Guffaw

I guffawed while watching the news.  I was just about to change the channel, because I was being affected too deeply by all the bad news:  Wildfires burning down houses, fatal car accidents, and fatal shootings.  Then IT appeared on the screen:

A large ammo box with familiar looking spray-painted symbols.  Just as I was about to say, "That's a geocache," there was huge BOOM as it exploded.  The Reno Bomb Squad blew it up, because someone reported it as a suspicious container.  They showed all these little toys and trinkets inside and I burst out laughing. 

I know.  It's kind of sick to laugh so hard over the destruction of a geocache, but considering all the frustration that my geocaching hobby has brought to me, it was good to see one of them exploding.  The Reno police publicly "spanked" geocachers for planting a geocache out in the open where it can scare mistrustful citizens.  Despite the wasted use of public resources, I'm sure the Bomb Squad was happy to finally have an assignment where they could practice their skills in a real-life scenario.  Hopefully, all future jobs will be just as innocuous as this one.  

Fishing on the West Walker River

My son and I went fishing on a Friday since thunderstorms are supposed to roll in this weekend. I fed the horses their breakfast and lunch before we left and did a good job of hiding hay in places where they normally wouldn't look for it, in hopes that they wouldn't gorge themselves. I had to leave the dogs indoors, otherwise Scrappy barks non-stop and drives the neighbors crazy. I hoped they would be able to hold their potty needs for most of the day, and if not, I'd be willing to clean up the mess just for one day in which I can commune with nature.

The early morning was nice and quiet, but by 9:00 AM the tourists started rolling in doing that "monkey see -- monkey do" routine that I love so much. Every time I found a nice secluded spot for us to fish, some dufus in a Winnebago would pull off the road and park right behind me. The side door would open up and out would pour all these kids who proceeded to invade our fishing hole in every obnoxious way they could invent.

It's probably time that I offer up one of my etiquette courses for tourists. I know no one reading my blog needs to be educated in this manner, but for now it is my only platform.

1. Most people go fishing because they enjoy being alone, so if you see someone fishing, steer clear and give him his space.
2. If you throw rocks into a river right where someone is fishing, you scare all the fish away.
3. If you go swimming in a river right where someone is fishing, you scare all the fish away.
4. If you stand on the river bank above the river and yell out nosy questions to a fisherman, you just piss him off because your voice and shadow are scaring all the fish away.
5. If there are 30 miles of river alongside a road, it is not necessary to park right next to other people. Spread out.

As usual, Colt wasn't getting any bites, so he asked if he could go swimming instead of fishing. I was done fishing and there were no other fishermen nearby, so I told him to go ahead. Next thing I knew he was caught in a current and being dragged downstream. I freaked. He grabbed onto a rock on the other side of the river bank, climbed up and started fishing from over there. I didn't realize he had his fishing pole with him. He didn't bring swim trunks, so he was out there in wet boxers when another load of tourists drove up. Sigh.

I told him he might want to swim back and get dressed before they start climbing down the hillside toward us. However, we both realized that he was in a bit of a conundrum, because the water was very deep beside the rock and the current was strong enough to sweep him away. I told him to swim hard for my side of the bank and I would run alongside and jump in if he got into trouble. There was one other instruction I meant to give him, but forgot.

He jumped in and was swimming toward my side of the bank, but the current was carrying him swiftly downstream toward the white water. That was when I remembered my other instruction: If you get into trouble, just drop the pole. My son managed to stand up on some rocks in the middle of the river, and then wade across the rest of the way. He emerged in his wet boxers and said, "I'm dropping my pants right here and putting on my dry jeans, so turn around."

I said, "No! People are coming."

He looked up and sure enough all these people were emerging from the bushes. My son hurried off for some distant bushes and changed there. I kind of stood guard to try to stop anyone from heading that way. When I saw he successfully changed and was heading back, I turned around and practically tripped over a lady who set up her chair right next to me and my fishing gear. She just smiled and said, "This place is so beautiful."

I agreed, gathered my stuff and promptly left. This beach we were on was about the length of a football field. There was no need for her to take my space. Perhaps she wanted to socialize, but that's what cities are for. People who go to the mountains to fish want their solitude.

Each time we got chased out of one hole, we got in our car and moved further downstream in search of a new hole with no people around, but usually within a matter of minutes someone would spot our car and decide we must know something they don't, and pull over to take a look at what we are doing. Both my son and I were getting very practiced at puffing ourselves up big and giving people a look that says, "Back off."

The good news is that I probably caught a dozen rainbow trout. The bad news is that all but two got away. I need to use barbed hooks next time. My son didn't believe me when I kept telling him I caught and lost another one, because he wasn't getting any bites. We finally teamed up with him crouching at the bank with a net while I cast my line in, and he helped me net the second one just before it fell off the hook. We ended up with one 14" and one 12" trout. I know I had one on the line that must have been at least 15", but just couldn't grab my net fast enough.

