Through the Christmas and Thanksgiving Holidays.... Back to work....

I started "vacation" on the 16th of December, 2011. I return to work tomorrow (I did work a bit two days last week). 

The Christmas Holidays were really nice, most of the family came for a visit, except for Ed who had to work, you know, that EVIL corporation Halliburton forced him to do whatever it is he does to DESTROY the environment. ROFLOL (and still typing).Susan and I had a very peaceful and private Christmas Eve, prime rib and lobster who cares about the "sides". All five grand kids and Allisa's kids were here, while quite a ruckus, made the entire holiday well worth while...

My father is improving and they are making plans for him to go home.  My mother-in-law on the other hand is in the hospital but scheduled to come home tomorrow (maybe today).

I got to spend multiple hours down the "septic tank" hole, replacing the lift station pump, don't ask you don't want to know. Talk about a sh**ty job, changing the pump qualifies.  So why not hire a plumber? good question. The pump cost almost $600.00 and really takes just a couple of hours to install once you've done it.  A plumber wants almost $2000.00 to do the same thing, Hmmm I can deal with a lot of sh*t for $1400 bucks, besides I have a washer (for the clothing I didn't toss) AND a shower. In reality it's not nearly as bad as one would assume, well considering the $1400 dollars.

I went to the eye doctor, fortunately I can still see fine HOWEVER I have developed diabetic retinopothy in both eyes. This is where blood and/or plasma leak into the eyeball and cause damage to the retina which causes blindness. Fortunately it seems that the leakage has stopped for the time being and no real vision damage has occurred.  I can however see the ghosts (in eyeball photos) of the damage that has already occurred.

As for going back to work tomorrow. I truly love my job, you know, working for another EVIL UNREGULATED corporation, ripping off the general public (right).  I feel fortunate to have liked my work at Digital Equipment, running my own consulting firm etc., and now working for Wells Fargo. I can honestly say that I learn AT LEAST one new thing (significant thing) every day, that alone makes it worthwhile? BUT there's nothing like time off to spend with friends and family....

I hope everyone had a fabulous Christmas Holiday and hope you have a grand 2012. (*NOTE* no political comments) lol.

So, Tomorrow is Thanksgiving....The Traditional Begining of the Holiday Season (for me anyway).

Well tomorrow is Thanksgiving, like most people we have plenty to be thankful for. First my 81 year old father is in the hospital, the bad news is he has twelve(12) broken ribs, the GOOD news is they broke his ribs doing CPR to revive him, and it worked....

Thanksgiving is usually pretty interesting around here. HOWEVER last year we had a great Thanksgiving at James and Solitares. Why you ask... Well the year before, as some of you probably remember the Turkey in the turkey bag, caught on fire and scared the heck out of me.  "Susan, where's the flippin (not the real word) fire extinguisher?", yup the one I kept one on the kitchen counter for YEARS. "Well I got rid of it a few years ago, we never used it", CLEARLY I never checked it either... dang....

A few years back we tried the deep frier. Turns out that they don't work too good when it's windy and 8 degree above zero.  FAIL... plus that too scared the heck out of me as we had to move it to the garage to keep it lit. It took nearly a 20 pound tank of propane to get the oil hot, and then... we stuck the turkey in.... Hmmm (not Mmm Mmm good, just Hmmm).

In any case most of the family usually come by, of course work schedules are tough for us 53% so occasionally not everyone makes it.  Usually a bunch of friends drop by, Susie, Mitch, Brandi, Allisa Sam, Lex... ect.....

In any case I started cooking stuff yesterday, more today.... Oh hold on, phones ringing.........        Hmmm that was Santa Claus, he wants to know if he can take a test run and use my barn to refuel (read feed) Rudolf and the other reindeer.  I told him no problem, I'll keep the young 'un in the house..... Stay tuned for pictures... lol.

How a Great Day Quickly Deteriorates into Panic, Fear and ?

So, Friday the 18th of November I spent the day at Freemont Elementary, got to visit with Molly, Gabe and Isis. Susan even came at had lunch with them while I helped out around the school as a "Watch D.O.G.S" volunteer (Dads Of Great Students, in this case a grand-dad.

So schools over and I'm exhausted, drive home and get ready to go to a "practice" cutting (on one of the horses), I feed the horses at the house, Susan is going to meet me there so she doesn't have to wait till the wee hours for me...

Robert, the horse trainer and I get there early, I saddle up Betty (Chic's Betty Crocker) and have a quick bite of fabulous green chili at the arena grill. I go out and start warming Betty up as people trickle in and start getting ready.  We set up the arena for "cutting" and bring the cattle in, in this case we had 16 head of probably 700 pounds, maybe a little bigger...

