave, Paula said she wanted to get her picture taken with us, so of course we obliged.

When my milk maid and the apprentice put us back into the dog crates (ugh!) for the ride home, they told us we were good goats (well, duh!) and gave us something called corn "chips," which didn't look like any corn that I'd ever seen before, although it smelled similar. I tried to resist eating them, thinking they might have been poisonous, but the humans left a few in the crate with me, and after a little while, I finally nibbled on one, and it tasted okay, so I ate all of them. I heard the humans talking about another television appearance in a few weeks. I do hope I get a luxurious travel trailer next time.

Marie and I were exhausted by the time we got home, and we spent the rest of the day lounging under a hickory tree while the rest of the herd was browsing around the pond.