Gabe Damast
Cow Camp
Hello, and on behalf of all of the invested staff here, welcome to Spotted Meadows. If you’ll follow me please, you will be able to see our oldest set of hard oak barns to your left. These barns were built when the ranch was first founded in 1880. Although they may pale against the size of some of our newer installments, they still hold our primary training facilities, and of course, the Spotted Meadows Museum. In 1879, a man by the name of William Dovine-Kowchivitz wandered into this stunning valley that we currently inhabit and said to himself, ‘I could do something wonderful here’. And so he did. With only the help of his sons Uttel and Churd, he built these two magnificent structures in a matter of months, and he entertained his first guests not a half year latter. If you look closely here, you can see a distinct red stain on the barn wall. We like to say that it was from when Mr. Dovine-Kowchivitz drove a nail through his finger during work, although really your guess is as good as ours.
Now as we pass through these wooden arches – which by the way are remnants of an old railroad that ran through these parts – you’ll see the Midway Hut, one of our three feedlots. Here we feed our guests who are roughly halfway through their stay here and as you can see, they are already showing signs of Bovinification. Trudy here is a peak specimen. She’s in her third week of intense training, and already she has developed a small utter, or a “mosquito bite” as we like to call them. You can also see the white and black pigmentation on her arms and neck, a sure sign of a successful conversion in progress. Over here is Duane, a fifth week guest. Note the drastic elongation of the ear tissue, development of the tail, and as you can hear, the loss of most vocal capabilities. In a matter of weeks, Duane will be transferred to one of our pastures in Greenvale where he will either be chosen for the dairy or meat industries - the final decision will be left up to his family of course. If you are wondering, recent breakthroughs in Bovinification technology have enabled us to grow milk producing utters on both male and female guests, giving males opportunities in both fields. Here at Spotted Meadows, we like to emphasize the fair treatment of our guests. Although by tradition, families send individuals here out of dislike or annoyance, we believe that we are bringing the Bovinification industry into the 21st century by providing a safe, humane way to dispose of not-so-loved ones. If you have read one of our informative pamphlets, you should know that there are a wide range of financial options to choose from when deciding on a course of training for your admitee. The cheapest of these options is the meat industry track that has a nominal entrance fee of $50, and will usually net a gain of $500 once the subject has been transferred. A more pricy choice is the cheese track which will cost a hefty $500 upon admittance, but commonly boasts a net lifetime gain of $2000 assuming the subject does not succumb to disease or lactation withdrawal – a very rare side effect.
Just past the Midway Hut you can see the first of our Open Range Pastures. This is an awkward stage for many of our guests since they retain many of their human characteristics, yet can be sustained solely on a diet of grass and grain. The instant that one of our guests begins to show any one of an array of…well…cowish signs, they are instantly moved into one of our Open Range Pastures where they can happily indulge their bovine tendencies. Although speech is quite beyond any of these individuals here, you can see that they retain their social habits, and like to share each other’s company even if conversation is out of the question. At this point in the tour I like to add that Cowland Express up the road does not allow these social gatherings, and is known to beat their guests for uppity behavior, an act utterly forbidden within the 1,160 acres of Spotted Meadows.
Now many of you may be asking yourselves an important question concerning the subject of reproduction. And it may please you to know that at no point in the Bovinification process is there any risk of inter-species fornication. Here at Spotted Meadows, we have developed a patented method that removes the key reproductive components in both males and females. It’s actually very comparable to the effects of being neutered or spayed, however without the messy details. As you can imagine, the possibility of bestiality amongst our guests here, or even after transport to a local farm, could be of utmost concern to an inquisitive passerby. But rest assured any sexual activity is quite out of the question.
Although reproduction is not an option for our guests, they do enjoy a perk that no trueborn cow can claim. We are now proud to announce that thanks to the breakthroughs that we’ve had in our Bovinification processes, our guest’s life expectancies are not shortened! Not only is this beneficial to our guests, but it allows a higher lifetime gross for family members as well. The profit margins that I gave you earlier are actually outdated data since we have had insufficient time to collect new statistics concerning lifetime gain. I won’t give you any actual numbers, but we expect the dollar amounts to increase three-fold.
