Inmates Flock To The Asylum

HH called me three times this morning while I was doing the shopping. It's not that he missed me, and couldn't wait to talk to me. No. HH had a new scheme up his sleeve. He didn't reveal his cards until the third call. On the first two, he was just asking where I was, and when I'd be home. He didn't want me to have to carry in the stuff by myself. Like I've done every other weekend before this one, because HH always says he'll be right over, but it conveniently takes him until I've already carried everything in. No, it wasn't just HH's saintly concern for me that initiated these calls.

HH had a secret.

Note to self, people: Do not tell HH any secrets.

Seems HH and The Pony had been down to the cabin to eat a hearty breakfast of chocolate donuts and Little Debbie Fudge Rounds while I drove the #1 son to church. After puttering around for a while, they came up out of the woods to the BARn. HH heard the dogs after something. He went to look. Here is how he told it on the phone.

"The dogs were going crazy. I thought they might have scared up a deer. They were chasing something around and around the BARn. Then I saw that it was a pig. There were two of them. Those pigs were exhausted. One of them had to stop. The other one could have got away, but it wouldn't leave the tired one. Ann bit it on the butt. I hollered at the dogs to get away. I opened the BARn door, and The Pony and I herded the pigs in there. I can't imagine where they came from. I think they're wild hogs. I called my Number One son, because he went on that wild hog hunt, and I asked him what they look like. He says not to do anything to them because they don't sound like wild hogs to him. They are a funny shape, and the hair on the back of their neck was sticking up. I can't keep them in the BARn. I have a roll of fence. I'm going to build them a pen. I'll have the guy up the road butcher them and have fresh sausage. I can keep it in the old refrigerator in the barn."

OK. You see what I go through? HH just found two pigs, and within an hour he's got them all set up in a pen, and we're eating them for breakfast. First of all, he couldn't describe them for me. My grandpa was a hog farmer. I am no stranger to pork. Then I told HH that we do not have wild hogs roaming Hillmomba. They obviously belong to somebody, and he needs to go door to door and find the rightful owner. We found two horses in our back yard eating our garden several years ago, and we didn't butcher them, and we didn't open a riding stable. We found out who they belonged to. And gave them back.

Now, for the other flaws in HH plan...he said he was going to build them a pen three feet high. I told him that would never work, the dogs would eat them. "Those pigs can't jump over a three-foot fence!" No. But the dogs can. HH would be creating a death chamber, making those pigs sitting ducks for the dogs who would jump in and kill them, with the pigs having no escape route. Also, The Pony wanted to keep them. He is just now recovering from the unfortunate chicken massacre. I told HH I would take a look at his new hogs as soon as I got home. In the meantime, he was to leave them alone, and not let the dogs get at them.

I called #1, who was just getting out of church. I told him his dad had two pigs, and was counting on him to help build a pen when he got home. "No. I am tired of building pens for whatever he decides he's going to raise. I am not building a pen." Of course, he said that to ME, not to HH.

After we carried in the groceries and put them up, I went to the barn. I saw the pigs. They were not wild hogs. They were somebody's pet pot-bellied pigs. How can HH not know what a pig is supposed to look like? It's not like he's a city boy. I'm so glad I talked him out of butchering one. We took some pictures, The Pony made pig sounds in his throat, and we showed them off to #1 and my mom when they arrived. Then HH took off in his Scout to go door to door and ask if anybody lost two pigs. According to HH, "I'm going to make THEM describe those pigs to ME." Like everybody will think, 'Hey, free pigs. I'm going to say they're mine.' One man's sausage is another man's headache, is all I have to say. HH does not share my view.

HH returned after about an hour. He found out it's the neighbor whose land adjoins ours across the creek down by the MiniMansion. Surprise, surprise. I'm sure it has nothing to do with the corn feeder that HH fills up for the deer. HH said the pigs belong to the guy's 12-year-old daughter. They did not even know they were missing. I asked if they minded that Ann had a bite of pork rind out of the smaller one's hide. HH said the guy didn't care. When he picked up one and put it in the truck, it hit it's head on some gas tank thingy and cut it open. I don't want to be the one to call and tell them our dogs ate one of their pot-bellied pigs the next time they get out.

Here's what I saw when I went into the BARn.


Make that a double. Two pigs are better than one. Expecially if you just found them and plan to eat them, according to HH.


You may notice that HH spared no expense on his BARn. He even had the concrete floor dyed to match the outside red tin color. He put down a big piece of cardboard for the pigs to pee on. Because wild hogs are BARn-broken, don't you know. You may also notice that HH is a pack rat. He had to build a separate workshop under one of the lean-to sides because the main part was full of equipment. Just out of the picture, and right where the lead pig headed, were a dozen 2 x 4s of six- and eight-foot lengths, leaned up against the side of the BARn. At the bottom was a right-triangle shaped piece of thin metal, about three feet long and two feet high. I told HH that he needed to make the pig play area safer, because one of those pigs was going to guillotine herself before he had a chance to shoot her. HH said they'd be fine. That was just before he took off to look for the owner.

Now HH is depressed because he can't spend his week off playing with his new menagerie. The Pony wants to get some pigs. The #1 son and I are relieved.

Those chickens are still stuck in my craw.