What I love about Alpacas

Directed Interdisciplinary Study I:

Studio Assignment 1: What I love about Alpacas
A stop motion puppet and poem about fibre farming

“Alpacas are the greatest”
is a thought I have had
while up late at night watching fun videos on YouTube
or when a great meme pops up on facebook.
They have sweet faces, and kind eyes
and are just a little bit weird.

I love alpacas,

I told my partner Keith one day
as we sat in Parc Laurier
sipping soy cappuccinos
and watching the world go by.

One day, lets have an Alpaca farm.
It made perfect sense, we agreed
for a fibre artist to have alpacas on a farm
and a farm seemed like a very nice
far away idea
from our apartment in the Plateau.

So when we moved too the country, perhaps
It is not very surprising
that we stopped by the side of the highway that one day
we drove past an alpaca farm

as moderately socially awkward city transplants
What was surprising is that we went right on up to the farmhouse door
to ask how we could help.

Alpacas are the greatest.
I love Alpacas – these were thoughts
based entirely on the way an Alpaca looks
or how soft its wool feels
thoughts based on the commodity, not the animal

One year later, here’s what I love about alpacas
Their ridiculous haircuts
That they don’t know how ridiculous they look
the heir on their back is called a blanket
they are tidy – will only poop in one part of the pen
You can use it for excellent fertilizer
They are gentle, kind
Alpacas are quiet, like deer
Their hairs are full of secrets
They don’t like strangers, and neither do I
They spit and kick, alpacas are not to be trifled with
they are sweet to each other
they are soft and furry

Here’s what I don’t like about alpacas:

they spit and kick – forget what i said before and get out of the way
They belong on mountains so you have to trim their toenails, and they’re supposed to gnaw on rocks so you have to sand their teeth with a dremmel.
Nobody tells you about the dremmel
They bums have poo dreads on them
You have to do all kind of crazy stuff like lance boils and give inoculations – things you would assume a vet MUST do, but no, that’s what farmers are up to in the barn
Coyotes want to eat them
But they’re still too big for one person to pick up
Loud noises scare them
They don’t like to be sheared

In conclusion – farming isn’t always quite what a city girl thinks it will be.
And standing in a barn in early may, freezing cold and wet and covered in hay and mostly digested grass spit

There is nothing I would like more

Than a soy cappuccino.

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