Pork with garlic?

My apologies to anyone who landed on this page looking for a good recipe. I couldn't resist. That's Jerry, our boar, coming to see what I'm doing.

The garlic I planted last fall is up and looking good. There's something else in the raised bed, however. Can you spot it below?

Look in the lower center of the photo, a few inches below the dividing board. Still can't see? Here's a closeup:

I had an idea who laid them and, according to my check on the Internet, for what that's worth, I'm correct: They are killdeer eggs. I've had a pair of these birds run or fly away every time I come out to the garden (which hasn't been much, the weather has been atrocious). Earlier today I found a single egg in another raised bed, but these are in an intentional nest, a little hollow in the mulch/leaf litter.

If you are not familiar with killdeer, they're a sandpiper-looking bird that nests out in the open in gravel. The adults will protect their nests in a cool way: If they perceive you as a predator, they'll try to lead you away from the nest by faking a hurt leg. But if you they perceive you as a dumb menace, like a cow that might step on the nest, they fly up in your face and try to startle you.

I've seen nests in people's driveways before doing just fine. So hopefully, they'll put up with me in the garden.

****

It's a little lonely in the pig department. On Thursday we had all seven of Lucy's litter from last August slaughtered, plus Red, a sow who was not getting bred despite four months of mating with Jerry. We've kept Jerry and Lucy; with any luck they'll get something going. If not, we'll be pigless for a while. If so, we're going to be raising piglets over the winter again, which I don't recommend for sane people but which is pretty much how we roll here at the Lazy J.

At least I'll have two pigs to keep me company while I'm gardening this summer.

Lucy doing her Bat Girl impression:

In other animal news, two of the goats have decided they no longer care for the inconvenience known as a fence. Each morning they hop over and spend the day roaming the yard and mostly just hanging out three feet on the outside of the fence, just because they can.

Friday afternoon they got the wind up and ran all over the place head butting. Goats do that sometimes.

I'll throw in some Mark/Lily photos because she hates the rest of us and won't let anyone else hold her.

Rotten cat.

But she is entertaining. She likes playing with a ball of waxed paper inside a soda box, and will knock the whole thing from one end of the house to the other with great amounts of noise and banging:

I don't need her anyway. I've got Milo. When he's not hurting me, he's my workout buddy.

Every morning he glues himself to me and tries to get me to pet him. If I'm doing crunches, he lies under my knees. If I'm doing pushups he lies under my chest and gets mad every time I press down. All in all it's not bad, although (a) he does bite if he's ignored too long and (b) cat hair sticks to sweaty skin. (That's Insanity on the TV there, by the way. Have I mentioned what a good workout that is?)

I'm sort of randomly throwing this post together while Easter dinner cooks. Happy Easter to all who celebrate it. Ours is strictly a food and chocolate sort of day, and the ham is resting as I write this.

I'm almost done. I just have to share an incident that happened yesterday. The Vermonters among you will not be at all surprised.

For those of you not familiar with our lovely, rural state: Vermont has the Green Mountain range running north and south the length of the state (we're the V-shaped one on the left; New Hampshire tapers up and it's on the right). If you need to get from the west (where I live) to the east, such as to go to Montpelier for your daughter's AAU basketball tournament in late April, you have to go over the mountains. For your convenience, there are a series of passes over the mountains, mostly known as "gaps." There's the Middlebury Gap, where you'll find the famous Bread Loaf School of English. There's the Brandon Gap, the Bristol Notch, the Lincoln Gap and so on. All are steep and curvy. Most run alongside rivers. Some are closed during the winter; some should be.

Yesterday, we chose the McCullough Turnpike (or Gap), that being the shortest route to Montpelier, which, on a map, looks deceptively close to Middlebury as the crow flies. It was raining.

All was fine until about 6 miles up the winding mountain road heading east, until we came around a hairpin turn and abruptly found ourselves in a winter wonderland, the kind without plows or sand trucks or houses or civilization of any kind but lots of snow and slush and the possibility we would have to eat each other if things got ugly.

