Reunions

So how was your week?

I shared mine with animals, the living and the dead.

LA (Little Avenger) was thrilled to go back to the farm we'd visited last summer to see her donkey pals Brownie and Whitey. She'd spent hours feeding them wild grass and dandelions on the hillside last year and looked forward to doing more of the same.

Like 'they' say: sometimes you can't go back.

The donkey duo were no longer roaming the pastoral rolling meadows but were confined 'exhibits' in a revamped 'petting zoo'. Which now charged a fee for admission.

click any photo to enlarge
LA greets Brownie and Whitey

Petting Whitey

Dreaming of better days

LA drew this later:


I think she captured that wistful stare.

Our next reunion was with Alberto, the badass llama, who tried ripping his exhibit signage off the wall as we cheered him on.

Go Alberto!


One badass llama


We also caught up with our old friend, Pig, who was now Mama Pig with 12 piglets...

and 7 nipples...


Does anyone know how that works?

Feeding 12 hungry kids when you've only got 7 nipples? It seems an appropriate time for an Octomom joke.

It was so nice to visit with old friends, but we wondered about the fate of Chocolate, the well-hung donkey. We found him roaming the hillside, blessed with freedom.

LA tries to get Chocolate's attention

She's got it- with dandelions

Which ended a day of reunions at the farm; bittersweet for LA who couldn't understand why her friends were incarcerated but glad to see them still.

So much for the living. Now for the dead.

The Visitor Center at Mount Greylock contained an assortment of gutted and stuffed animal friends scattered about in cases, hanging from the ceiling, off the wall, in a 'Nature Discovery Room' for kids-- a gruesome menagerie; the stuff nightmares are made of. In fact, LA had a bad dream that night, about a monster.

Meet the critters.

opossum


bobcat


turkey


fox

owl

squirrel

hawk

Don't those freak you out?

Maybe it's me. Not a fan of taxidermy. I like my animals with a pulse and a wet nose.

But it was an otherwise nice day on Mount Greylock. Did you know that it's the tallest mountain in Massachusetts at 3,491 feet?

Big deal, you say; Mount Everest is 29,029 feet tall, and K2 is 28,251 feet tall, and Kangchenjunga is 28,169 feet tall.

Well hotshot, those aren't in Massachusetts.

In fact, I climbed Mount Greylock. Well... not the whole thing. Not most of it. Part of it. A little piece. But I could have done it all if I wanted to. I just didn't want to. See, here I am at the uh... bottom...


So, good to be back in Hoboken... I think. Time to catch up.

Message to Da Kurt: thanks so much for loaning me your camera for the trip.

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