On the way home some Californian in a Mercedes sports car blasted past a long line of cars in the oncoming lane going about 100 MPH in a 55 MPH zone. I was pissed, because I had to drive past the scenes of two fatal accidents caused by people driving in the oncoming lane today. Anyway, we got into a double solid yellow line zone and the guy was still in the oncoming lane passing cars.

I let out whoop when we came over a hill and there was a cop on the side of the road. He immediately put his lights on, and the driver of the Mercedes just automatically pulled over in front of him. The cop didn't even have to drive out into traffic and get behind the guy. He just sat on the side of the road with his lights on and the offender came to him. It was hilarious.

So we got home and weren't even home for five minutes, and I walked out of the house into the garage to find my nosy neighbor idling in her car at the end of my driveway staring into my garage as if trying to figure out where we went. I mouthed, "What the hell do you want?" at her, and she rolled forward behind my trees, but then just sat there in front of my house in her car. So, I ran inside to get my camera, but by the time I got out there to start photographing her doing surveillance on my house, she drove off. What a sad life she must have to be so engrossed in having to know where her neighbors have been.  If she read my blog, she'd know everything and not have to snoop around in my garage.

When Good Boys Go Bad

You may remember me mentioning that my son had long hair when he left for his sports camp, and thanks to one boy's prank, my son came back looking like this:

That's his puppy dog eyes, and girly girl look. He's just being silly. He's always got to be in some kind of character for the camera. Here's a side view...

Back view...

I shaved his neck, and some kids did the rest.  We are aiming for going on our annual fishing trip some time soon before he leaves for college.  I booked his flight today.  He and his father got the last two seats on the plane.  It was a close one, considering there were eight seats available just half an hour before.

No news to report on Gabbrielle.  I called today to see if I could observe another lesson and the trainer said she was too busy running her day camp.  She said she is riding Gabbrielle, but it's difficult for her to schedule anything and stick with it, so I have an appointment next Wednesday.

It's good to know I'm not the only one incapable of making a schedule and sticking to it.  I'm like...  Oh, I think I'll run on the treadmill this morning and make sure I take all my vitamins -- WHAT?  We still haven't submitted all the paperwork for your college loans?  Dang it! 

Or... I think I'll lunge the horses today, put the fishing poles together, and take the dogs for a hike -- WHAT?  No one has booked your flight to your university yet?  Argh!  

Or... I think I'll walk some dogs at the animal shelter today -- RING! RING!  Hi, Nuz Muz, I got a problem.  Can you fix it for me? 

I'm done fixing things.  You forget something important -- you suffer the consequences.  You make the mess -- you clean it up.  Although it is kind of hard to get a skunk to wash my dogs and get my horse to stitch up his own wounds.  Oh well, I guess personal responsibility doesn't exactly extend to the animal world.  Although, my horses do try to clean up their own poop.  The only problem with their method is that it just comes right back out as poop.  It's a poopy poop world out there.  Better look sharp.

Sirens

We've been experiencing the sound of so many emergency sirens racing past our house each day that I've decided to add "no police stations or fire houses near" whatever home we move to in the future.  I know they are convenient to have nearby when you need them, but my little rural neighborhood is beginning to sound like New York City.

Sometimes they are racing to wildfires, but more often than not it is car accidents in which someone was speeding or drunk or on drugs or talking on a mobile phone or all of the above.  What is really scary is the number of fatalities that have occurred this season.  We have always had accidents during tourist season, but this year many people are not surviving them.

Someone stole the roadside memorial for a 16-year-old girl whose life was cut short at a dangerous intersection many years ago.  It was a memorial that was kept fresh and clean, maintained by friends of the family, so there was no reason to remove it.  The family of the girl has been a strong influence in our community, offering college scholarships and awards to high school students every year in their daughter's name.  You'd think people would show more respect.

Despite traffic increasing during the summer months, I still see people driving in the oncoming lane everywhere I go.  I always wonder is it stupidity, selfishness, laziness, or foreign substances that make people behave that way?

Yesterday there were two more Sheriff's officers visiting a house in our neighborhood.  Twice in one week at two different houses isn't a good sign.  We seem to be attracting the riff-raff as our housing values decline.  I was out watering the pasture when someone came racing around the corner going about 50 MPH in our 35 MPH residential zone.  Apparently, the driver was too busy checking me out to notice the two police cruisers on the side of the road.  He saw them when he was finally on top of them and literally slammed on his brakes, and then crawled past.  The officers were too busy dealing with the people at the house to give him a ticket. 

I read in the paper that the animal shelter is full and they have a waiting list of people who need to find new homes for their pets.  The abandonment rate of animals has gone way up in the past month.  They desperately need people to adopt.  I'm tempted, but I know that Scrappy would not handle another dog well.  He is finally learning to accept Midge.  He still tries to intimidate her with his body language, but he's learned not to lunge at her with his teeth bared.  He has tried to bite her in the past, but fortunately all he's done is tug on her fur.  Also, since my husband is the light sleeper who gets up to let the dogs outside at night, he made me promise not to bring home any more dogs.