I don't know about you, but when I am faced with a straight-uphill snow-and-ice-covered slippery road in the middle of nowhere and my tires are spinning and it doesn't look like we can go forward or back safely, I do the obvious thing: I start to cry.

OK, I didn't actually cry. But I did start saying, "I'mscaredI'mscaredI'mscaredI'mscared" and gripping the wheel, turning it this way and that with no effect. The car got slower and slower and just about gave out all forward motion. Fortunately, there was a pull-off on our right. So I pulled off.

I turned/slid around and we slid down the mountain. Drove another 20 miles north and got on the Interstate and headed back south another 40 miles to get to Montpelier. 

We missed the first half of the first game of the tournament and I sprang 47 new gray hairs. But, as it turns out, several people at the tournament had had the same experience as us.

And that, for you flatlanders, is known as Springtime in Vermont. If it had been July, it probably wouldn't have happened. 

Probably.

Comments

[Elizabeth]

I love the Bat Girl pig, those ears! I was sort of expecting a recipe but this was just as good!
Ever try to do yoga with cats? That mat was put on the floor for them, right?

[Rebekkah]

Oh dear, that is why I dread driving during so much of the year around here. I don't think our geography is quite as bad as yours when it comes to getting around, but Keene is in a basin, which means it's uphill (and winding country roads) to get pretty much anywhere else. Which I hate in the winter. (Not that I ever really drive in the winter.) And I try to just Not Think About It when my husband has to drive out of town for work in that weather. Which is usually more than once a week. bleh.

A few years ago we did a 180 just trying to get back from Springfield, VT, on Thanksgiving. And then in our attempt to actually get onto the exit (what caused the 180 in the first place), we overshot and went straight into the snowy ditch.

Sometimes I wonder if we really should get an SUV or truck, just so I don't have heart attacks during the winter driving.

Glad you made it to the game safely! And as always, I love all the animal photos and stories. We have just built our raised bed garden (still need to add more dirt and plant things), but alas have no pigs to watch us as we work.

[Lindy]

Mark/Lily photos reminds me of the Mark/Sopie photos. Still love Milo. >^..^<

[Linda]

OMG! This brings back nightmares of traveling through the Cascade Mtns. in March!Sashquamie(sp?)Pass! Yep. If I was in your shoes (car), I would have sat in the pull-off til Summer!! Glad you made it ok and had a great Easter.

[Abby]

I recall I vacation in Vermont from a long ago. A local directed us over a mountain (I think to get to Rock of Ages Granite Quarry) and it turned out to be washboard that we had to travel in second gear. For such a small state, nothing is close by. I'm sure your Easter ham was better than ours - I've had a nasty cold and just grabbed one at Krogers. Edible but just barely.

[gayle]

Every year at this time I kick myself for not planting garlic the fall before...
(One of these years I'll learn. *sigh*)
Love the piggy pics!

[donna lee]

Spring is finally making its presence known here so there's hope for you all up there. The trees have leafed out but the temps have been so cold. This past weekend they all released their pollen at one time (at least that's what my allergies told me) and it was a miserable time.

Easter is all about food and chocolate here too. One of my favorite holidays.

[Shelagh]

Love the Dancing with Goats pix! Commiserations on the Scarey Drive. We went over Bethel Mtn. to SPA in Freeport at the end of February. Going down Maine was clear & easy; blizzard while we were snug in the Harraseeket Inn over the weekend; and not very nice driving for Kelley on the way home (I sat in the back and kept my eyes closed) altho we didn't attempt Bethel again and Vermont roads were so much better than Maine or NH.

[sahara]

Hey there!

Glad to know that everyone's cool, even the "rotten cat". Hilarious. Life in NYC has been good, spinning away with my "rotten cat" determined to break my drive band. Hmmph!

[online casino]

Xinmei went to Bethel. SPA in the free port at the end of February. Maine is clear, easy snow fall, and our neighborhoods over the weekend Harraseeket comfortable.