My 12-year-old daughter wants a goat.

We don’t live on a farm, but we’re outside of town. So I can’t count on a city ordinance to save my grass.

My friend Mickey had his batch of kids 10 years earlier than my wife and I, so he coaches me on kid matters and, lately, kid matters involving pets. He was skeptical last year when I told him about my children wanting chickens.

“Have you lost your marbles?” he’d said. “I’ll bet your kids are talkin’ up the free eggs and how they’re so much healthier, right?”

“Yeah,” I’d replied. “Pretty much like that.”

“And the little buggers don’t mention the $300 coop and the $50 de-icer and the $200 a year for food and bedding and supplements. But hey, each week you’ll get 50 cents worth of completely free eggs!”

Then Mickey became dead serious. “Listen, buddy, chickens are a gateway farm animal. They seem harmless enough, but your kids will crave the serious stuff. Stuff with hooves.”

I should have listened. My track record with kid pets is lousy. Just as Mickey had predicted years ago, the children lost interest in the kingsnake in about a week, but I kept buying frozen mice for years. The first parrot died young, an apparent suicide. The second parrot wouldn’t die at all, even after every family member cursed his deafening existence.

As for the beta fish, rats and guinea pigs, the kids sucker punched me with each one. I would invariably start rattling off reasons why another pet was a bad idea. “Who’s gonna feed and water, scrub cages and arrange for care during our vacations?”

I might as well have been clicking gibberish like a pet porpoise. The particular kid would look back at me, eyes a little glossy, and say, “But Daddy, they’re so cute!”

When we were first considering chickens, Mickey draped an arm across my shoulders and held up an instructional index finger. “Remember this above all: They won’t be farm animals.”

I was confused. “They won’t? What about the free eggs?”

Mickey gave a knowing smile. “They’ll be family members, just like Rover or Puss-Puss, understand? When Henny Penny gets the sniffles or waddles with a limp, you can’t just lop off her head and fire up the grill. It’s off to the vet for an MRI and a private cage.”

Again, I should have listened. One of the chickens recently needed a month of antibiotics, administered (and not by the kids, mind you) with a little beak syringe. Adding insult to injury (our insult, Henny Penny’s injury), no eating the completely free eggs lest we dose ourselves with fowl drugs.

Now our 12-year-old wants a goat. After all the painful poultry lessons, my parental skepticism was off the charts.

I had a heart-to-heart talk with her. “Listen, Sweetie, goats are serious farm animals. We’d need a pen, a lean-to, vaccinations and bales of hay. And don’t hit me with that free milk routine. Goat milk tastes like goats smell, and goats stink, which reminds me… the goat itself probably costs $50.”

“For the breed I want, $250. But Daddy,” she said, her eyes a little glossy, “they’re so cute!”

I know, Mickey, I know. But you weren’t sitting there when she said it.