I know, living on a farm in wine country, I experience a lot of things that would seem unusual to most of my contemporaries. However, piglets in a cage in the entryway of the house threw me for a loop.
At first, I thought maybe the farm cats they'd been talking about getting had arrived until I heard the small grunting noises coming from the cage. Then I noticed that they were not cats, not kittens, not a new puppy, not even a duck (which wouldn't be the first time, since my ex decided it was a good idea to get pet ducks and have them live in our garage.) Nope, they were indeed little black and white piglets. Piggies. Swine.
Now, my family here and the farm manager raise pigs for food; they get them as younguns and then they grow up in a big pen up towards the top of the hill, rooting in the mud and eating food scraps to their hearts content. However, there is a distinct difference between FARM animals and pets, and never did I ever think a pig would come into the house unless it was in pork form.
Turns out, some friends were hunting boar and grazed a sow, and then rescued the babies. Since these friends live in the city during the week and the piglets need to be feed every couple hours, my uncle said, "Sure!" without really thinking about the maintenance that goes into to caring for a baby piglet.
I had the great idea last night after a cocktail party/pig roast (Ha! I just noted the irony) that I could just wrap the little guys in a towel, a swaddling per say, and get them to feed that way. This is when my Uncles' conjecture that "These are not cuddly fellas..." was proven true. Two pounds of pure muscle can wriggle like hell, and the term "squeal like a pig" has a whole new meaning for me. Needless to say, I ended up with more goats milk on me than on the pigs face, and certainly more than in the pigs belly since it was too busy spazzing out to actually drink any.
Lessons learned:
Pigs are, indeed, not cuddly; Piglets in a cage confuse pet dogs; Goats' milk mixed with piggy spit is not a good smell.
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At first I was disappointed to see no comments on this hilarious post. But then I realized there have been a number of pithy comments back and forth by some of the women of the older generation of Ms. Caitlin's family, who - having grown up on a farm - found the post quite amusing. But, alas, coming from the older generation, these comments were never posted here but instead were exchanged by old, stodgy email.
ReplyDeleteAll that being said, I wonder if the little piggies squealed in objection mostly because the milk being offered them was from a foreign species, to wit goat. I know we humans accept milk from other species, sometimes, as in the case of goat, with some delight. But perhaps piggies are more particular?