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Ted's Diary
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Thursday 4th May. I wish the folks round here would make up their minds. They put fences up – then take them down! Put us in one field then yell at us to "change fields!" and we all have to go to another paddock for the day. Now they have moved the shelter into a paddock on the other side of the field! Whatever next? OH, NO! MY HAY! Who stole my hay! I left it in my shelter! Uh Oh! Of course - The Shelter! Whose brilliant idea was it to get poor old "Other Half" to move it? Oh, guess who? Yep! The BOSS is at it AGAIN! |
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| I have heard that the shearer is coming next week and he will be checking all our teeth. Funny, I thought he was coming to take our fleeces off! Multi tasking, I suppose! So I have decided to do a bit of flossing - with this fence; it's quite handy really – if the BOSS leaves it one place for long enough!. |  |
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I think my mum, Cleopatra, is having one of those ‘senior moments’; - we all know she has a big mouth, but that’s a bit over the top for dental floss! | ||||||||||
| Sunday 7th May. If I really strain my neck, and peer over the fences to the far side of the field, I can see lots of strange activity going on with my humans and their friends. They're putting up a cloth house! Honest - no word of a lie! A HUGE cloth house! "Other Half " built a new catch pen yesterday, and now he's having this cloth house put on the end of it! The BOSS says it's a marquee - well it looks like a cloth house to ME! It's just another of the weird things the BOSS comes up with. She says it's for the shearer to work in, but I think she just ran out of things for poor old "Other Half" to do. BOSS says because I'm an Alpaca of Distinction I don't have to go in it for the night like everyone else - I can stay in the paddock! Ha Ha - I'm Special! Hang on a minute ! What if it rains! I'll be the only one to get wet! That means I won't get sheared! And there's a heat wave coming - the BOSS said so, so it must be true! |  |
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Hang on! What's Alex doing out of his paddock - ON HIS OWN! - SOMEBODY left the gate open! It must have been "Other Half" - the BOSS NEVER makes mistakes! He'll really get it in the neck. So what's Alex going to do with his new found freedom? Run away? Make mischief? No! Some alpacas have the brains of a gnat! Where's he going? Straight over to the BOSS to tell her he's not in his paddock! I mean, come on! Bright move Alex! She's put his halter on and marched him straight back to the paddock. Why don't I ever get a chance like that? Just think of what I could do, where I could go, the mischief I could cause.... Do you suppose that's why they are always so careful with MY gate? I can't wait for Wednesday, - the shearer is coming to take ALL the clothes (um - that's fleece of course) off the girls! They're all going to be naked. Wow! And "Other Half" says he can't wait to get loads of pictures. If he thinks HE can't wait, he should try being an Alpaca of Distinction, - with no patience! |
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Thursday 11th May. I awoke bright and early on Wednesday morning to find myself ALONE, I mean completely ALONE in my paddock! I started to panic but then I saw that the BOSS and "Other Half" were already getting breakfast ready for us. US? Oh yes! The others were in the big cloth house, sorry - marquee, waiting to be sheared – oh dear! Its shearing day! Everyone seemed calm and munched away at their supplement with no idea what was to come. We had to wait ALL day as the shearer did not arrive until late in the afternoon, by which time I had calmed down and everyone else was getting jittery! I watched with interest as the shearer and his mate unloaded everything – table, shears, ROPES, WINCHES – oh my word! I had forgotten about all those things! Hey girls, don’t look! And what is that thing for? "For grinding teeth" did the BOSS say that? Not mine! |
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Oh, good; -it's Alex first- don’t worry Big Guy, it will all be over in a flash! Nails first, then whiz and that massive white fleece has vanished! Teeth OK. See, told you! Ha! It’s a good thing alpacas don’t have mirrors! Mr Macho seems to have lost something – could it be his dignity? That’s it, lad, back to your field, whilst the girls are looking the other way! Ha Ha! Poor kids, it's their turn next, then Ivory – well that didn’t take too long! Who's next? No, I do not want to go! Stop pulling me. I’m an Alpaca of Distinction, you know! Tell him to be gentle with me! Oh my word! |
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Be careful with those rope ties! What are you going to do with that! Oh no, here we go! (Or should I say "There it went?") Phew! That went well! The new me! Oh, do I look good or what! Hey girls; check this out! Do I hear snickering in the marquee there? You just wait,- its your turn next! No! Please don’t put me all the way over here - I can’t see what’s going on! Wow! Look at that! NAKED GIRLS! Hey, the day just keeps getting better! Do they look great, guys? Why is it that they look so good and us guys look so daft? Not me of course – I always look good! What else do you expect from a web-celeb Alpaca? |
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| Sunday 14th May. A funny thing happened this morning - when "Other Half" came into the field to give us our breakfast, he left the field gate open, and he was followed in by lots of short-necked alpacas! I think they must have come in looking for me; I have such perfect proportions, you know, being an Alpaca of Distinction, and their necks were so unfashionably short! Probably the Devon version of an alpaca - something they call "Sheep". It'll never catch on. "Other Half" looked quite funny; running around like a cria, chasing them back out again, - he obviously didn't want them to get embarrassed by our outstanding beauty! |  |
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I think "Other Half" must read my Diary when I'm not looking - I said a little while ago that I'd like to visit the seaside. Now he's replaced my perfectly good shelter with something that looks like a beach hut! He says it's only temporary, while I'm waiting for my clothes to grow back, but unless he supplies the sand and sea to go with it, I'm thinking of complaining to the BOSS. It's not right, I am a web-celeb you know, and he's supposed to keep me in the manner to which I'd like to become accustomed! |
