These are a few of my favorite things

So far, I’ve figured out that collecting eggs at this farm isn’t quite as fun as I had remembered. However, I have figured out two things that I do like very much:

First, is the pirate chicken that escaped the coop and now lives in a grove of bamboo. I am thinking that a name is definitely in order but I haven’t thought of a good one yet. So far the best I’ve come up with is “chicken-that-is-followed-by-a-loud-peeping-noise” because you can easily find her if you follow the noises coming from her new chick that is never more than five inches away. Maybe I should just give them both one name, “the-pair-that-can-make-even-scrooge-smile.”

My other favorite thing is the wreath room. On the outside, the wreath room is only a large wooden shack. But step in, and it smells like heaven. Inside the walls are covered in wreaths and from the ceiling hang hundreds of flowers and herbs in bunches. The wreaths have taken hours to make by hand, crafted by the flower ladies who sit inside on rainy days to weave the plants together. Now I know when I need a pick-me-up, I can just stick my head inside to get a whiff.

Day 2

Today was a very chicken-y day. I started my day with mostly animal chores: milking and feeding cows and then collecting and cleaning eggs. Collecting eggs on this farm is not really the same as collecting eggs at Pie Ranch. In Pescadero, I was always the first one to volunteer myself for egg collecting and relished those last few moments of sun when I would go from one coop to the other with my basket in hand. I suppose the reason I don’t like it as much here is because the Full Belly hens are older and much more crotchety. The first time I stuck my hand under one it made loud screeching noises and pecked repeatedly at my hand. Needless to say, since then I have learned harsher methods. Now every time I come up to a mean looking hen I quickly use my other hand to hold her head back so she can’t attack. I guess what it boils down to is that the Pie Ranch chickens were much less caring about their eggs, they weren’t “mother hens” like they were supposed to be. There, they seemed only mildly curious when you stuck your hand under them to grab at their treasures. Here, collecting eggs seems more like stealing.

After my morning of thievery, my next project was ironically to help facilitate others’ stealing. I spent the day hanging a (human) door to the brand new chicken trailer where the new pullets will soon start laying eggs for us to harvest. The door was my second official construction project, but unlike the planter from a few weeks ago this project took much longer than expected. What I had believed to be a two-hour job ended up taking Rebecca and me an entire day! To our credit, the builders (*cough* Joe and Alex *cough*) neglected to level the frame completely so our job was inundated with headaches. Despite all these complications, after a full day of assorted doorknobs and power drills, we finally finished and the door now closes perfectly…And now, some day soon I will be able to use this door to collect baskets and baskets of fresh eggs.

Full Belly: Day 1

Today was surprisingly much more low key than expected. Last night I spent hours in my room surrounded by piles of clothing, but so far packing has been way more stressful than actually being here. With a frost still looming in recent history, the farm is moving slowly and stiffly.

Since my departure in the fall, things have mostly stayed the same here. The most noticeable change is the new office building that is starting to look more and more like an actual office than a skeleton of a building. Besides the construction, the only other change is my new abode and the three new neighbors that come along with it. My new home is a dusty old abandoned pink trailer behind the barn. But after only a few hours of work, I think I am finally moved in! I spent a long time getting rid of dust and cobwebs – which will undoubtedly return sooner than I would like them to due to the vast number of spidery friends I live with – and now the space is totally livable.

Even though it’s only been a few hours, I already have two suspicions. First, I have the feeling I will spend most of my time in my bedroom area because even though it’s only a trailer, it still feels really big to live here by myself. Also, I have the inkling that I am going to become very good at tuning out pig noises. Just five feet from the door of my trailer are two stalls with five full-sized pigs in them. Five very loud full-sized pigs, to be more accurate. To make this even better, one of the sows gave birth to three piglets around Christmas so soon enough the chorus of squeals will be almost doubled. Note: I realize that this can easily be perceived as sarcasm but I thought I should set the record straight and say that I actually do enjoy living next to the pigs (thus far).

I can already tell I am going to grow fond of this trailer.

2010

In Baltimore, I re-watched the 6th Harry Potter movie with my cousins. In the movie there's this magic hourglass that changes depending on the level of conversation. If a conversation is more interesting the sand slows down, but if it gets boring it speeds up. Unfortunately for me, right now I feel like my life is moving like that magic hourglass' evil twin. The New Year is quickly approaching and in less days than I can fathom I am moving away to Full Belly. Everything is moving in high gear (hence the sporadic blog entries). In these few moments of quiet that I have just before I go to bed I wonder what change the new year will bring and hope that 2010 will be full of interesting discoveries. Here's to the next chapter in life!

Travels

In terms of people watching, airports have got to be up there on the list of ideal locations. There's something freeing knowing that the person you spend a whole flight next to you may never see again. I know people who like to go on planes and put on a completely different persona just for fun. I have to say I've never gone quite so far but I can definitely see the appeal. If I were into theater I'm sure that would probably consist of most of my training.

Well, even though I didn't pretend to be someone else, I did end up befriending a few unlikely characters en route to Baltimore...

First, while standing in line we met a very friendly man who engineered satellites and told stories of his great aunt who had been a slave in the South. My mom ended up sitting next to him and I don't believe there was a single moment when they weren't talking. The two then proceeded to make friends with the man in the third seat, a young Indian man from Punjab who was on his way to a three-day wedding in New York.

With their incessant chatting going on across the aisle, I was in the meantime squashed between two other guys. The old man to my right ate his way through an entire bag of Hershey's kisses while reading "Seduce Me At Sunrise" for the entire duration of our five hour flight. 

On my left, the young guy who had been sleeping with his head against the window before I sat down woke up and was startled to find me there. After groggily rubbing his eyes a few times he introduced himself as Chris, the son of a retired Navy officer. I surprised myself by not being as judgmental of him as I would have expected. Normally if someone were to tell me they were in the army or that they just got inked and spent 700 dollars on the tatt, I would be more hesitant. But in this case, curiosity got the better of me. We spent the next three hours exchanging life stories and I learned about his home in Annapolis and his school in Monterey. He showed me how to write sentences in Arabic and told me the ins and outs of life on the base.

Then, on a bathroom break I met a So-Cal college football player whose neck must have been about four times as thick as mine. We talked about school and mostly about him: he spent twenty minutes talking about his model girlfriends, his football career, and his job at Vans. After being overdosed with information from this guy Gerard, I went back to my seat and spent the rest of the flight talking with Chris and the old man.

Finally in Baltimore we piled in the car with our luggage and drove through the city. All around cop cars had their lights on as snow began to fall and they collected the homeless to bring to shelters.

In one day, I got quite the spectrum.