A brief side note on cutting. A horse and rider enter a herd of cattle, select one and only one to separate from the herd and physically intervene the "cow" from returning to the herd. Of course this sounds simple BUT cattle are very herd oriented and will try all kinds of back and forth running, slamming on the brakes etc. moves to try and by-pass the horse and rider to return to the herd.  The rider has a couple of jobs. First, select a cow that the rider thinks will help the horse show "his" stuff to the judge. Second, hang the hell on and stay outta the way...

The horse, 1200 pounds of pure muscle, physically places itself in front of the "cow", "reading" the cow to try and determine what it'll do next.Moving in gut wrenching side to side motions to "block" the cows path. This may seem like the hard part, but let me assure you that the hanging on is hard for anyone, but for a 58 year old man that thinks he's 26, well that's "wrenching" to say the least.

So we get a couple of chances, each one lasting 2.5 minutes, that seems like hours and we didn't get dumped even once, Betty was FABULOUS, she is VERY, Very good at this "job"...

It gets to be about 10:30, cold and windy outside I loosen Betty's saddle, take off the bridle and leave her tied to a hitching rail while we get stuff cleaned up and she has a few minutes to dry off (it is a lot of work for the horses). 

I go outside, get the trailer ready, turn around and come up by the door. THEN I go in to get my saddle to put it in the trailer and I can't FIND the saddle, worse yet I can't find Betty, the lead rope and halter are both gone too. About 30 feet away is the "overhead door" and it's open (of course, so people can get horses in and out of the arena).

So I ask Robert, "where's Betty", thinking he moved her, he thinks I'm joking and I can't believe she's gone.

another side note - Betty is very, very good at all she does including making fine foals.  In addition to having her for the last 12-13 years, we paid $30,000.00 in cash for her in 1999. She was a 1998 NRHA Futurity Finalist finishing 10th out of over 400 horses.  I wouldn't sell her for $60,000.00 dollars today and that's a fair price.  In addition I had loosened my $3,500.00 dollar custom made (fits my ass like a glove) saddle and hung oh maybe $1200.00 dollars worth of headgear on the saddle horn... 

The Latigo arena is about 12 miles from the horse ranch.

So everyone goes outside (about 20 people or so) and walk around the Latigo grounds (some driving), checking every place we could, two hours, not a single sign except you could see a trail from the lead rope leaving the arena. 

About one AM after driving EVERY road in the Latigo housing development (surrounds the arena) we took the other three horses back to the ranch.  NOPE, she wasn't there..... Put everyone else away, dropped Robert off, went home and broke the bad news to Susan. We had bought Betty for Susan in 1999 so she could learn to rein from and experienced horse, Betty bucked her off the first day).

I set my alarm for 5:30AM so I could be at the arena at sun-up. From experience we knew she probably hadn't gone far, but there's so many fences and barbed wire around, one has to be worried about her getting scared and tangled in some bad thing... (I set the alarm but didn't get much (any) sleep).

So I drive to Latigo as the suns coming up, drive in and take a quick circle (with the truck and trailer) around the outdoors arena, low and behold, there's Betty, the saddle (still just like I left it) and headstall still hanging on the horn.  She's munching on grass next to another horse in the Latigo stalling area (they board horses), about 100 yards from the arena door she wandered out of.

I pull up the truck, jump out and call "Betty", her head flies up, she takes one look and runs over to the trailer pawing the door to get into the trailer... I let her in and we (I should say I) had a good cry...

One really good thing to know about horses is they usually stop at the first place they can find food and wander around that eating...

So after an anxious night with little sleep (for me or Susan), Betty and the rest are home waiting to torture the old man next month with another practice cutting... December 16th at the Latigo arena if you want to have a good laugh... (an old man acting like he 26). OH YEAH, I'll check and double check the knot...

Eighteen Years ago TODAY!

18 Years Ago Today, June 12th, 1993

Eighteen(18( years ago today, just about this time of the day, friends and family were starting to gather at our nearly brand new house in Black Forest. The occasions was our wedding.  It wasn't big, we had at the most a couple dozen people, BUT we were married outside our house in the forest on a sunny Saturday afternoon.

Susan & I had already been together for eight(8) years  when we decided marriage might be a reasonable option.  It has proven to be a good choice, especially for me since I'm fairly certain I'd have driven most anyone else off by now.

I proposed to Susan while we still lived in the old house in town. Becky and James were BOTH there for that too.

Note that Ed is not in ANY of these photos. He was honorably serving our country as a United State Marine.

Not a huge wedding but all of the family that could make it. (Hmmm time travel).







We were going to sell this house. I would have regretted that decision every time I saw these photos. This is really OUR place, we picked the lot, designed the house and chose the forest and "mother nature" for our life long commitment...

