To continue the theme of piglet being much more interesting than her two human guardians, take a look at this alarming picture. Demon piglet does not appreciate the cell phone camera.

The little one keeps picking fights with the feral cats living in the field/old buildings across our house. Today, Amanda and I heard much screeching, and when we ran out piglet was all puffed up and angry. Earlier, Amanda had noted five cats (undoubtedly feral) hanging about the old garage/car dump nearby, and piglet probably wanted to encroach on their territory. Given that she has a warm home and plenty of food, it is hardly nice for her to pick on the poor neighboring cat posse who have to catch their bfast every morning.

Bad piglet!

Amanda and Susan doubted the allure of the new IKEA cat bed. But look here!

Muwhahaha!

The sky earlier this evening was quite odd. In this picture it was very purple. I wonder what the airplane pilot thought?

The atmosphere kinda mutated between various shades of purple and orange. I was happy the picture verified it was not my addled imagination.

Last Saturday we went on the Harvest Celebration Farm Tour; various farms in King Country were open to the public and had special events and whatnot.

We went south to Auburn and Enumclaw. First we stopped at Tree ‘n’ Bees, as one might expect, they are an apiary and holiday tree farm. We saw a demonstration of how honey is extracted from the hives. I had seen such stuff before, but Amanda had not. They also had a hay ride, but we skipped that event, although it might have been cool. Amanda made a beeswax candle later, and I sampled their various types of honey. I did buy some (blackberry and fireseed) even though they were a bit expensive.

We met Splash, one of their two cats. She was very friendly to me, although she did give me quite a nip later.

Amanda said that two kids were giving her evil pets instead of “soft pets”, so perhaps she thought I saw going to be evil as well. We did not see her sister whose name I have forgotten.

We then went to Thunder Mountain Farm & Sleeping Giant Alpacas. They were more nursery than farm it seemed. We did see a cool muscovey.

And Amanda was happy to see two crias.

I ended up buying a purple coneflower for our house for my new echinacea business.

Next was Rockridge Orchards and Bamboo Groves. We went through their bamboo maze which was almost a little exciting. They had a chef’s demonstration that we just missed… I guess we were looking at the ducks and alpacas too long. They also had a lot of cider and different types of pears. I finally tried the “rum” pears that I had seen at various farmers markets. The woman said some people said they tasted like rum, others said no. She did not know herself because she has never had rum being a virtuous high school student and all. My verdict: yes, they definitely taste like rum. Maybe I wasn’t a virtuous high schooler.

Our last visit was with Rainier Alpacas.

As one might expect, they had many alpacas. Most of them were recently shorn. There was also a one week old cria, Sugar Baby. She looked very large already.

We took the scenic route back through Auburn and Kent. I found the roads and building orientations in Auburn very odd as nothing seemed to be a right angles for some unknown reason. We stopped in Tukwila for a snack and to look at books in a Barnes and Noble. Then is was back home to the piglet piglet.

I found this picture recently on a website for my last high school reunion (lifted shamelessly without permission, but, hey, I never signed a model release either). It was taken at Mount Trashmore park… yes, that is its real name… during a picnic; I did not actually go to any of the other reunion things.

Blake and Mark are the other two guys.

Some interesting-to-me-anyway things:

• Amanda immediately noted: “No gray hair!!!!!”
• I still have the fleece vest, but Amanda does not want me to wear it in public and embarrass her
• I do not have the t-shirt anymore
• nor do I have those round glasses

Hmm, I definitely look thinner especially in the upper body. Perhaps I was in my T-Rex body type phase (Amanda: “humongous legs, teeny useless arms!”) since I was bicycling everywhere in the last half of the 90s.

I wish I still had the waxed floppy hat; it had been with me on countless hikes and mountains and protected me from rain, sleet, and snow for years until I lost it within the first week of moving to Seattle. Sad. I have not been able to find a replacement, although I did see one almost like it on Kaua’i, but it was too small.