Llama Spit and Other Images

Before I leave for my annual weeklong writing retreat, I thought I’d take the opportunity to share some images from this last week as I did chores. Also, since the Farmer is very busy with an 8-week short-term job with Uncle Sam and won’t have time to read this blog, I’m going to ‘out’ one of her hobbies, then slip away into the night so she can’t yell at me. Now and then she’ll say, “You aren’t going to blog about this, are you?” When she asks that, then I can’t. When she doesn’t, well…. We bloggers live dangerous lives, with big fat lines running through them. Sometimes it’s kind of fun to cross over those lines….

The Farmer is strong and tough. She drives a Farmall 706 row tractor, a big son-of-a-gun. She has a chain saw, a wood splitter, a four-wheeler. She has a weed whacker that can fell small trees. Yet what does she do when she comes inside? She fusses over pretty little flowers.

I’m not at all into fussing over flowers, and barely remember to water them. I just want them to look nice without any work. But thanks to the Farmer, there’s lots of blooming going on here:

She knows what sort of orchids these are, but I don’t care about that—I just like looking them as I walk by.

Other images from this week…

The puppy pretending she has a broken leg.

Pumpkin looking pensive….

Helen, the last duck remaining. (The other two? The puppy got one, and a predatory bird got the other. Damn.)

Chachi eating his treat in a private dining room, with Tucker the jerk standing there trying to intimidate Chachi into leaving the treat for him. All three llamas are in the same pen this winter, and it’s just like a junior high school in there.

This hen gives new meaning to the phrase ‘beady-eyed.’ What she’s really saying with those baby blacks is, “Steal my egg one more time and I’ll peck your eyes out and stuff them down your throat.” Sadly, I stole all the eggs she was sitting on.

A lovely snow morning…

Nearly every single person who meets our llamas wants to know if they spit. “Yes,” I say, “but not at us.” We would never stand for it. The llamas, however, do spit at each other now and then, and have been known to spit at lambs that might have been bugging them. Melissa had a close call when she accidentally got between two llamas about to attack each other with wet, green glops. Their ears were back, their glares were fierce, but she yelled and waved her hands. “Break it up!” Their ears went back up, and they wisely swallowed their slimy projectiles.

I saw this the other day. Had to stop and stare. What the heck? Oh, llama spit.

I don’t know who did the spitting, but his aim was WAY off. I should go out there with a bucket of soapy water and make all three llamas clean off the barn. How else will they learn?