My mom is a knitting aficionado. She has had pieces in magazines and has had public showings across the midwest. On this occasion she was asked to judge the the skein competition (a skein is a pile of yarn, judged on how fluffy it is, I guess). I came with her to the show in Jefferson, WI because, what the Hell, it's not like I have a job or anything.
The show consisted of 4 areas: the merch barns where people sold smocks and stuff, the stage where they did fashion shows and sold food, the field where Border Collie trials were held, and the creature cages where the show sheep chilled. Sheep are dumb; I like sheep, but they're very dumb. The first dude I cam
e across, a scottish flatface-fuzzkush or something, didn't like his neighbor, so he'd ram his head against the cage whenever the other sheep got close. The other sheep didn't notice and continued eating straw throughout. Later, I walked up to a ram and two lambs in a cage, intending to take a picture. As soon as they saw me, all three sheep turned around and ran into the other side of the cage, forgetting it was there I guess. Then, realizing they were trapped, ducked their heads into the straw, exposing their meaty hind quarters to me, the assumed predator. Apparently the ram forgot that his horns were on his head. With such a pathetic defense strategy, it's surprising that sheep have made it this far.The Border Collie trials were the best part of the festival. Essentially, they released a dog and its master on to one end of a field, on the other end three sheep were position
ed. The dog then herded the sheep through an obstacle course using the master's instructions, conveyed via a high pitch whistle. Border Collies are bred for intelligence, and they're trained to move close to the ground while stalking, staying in the sheep's blind spot. When commanded to "lie down" they sink into the grass so that only their ears can be seen. They run like cats, low to the ground, using their tails for balance. They're very fast; I estimated a Border Collie can run as fast as an olympic sprinter, but can keep it up for an entire day of sheparding. Border Collies are impressive animals.
Half way through the festival I got bored and went to Jefferson's downtown with my dad. We ended up at what my dad said was a typical Wisconsin bar: no windows, wood panelling, Badger football game on TV, pictures of dear and hunters in orange everywhere. We drank Guinness and came back to the fastival on woozy legs, ready to feel us some felt and watch us some hand-spinning technique demos.
We ended up spending about 8 hours at the festival total, including brunch (lamb and cheese sandwhich, kinda rubbery) and lunch (lamb hotdog, looked and tasted like a beef stick that somebody had been sitting on). I didn't find any promising job
prospects, but it was a good learning experience.