To our left is one of the key historic landmarks here at Spotted Meadows. Housed within the only hillside that we have on our land, ‘It’s a Small World 2’ was commissioned in 1956 by the same architect that created the popular theme park ride at Walt Disneyland. The two rides are in fact identical, yet here we have adapted the wooden boats into larger vessels fit to hold the weight of a 3,000 lb cow. Although there have been questions concerning the validity of this technique, we believe strongly that ‘It’s a Small World 2’ holds a crucial part in the conversion process. This aspect of Bovinification has no hidden qualities, for our guests merely take a ride on the river. Through intensive research, our scientists have found that prolonged exposure to this ride causes a surprisingly dramatic drop in IQ. Through access to ‘It’s a Small World 2’ at least once a day, we are able to bridge the gap between even the highest human intelligence, and that of a cow.
This leads me to our next stop, which is just ahead. As a side note, I should remind you that we have a two-week risk free money back guarantee for all of our guests. Studies have shown that the permanent effects of Bovinification do not begin to occur until the 15th day (or as we like to call it, the Cow-ciñera) and we can assure you that if you do change your mind within the first two weeks, all changes are fully reversible.
Here is the pride and joy of our establishment. This inconspicuous red silo in front of us is in fact just the entranceway to an underground catacomb of holding bays, feedlots, dormitories, and correctional facilities. If you’ll follow me inside, we can get a glimpse of what happens below ground. Mind the elevator door. The history of this building is a short one, since it became fully operational only three years ago. This elevator shaft actually is the deepest open-hole chute in the entire state of Wisconsin, traveling 602 vertical feet. If the shaft was above ground, it would stand taller than any building in Alaska, Arizona, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming, and of course, the great state of Wisconsin. Now you may be wondering what we do with all of the room we’ve got, and the answer is: lots of things. We’ll stop here on floor B22. All of the doors that you can see on this hallway lead to our top of the line inspection rooms where we bring in private bovine medicine specialists to perform periodic checkups on all of our guests. If you look through this window here, you can see the final product of twelve weeks of intensive conversion. Sheila is undergoing her last inspection before she joins the herds at the Finnegan’s farm across town. Her well-developed belly, bent spinal column, and elongated snout are sure signs that Sheila will be flawlessly initiated into - as well like to call it - Cow Culture. Now if we can head back to the elevator, we’ll see the amazing things that happen on floors B25-B50. Mind your heads.
It may interest you to know that this entire facility operates with its sole energy provider being, well, crap. We store all of the cow droppings in large subterranean rooms where the methane gas produced by the feces is then converted into electricity and natural gas. We take much pride to say that our environmental footprint (or as we like to say, hoof print) is the lowest out of any similar facilities. Through the window to your right you may be able to make out our shovelers heaving away at the mountains of cow patties that arrive every day. Here at Spotted Meadows we employ a total of 500 laborers, 50 of them being shovelers. We require so many workers in this area because every 72 minutes, their shifts must alternate. Studies have shown that extensive exposure to Methane gas can lead to serious illness or even death, so we like to minimize the amount of time that any of out workers are prone to danger.
Now the corridor just ahead is called the Holding Hall. Its name serves it justice, for the series of rooms that branch off the hall are all used to hold new guests who are less than willing to participate in the process of Bovinification. As we step inside, note the series of security locks that prevent any unauthorized movement within this area of the facility. To the right is a set of hormone shackles. Upon admittance here, the first step of conversion occurs through six solid hours of exposure to these shackles. The hormones from the cuffs are absorbed into the guest’s skin, and begin the Bovinification. At this point in the tour, we allow you all to try on the cuffs for a second or two, for in small amounts they are actually quite fun to experience. I strongly encourage, no, I insist that each of you try the cuffs, for after a few seconds you will feel the irresistible urge to moo. Oh I’m glad that all of you are willing to try them on. Often I have to use more…persuasive techniques. Now I’ll just turn the machine on…ahh. Can’t you feel the hormones coursing through your body? Oh, there’s no use resisting. You may as well sit back and enjoy, it’s going to be a long six hours.