8/25 Part 2 (In which the milking occurs)

((I'm just going to jump right back in where I left off, because doing anything else would require...thinking.))

Then we had the pig feeding clinic. The take-home message from that was give them solids and liquids twice a day, though good luck figuring out what specific solids and liquids go when, and they eat like pigs so be careful of your feet if you have to go in and line up the troughs. I had animal feeding today, so Tessa took me to feed the chickens and collect their eggs and clean the horse paddock. Usually we'd also feed the pigs, but that had obviously already happened, and the calves, which had also already happened because of a miscommunication (which google is telling me isn't a word...so if it isn't...well, I think it is?). This was also when I "milked" a cow, though it wasn't like I milked the whole darn thing (which could easily have taken me over an hour). I just helped strip the cow, which was testing each udder to make sure the milk was coming out clean and liquidy and all that. It's especially important here since they sell the milk raw. I don't mind being around the cows, which is good, considering I have to teach children to be comfortable with it!

After animal feeding, I started writing this blog entry-- it's taking awhile, as you might imagine-- and then had dinner. I realize the food is one of the most described things so far, but it's good! And also easy to describe. It's been a little strange eating dinner alone, though I got used to it in London and Sydney. I have a lot of alone time so far, and I'm not quite used to that. Not that it's bad... it gives me time to write this all down! After I showed, I came out to the children's garden and now I'm sitting under the grape...sukkot, for lack of a better word. There are actual grapes hanging down-- green and purple, so I can't quite figure out which one is the ripe one that I could try! At least I can snack on the cherry tomatoes-- farmer's candy, as Matt says. In front of me is a gourd hut, which is awesome and worthy of description, but I won't do it justice so I'll take pictures and post them later. It's a good child-sized hut, though grownups can still fit in, and it's completely covered by climbing gourd vines. When you get inside, there are little curly vines and little and big gourds hanging down...it's pretty magical! Tere are some huge ones.

I have animal feeding again in the morning, which means I'll meet Nick at 6 am...that's sleeping in, though, because Beth has to be at the barn at 5 am and Joanna has to be at the bakery at 4 am!!! Chuh. ((I can't help but interject here, because I would like to point out that 4 am is 1 am in San Diego. Which means that someone who lived there, if they didn't have work in the morning, could easily still be up at 12:30 am when someone at Hawthorne Valley was getting up at 3:30 because the only way they were going to survive the next 3.5 hours was with some seriously caffeinated tea))

So going to sleep early is probably a good plan. I'm going to go check in with Nora and the other little cows first, though. They're pretty skittish, but I'm persistent, and we're all curious. So one of these days.