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| My field is springing up all over with a variety of local delicacies - several different types of grass, dandelions, docks, buttercups, all sorts of things. The BOSS says some might be bad for me so she's pulling out anything that's not green. I'm having to eat at double speed to get my share before she pinches it all! But wait a minute! Perhaps I can take it straight from her wheelbarrow when she's not looking! Who am I kidding? The BOSS has eyes in the back of her head! If it was only "Other Half", that might be a different matter (remember the sheep?) he never seems to know what's going on around here! |  |
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Thursday 18th May. I've always been very fond of the sunshine, you know. I soak up the rays, chew on a little hay, let "Other Half" tempt me with a little supplement when he brings me my breakfast in my shelter. But now I know what the farmers all mean when they say "We need this rain" - I've just learnt that the VET was due to come and see ME! But she has been called off - because of the rain! Well..... we DO need this rain, you know, LOTS of it! AND for a long, long time. It must be the same for all those farmers, too. They're obviously avoiding their VET's visit to see THEM as well! Hmm! I wonder what the VET was coming to see me for? I'm quite healthy; - in fact I'm as perfect as I've always been! It couldn't be serious, could it, or she would have visited, anyway, wouldn't she? .....Wouldn't she? |
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| We've been having a typical Devon breeze here. What the rest of the country call "severe gales". Which means that we've all spent an enjoyable morning watching the BOSS and "Other Half" struggling to take down the cloth house they struggled so hard to put up for the shearer last week. You'd think that "Other Half" could have moved our shelters around to face the entertainment, wouldn't you. As it was, we had to crane our necks out of the sides of our shelters to watch them; we could have got as wet as they did. And then the wind didn't happen at the right times, and they didn't get blown away - so I lost THAT bet with Fred, didn't I! Now HE get's the warm corner of the shelter tonight! |  |
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Sunday 21st May. It's been a typical summer's day - a typical DEVON summer's day, that is. There's been wind, torrential rain, then more wind, then... well you get the idea, don't you. I've spent the day in my shelter: that was good of me, "Other Half" knew where to find me to give me my breakfast supplement and top up my hay supplies, and didn't have to look around for me in the pouring rain getting wetter than he was! Strange creatures, these humans, but I wouldn't be without them: they work so cheaply - in fact I don't pay them at all. |  |
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Me - Hairy (As God intended!) |
Only I can look this good scalped! |
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| I've was thinking (there isn't anything else to do, apart from watching my humans get wet and blown around the field), now that I've been given a body wax by the shearer, I could try new hair styles to go with my web-celeb status. | |||||||||||
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| Hmm! Perhaps NOT! Now where did I leave that hay?..... | |||||||||||
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Thursday 25th May. Is been a funny couple of days! Rain, wind, hot sun, hailstones – I suppose this is the beginning of what is known as "summer" in this part of the country! Poor old Alexander, he was so cold and miserable the BOSS decided to let him come down into MY field. |
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| Now, a visit from "Macho Man" Alexander, would normally have me on my mettle and looking for a ruckus, but I felt so sorry for the Big Guy - all on his lonesome, and SO naked. It's being all white that make him look so bare, I suppose. Mind you, since he has been sheared he doesn’t seem so big or so scary – in fact, he's just like me and Fred, well not quite like Fred! (If you know what I mean!) But normal, alpaca sized, and not quite so aloof. Well it comes to us all at some time – coming down in the world a bit! He may still be the Macho, but now he's pretty much the same size as Fred and me! |  |
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The Boss says he’s stunning – but now they've shaved off that big, flash overcoat, what have you got?  Well, the BOSS says he’s still stunning – she likes that word, especially around Alexander! But I think he just looks, well, smaller! At least with me What You See Is What You Get – WYSIWYG - now there’s a name! My fleece WAS flash, but big it wasn’t! Being naked is a great leveller – one alpaca looks much like another – unless you're like ME! - An Alpaca Of Distinction. |
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| Sunday 28th May. After my experiment with alternative hair styles last Sunday - (you may have noticed that Sundays tend to be a bit boring, so I am inclined to do strange things) - it was decided that I should combine the "Sopwith Camel" look with the rather cool "Centre Parting", thus pleasing two of my staunchest fans in Wiltshire; - I could call this new look "the Soppy Parting". No, I have decided to never go through this again! | |||||||||||
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Now for more serious topics. - HAY. This is MY hay - NOT Alex's hay , and NOT Fred's hay - it's MINE! and I am going to eat all of it before the BOSS decides to throw it away. She seems to take everything that is tasty out of the paddock. At this very moment she is digging up MY docks. They are especially tasty when full of seeds. The BOSS says that my "natural processes" deposit the seeds all over the place! I DO try to keep all my "processes" in the same places, but she may be right, as I have noticed that there seems to be more docks than usual around the poo piles - My fault I suppose! The BOSS seems to be leaving those ones alone! (I try not to get too close, either!) | ||||||||||
You know, I'm looking forward to life getting a bit more interesting soon - the BOSS says we've got cria (that's alpaca babies) due, the vet due, jabs due....... - on the other hand, maybe NOT! I've heard from my number one fan, Jacki in Wiltshire, that she's going away to New York for the week ( I haven't even been to Old York, yet ) but she wouldn't sneak me along in one of her suitcases, so I have to stay here. She does say that she'll bring me back a baseball cap - whatever THAT is! I wonder if they have alpacas in New York? No, I don't think so. If they did, they would definitely have contacted me - after all, - I am THE Alpaca of Distinction. |
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| How the saga began | |||||||||||
| March, Year of The Ted 2 | |||||||||||
| April, Year of the Ted-2 | |||||||||||
| May, Year of the Ted-2 | |||||||||||
| Fab 40s website | |||||||||||
