Tuesday, July 23rd – Wednesday, July 24th, 2013
Unfortunately, the night wasn’t as peaceful and pleasant as the night before. There was a swarm of mosquitoes hanging out in our van eating us alive. We spent most of the night squishing bloody mosquito carcasses against the windows until they were all dead.
There was still buzzing in my ear in the morning. A few of the mosquitoes must have hidden out of sight during our murder spree. I was up early enough to watch the sun rise over the corn field. Mark made us egg, cheese, and sausage breakfast burritos, with sausage made from actual “meat.” He said there were “no lips, ears, or butt holes about it!” A friend of Mark’s wearing overalls came over to sell him guinea hens, then we watched the animals all morning while Mark left to run some errands and Laura went to work.
Trevor found it hysterical that the rooster was constantly trying to attack me. I was less amused over the matter. After chasing me around several times throughout our visit, the rooster finally made it’s move. He jumped up to claw me, so I gave a defensive kick. We both missed each other and the rooster ran off. I hated that damn thing! It sensed my weakness.
We ate PB and J sandwiches in the van and tossed the Frisbee around before going with Mark to his old house to build pig fences for the pink “confinement” pigs that lived there. We watched the chickens as we munched on veggies from the garden before heading back to the farm to take the additional posts and fencing down the hill to make pig pens down there too. The mosquitoes were horrendous out in the field, and we didn’t quite finish up the pig pens, but made some progress.
On our walk back, we saw some deer, and then had a Frisbee session before showering off. Laura returned from work and I helped her out in the garden before we all snacked on cherries and played corn hole. It was the guys versus the girls, and the guys won the first few games, but we came back for the win during the last round. Mark started a fire and we had a late dinner of halibut, coleslaw, cherry tomatoes, cheese and crackers.
Fortunately, this time there weren’t any mosquitoes in our van overnight, so we got a good night’s sleep. In the morning, we went to the Co-op to grab some snacks for the road, then did our laundry. Mark and Trevor worked on the feeder while I deadheaded some plants.
Mark got irritated by the crop duster flying over the neighbors farm since the pesticides he was dumping were blowing onto his property. He didn’t want all the deadly chemicals that commercial farmers used blowing on his plants, and didn’t really care to be breathing them in either. Who could blame him.
Mark wanted to take us to a few local businesses so he took us first to the apple orchard, then the pie shop for peaches, and then next door to the “Harbo Cider, Winery and Cheese” shop for all the local cheeses. We bought the Garam Masala and the Portobello Chive cheeses, and it seemed like Mark bought the whole shop!
We got to sample some of the ones he purchased at his house, like the Honey Flavored Gouda and Creamy Bleu Cheese. They were all amazing! After eating more cheese than recommended, he gave us some local honey and a few other goodies to take with us for the road. We hung out with the pigs and fed the larger ones as we waited for Laura to get off work.
It was sad to go since we had so much fun catching up with them, and the kitten was just starting to warm up to me. Mark had a stencil of Charlie Brown and tagged our van with it before we said goodbye to them, and got on our merry way. We grabbed some lunch at the Co-op in Saint Peter before taking US-169 North towards the “twin cities” where we found a Walmart in West Saint Paul, MN to sleep at.
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Stubbs Rambles On 