This is the end Beautiful friend

13 November 2010

Today the last of Rose and Mabel’s piglets left the block. Their destiny decided before they were born, the drought and a lack of grass gave them another month. Their last 6 weeks they have spent basking in the sun on a mound of silage, occasionally stirring themselves to wander the few short metres to the pond to drink or to cool their sun-baked bodies.

“I don’t suppose your pigs would experience much stress would they?” asked colleague Roger yesterday.

Despite the lack of grass, these pigs have had a wonderful life. They have been some of the nicest pigs we have had on the block. They’ve been so calm and friendly and altogether quite lovely.

And so as I watched their little faces disappear out the drive I completely lost it.

Don’t get me wrong, I was always cry when our animals leave but for some reason this time around it’s been really hard. It doesn’t help that I have a chest infection and the crying sets off spasms in my chest that having me coughing so much I start retching.

It’s interesting that it never gets any easier. I want to be tough, staunch, unaffected by these goodbyes but the day I am we’re putting the farm on the market.

Lessons in Cool From Piglet

It took an hour of quiet reflection to stem the flow of tears this morning. God knows the garden could do with the moisture so I guess it’s not such a bad thing.

I emptied, scrubbed and refilled the duck pond barrels. These summer weather conditions are turning the duck water a foul green within days.

I also sprayed some of our precious water around the feeding areas. The smell of duck pooh has been getting just a little too pungent. Can’t complain too much though; that duck pooh is a nutrition blast for the plants, and it’s the trees directly below the duck feeding areas are incredibly lush with spring growth.

With ducks watered, the dogs and I headed down to the shed to make some meals.

As I collected the crates of greens and fruit from the coolstore piglet joined us, grunting enthusiastically with each crate I carried through the door.

I set up the table with board and knives and buckets and then I started sorting through the crates.

“Oi!” Piglet tugged on the bottom of my trouser leg “I’m not smelling any cheese yet”
“That’s because I’ve got to sort the greens first piglet” Piglet tugged on my trouser leg some more “Piglet, you had heaps of cheese this morning. You can’t possibly be hungry yet”
“Cheese. Cheese. Cheese. Cheese. Cheese” Piglet grunted and nudged my gumboot determinedly in the hope I would cotton on
I bent down and looked at piglet “I know piglet, how about we try something a little different before we get to the cheese? How about we put on a bit of music?”
Piglet looked at me suspiciously “Does it taste as good as cheese?”
“Well, no piglet, it doesn’t actually taste”
And so he followed me as I connected leads and flicked switches and he sniffed eagerly around my feet
“Are you ready piglet?”
The sounds of 80’s INXS suddenly filled the air. Not loud by any stretch of the imagination but seemingly loud enough.
Piglet stared at me with a look I can only describe as a combination of horror and confusion and then he bolted!

He was straight out the shed door, across the drive and standing next to the hole under the fence where I swear he let out a shiver. A shiver of what? Revulsion? Distaste?

You’ve got be kidding me? “Piglet…it’s INXS…INXS for god’s sake. They’re not that uncool.”

Apparently they are…

My compilation dance music CD soon became an interesting lesson in what is and isn’t cool.

Enrique Iglesias drove Whisky from the shed and Ricky Martin had Coppa dithering in the doorway.

Piglet was well gone and I was fast becoming a sad party of one.

And then Creedence Clearwater was rocking on down and suddenly piglet, Whisky and Coppa were all back in the shed.

Pink caused a mass evacuation. The party wasn’t so much getting started as it was shutting down. Sorry Pink.

They were umming and ahhing over a bit of Grease soundtrack and Duran Duran. Fair enough. But Tommy and the Shandels had piglet running back and forth between my legs as I boogied on down in the shed.

But then I discovered what cool is… Bob Marley.

As soon as Bob Marley came on Piglet sat down on his haunches and then slowly, very slowly he flopped down on the floor totally grooved out like any Bob Marley fan would be. Whisky licked Piglet’s ear and lay down on the ground next to him. Coppa looked up at me with a smile as he ‘laxed out on the floor.

Oh my god, where’s a camera when you need it???

A bit of early Queen went down well as did some Kiwi Supergroove.

Mozart and Beethoven may work well on cows but it would appear it’s Bob Marley all the way with pigs.

Cool. Very cool!