The elephant next door

You know how folks refer to "the elephant in the room," right?  It's that topic, problem, or person about which everyone is aware, but that nobody wants to admit to or discuss.  We all have at least one, don't we?  
I'm pretty liberal with pictures taken on our property.  This is a wonderful place to be, especially since we moved back here into the trailer house.  Especially this time of year.  
However, I do a lot of picture-editing.  There's a house next door, built only three or four years ago, that I crop out of many pictures.  I removed it from the right-hand side of my new header picture, as a matter of fact.   
Why?  Well, the siding is blowing off the backside of it, for one thing.  Oh, and the yard is bare dirt.  No grass has ever grown there; if weeds get too tall, it is bladed it back to bare dirt.  Areas just across the fence from us are covered by very tall weeds.  
We bade goodbye to one such elephant when we got rid of the old rental trailer.  There is no remedy for this one.  Thank goodness for the ability to crop pictures. 
If you ever wondered why zoning laws are enacted, you can stop wondering:  Now you know.  

Speaking of elephants, Clyde is steadily growing.  Sometimes I'm asked, "Isn't he old enough to wean?" 
Of course he is, but if I weaned him I'd either have to milk twice a day (you've GOT to be kidding) or dry up the cow and buy my milk (I really like our raw milk, even though we don't use much).  Clyde takes care of the milk until I need some; then I remove him from his mommy overnight and milk Bonnie in the morning.  I milk once or twice a week.    
I've been asked, "Won't his mother wean him?"  
I have never yet seen a cow that would wean her calf by her own choice, but maybe it has happened somewhere, sometime.  Sir Loin, Bonnie's last calf, nursed until we hauled him away at the age of one year.  
Clyde will nurse until the end of June; then we'll take him straight to the butcher shop and Bonnie can rest for a few weeks until she has her next calf, around mid-August.  During that time, we'll buy our milk.  By the way, I love to milk cows!  I just don't want to have to do it every day.  

Until that time, Clyde remains his mommy's baby.  

Ideally, I'd love to wean Clyde now and put the new calf (Jody) on Bonnie; however, that would require a separate pen with a source of water for Clyde, and that's just too much trouble.  So I'm feeding Jody store-bought milk replacer.