The Miracle of the Hot Water Bottle

Yesterday, I went to the small animal swap in Spring Valley. It was a muddy cow pasture, made worse by the rain that kept falling. It was, aside from being cold and wet, a really interesting experience. People had goats and geese and LOTS of chickens and rabbits and chinchillas and a pig was there and parakeets and doves and something that looked like an overlarge weasel and I heard someone had had a trailer load of sheep but they went right away at 5 AM (I got there at 6:40). It was barnyard overload and I have never been so happy to only have $40 in my back pocket.
After some negotiation with the cutest eight-year-old in the world and a more bedraggled and grumpy mid-thirty year old (sorry, but it really isn't good business practice to complain that what I am paying you for your rabbit won't even cover the gas it cost you to come, while you are snatching up my $10), I came home with a New Zealand doe who may have been bred that morning by accidental close relations with the buck for sale, and a Flemish Giant-Californian cross, which was my best guess after being told she was a "scruffy mixed doe from an Amish guy". I came home with two new livestock members before 8 AM. The rest of my day was a whirlwind: build two cages, borrow car & trailer from friends, go to Boyceville to fetch a rototiller, go to Amery to buy chick starter after an out-of-the-blue call from the USPS dispatch center in Eau Claire telling me my chicks (expected on Tuesday) arrived at 10 Am and did I want to pick them up, go to Clear Lake to pick up crates to transport meat birds for processing on Monday morning, back home to drop off crates, food, check on rabbits, back to friends' to drop off car & trailer, back home to release dogs & feed them & the chickens & collect eggs, back in the car to pick up other friend who I coerced into coming with me to Eau Claire, get lost in Hallie, finally find dispatch center, pick up box o' chicks and take-out from Culvers, drive home, show other friend how to settle a new box of chicks for the night, spend 40 minutes fussing with quilt tent to cover chicks for the night, let out dogs, and then go to bed.
So this morning, I am moving slowly. Too slowly for the puppy, who pees all over the floor by the back door because he can't hold it any more. Well, a mop up job for later...and then I am out the door in sweats, dealing with chickens and rabbits. What do I find? SEVEN NEW KITS, all on the ground under the "she may be pregnant" doe's cage. All were cold, covered in crud, and I thought they were dead on arrival. I felt horrible. I didn't even have a damn nest box, and here I was confronted with the knowledge that I needed one, like, yesterday. I thought about burying them. I thought about going inside for coffee and a nap. What I did was, gather them up, rush them into the house, wrap them in a towel and park them on top of a hot water bottle, and go about the rest of my chores thinking, well I can bury them later, poor things. Imagine my surprise when I came in and peeked under the towel and discovered FOUR were alive. I felt like Dr. Frankenstein, shrieking "It's ALIVE! It's A-LIVE!"
Three of the four are back out with mama rabbit, in a temporary cardboard box-nest box. Baby bunny #4 is still warming, he/she was really chilly and rather small. Now I need to get off the computer, get dressed and go into town (oh joy of joys, just where I wanna go today), and buy a proper nest box for these unexpected but welcome new arrivals.
There you have it: The Miracle of the Hot Water Bottle. I think I should call the Pope.