Guess we all know what happens to a "long haired hippy" when he gets old? dang had a lot of hair once...

 Happy Anniversary Sweety



What Sets Us Apart From the Other Animals on This Planet is Our Infinite Capacity to Love...

Happy Mothers Day to all the Mothers out there. Thank You..

Just went outside with the chainsaw and cut a bunch of unhealthy trees down, including one that had been killed by pine beetles. After bending over cutting down dozens of little trees (1" to 6") I stood up and nearly went down myself, thought my heart was going to explode, guess I better get back on the wind trainer. Dang.

Being outside in the "yard" reminded me of how exceptionally lucky we are to live here. 100 foot plus trees, beutiful wild flowers, great topology, I don't think we could have found a nicer place to live... and it's SO quiet just the wind in the trees.  While sitting on the ground recovering I looked up at some of the older trees (140+ years) and noticed how many had been struck by lightning over the years.... Simply amazing...

Two nights ago I was outside feeding the horses and heard an owl, hooting. I looked across the road, 30 feet or so and there was a HUGE (2.5 foot tall (guess)) Great Horned Owl with something it had scrounged for dinner, no not one of our cats.

We can certainly claim Spring has sprung when the "birds of prey" start there annual migration, soon we'll see the geese and the most amazing of all, "Sand Hill Cranes". They fly in GIANT flocks making incredible noise, then periodically they fly in a giant whirlwing circular pattern before continuing on their way to the "Sand Hills of Nebraska" along the Platte River. Twice in the eighteen years we've lived here they've landed in great hordes all around us for the night.

Grizzly and Gnarly are the best of friends, Gnarly has really settled down since Griz has been here. Everyday after dinner the wrestle like two huge bears for about an hour... Both are covers with teeth marks and scabs from playing too rough. Never seem to hurt each other though...

OMGoodness Gnarley FINALLY has a playmate

It's pretty amazing to watch 257 pounds of newfoundland "play". As Griz feels better and as he's started adjusting to his new home he not only puts up with Gnarley's instigation but actually plays back. Griz is the FIRST dog to actually play with Gnarf.

So today we went for a walk, newfs are not only water dogs but draft dogs too. Used for pulling in fishing nets and extensively in Newfoundland for pulling milk carts and other carts around.  Newfs hold the world record for pulling over 8,000 pounds.  So we're walking around the circle, well sorta walking, two yellow labs jump our neighbors fence (she's a vet) and come charging out like they're attacking. Of course the newfs wanted to play and started chasing them, back to their yard, back over the fence  The choice, let go of the leash or bite the dust. Now I gotta chase the dang dogs chasing the dang dogs.... dang.

So I'm trimming the hair on Griz's front paws, they look like he has on fuzzy slippers, I should say looked like. In any case his paws are as big as my palms and I recalled a conversation I had with James a few days ago. Our first newfoundsland was "Windwalkers Feel The Thunder" after her daddy and the Air Force Football "theme". We called her "Windy".  Her daddy's name was "Windwalker Thunder Paws", but try as we might neither James or I, certainly none of the rest of the family could recall our second newfoundlands "proper" AKC name. It suddenly dawned on me during a "Thundersnow" we had the other day. We called her "Rainy" (We also had a Sunny, a Stormy and a Snowy the half newf), but her long name was "Riverfronts Delicate Sound of Thunder". ( a Pink Floyd live album, for those that don't know).

Well both dogs are passed out, I'm next!

It's "Grizzly" aka "Griz" and yes, he lives here

Well, it's been a little over four weeks since Darth > X > Grizzly came to live with us.  I still can't believe how massive he is. Even more than his giant size, he is amazingly gentle and laid back.  When James and Solitare came down with O.C. and Baxter it at first seemed like there might be a little excitement but it turned out good, all four dogs got along fine with Gnarley being the top instigator, well "play" instigator.

Gnarley really likes having the big guy around they lay out on the front porch most of the day and now both sleep around our bed ay night. We take them everywhere we can while it's still cool outside, they run out and jump into the van then when they get home they run to the house.  Fabulous.

Poor Griz lost his "family jewels" about ten days ago and it's been quite an ordeal. They were the size of tangarines and after removal he got all swollen and bruised. Of course after a week they became infected so he's now on anti-biotics.  This underscores the reason to have this procedure done when they're young.

It is still amazingly sad that such a well behaved, loving and handsome dogs would simply be dumped. That's right DUMPED, we haven't heard a single thing from the humaneless society, (except they now send me solicitation mail since I gave them my address), nothing from Craigslist, neither of the two newf rescue groups have heard anything and not a SINGLE "lost dog" sign....

gotta go feed the equine, then take the pups to Castle Rock so WE can have some Dream Pasties for breakfast... bye....