I hope that whatever is going on in my community to make people act so crazy will settle down soon.  Usually a little snow takes care of it, but I'm not asking for some.  We've been fortunate to have a mild summer with temperatures in the 80s this year.  I'd like to keep it a little longer, minus all the trouble that people cause when they aren't holed up inside their houses.

What to Keep and What to Toss

Here's another blooming lily from my Mother's Day garden that my husband and kids planted for me years ago. Don't you think that's a great idea to plant a garden for your mom? It's the gift that keeps on giving.

Speaking of moms, some of you mentioned that you too have experience settling your parents' estate after their passing. I have a question for you: How do you decide what to keep and what to throw out?

I removed everything from their house that was personal and had their names on it. My kids helped pack everything away in boxes, and I am just now going through it all. I don't have much room to store stuff. My house is already so cluttered. However, I have a friend who has been giving me a hard time for not being sentimental enough. He says I'm going to regret throwing out memorabilia. He actually took all of my and my brother's trophies because he cared more about our childhood than we do. He also took an antique secretary from 1893 that belonged to my great aunt and said he'll hold onto it for me, because he thinks I'll want it back someday.

Anyway, I'm throwing out trophies, plaques and awards, because they are bulky and take up too much space. I'm saving all pictures, with the exception of those long class pictures that are rolled up, cracked and yellowing. I'm saving anything that might possibly be valuable to a collector, such as play bills, stamps and coins. I'll hang onto their yearbooks for a while until I look through them, but I can't keep them. I might just cut out the pictures of my parents and throw the books away.

My father saved all these travel brochures from the places they've traveled. I think those can go in the trash. He took thousands of pictures from his travels and has the negatives, the slides, and the photos. Do I really need to hang onto the negatives?

All the scrapbooks are taking up half a closet, so I'm planning on scanning the photos into a computer and then burning them onto a CD. The job feels a bit overwhelming, though, because my new scanner takes about one minute per scan, and all of these scrapbooks have pages that are larger than my scanner, so I have to either take the pictures out or cut the albums up to fit. I might hire someone to do it for me. My only problem is that technology keeps changing and it seems that as soon as you transfer media to a new form, it is no longer supported. All of our family videos are on VCR tapes and all of our VCRs are broken, so we can't view them. Since photographs don't involve technology to view them, I'm probably safer keeping them, even though they do deteriorate over time.

I'm saving anything related to our family tree.  I really am not interested in my genealogy, but I'm the only one left in my blood line who is in the position to save this stuff and someday someone might be born who will actually care about it.

Do you hang onto baby shoes and teething rings that belonged to your relatives? What's the point? I've got wedding rings that belonged to all the women of my older generations, but it makes sense to keep them because they are worth money and my children or grandchildren might some day get married and prefer to recycle a family rock over buying a new one.

People keep giving me baby clothes and tablecloths that were handmade by relatives, but I have no use for them. Yes, the silk or the lace and the handiwork is lovely, but we've got a crappy little kitchen table and no dining room and I'm too old to have anymore babies. The clothes are too old fashioned for any grandchildren I might have. What do you do with all that stuff?

The Scar, The Fuzz and More Fuzz

Bombay has something to say.

My boo-boo is looking and feeling much better.

My husband and I went on a short geocaching trip this morning.  As we were about to back out of our driveway a Sheriff's Deputy drove up our road.  I had to pause to see where he was headed.  Can you guess?

Where else?  He drove to my annoying, weird, nosy next door neighbors' place, but he couldn't get in, because they had their front gate locked.  Hmmmm.  It was almost as if they were expecting him and wanted to keep him out.  I watched for a little bit, but it didn't seem like anyone was going to let him in.  He just sat there doing surveillance.  I wondered if he was looking at the suspicious, wrecked car that magically appeared one day.  I guess there's no need for me to call the police now and give them the license plate.  I'm sure they know about it now.

You know how I say that these people shouldn't be allowed to board animals, none-the-less babysit kids?  Well, yesterday I was standing in the kitchen window rinsing a dish when I saw my neighbor woman come racing up the street in her car, looking in her rear view mirror and smiling.  A short time later the little boy she babysits came running up the dirt road with her dog on a leash and they were both chasing the car.  The dog lunged ahead, pulling the boy right off his feet and he slammed down onto the road face first skinning his hands and knees.  The dog took off after the car.  The boy got up in tears and the woman didn't even stop or come back to get him.  He had to limp back to her house.

Anyway, we started our geocaching journey and missed the first cache, because it turned out that the street we were looking for did not have a street sign.  We should have just been watching the GPS coordinates.  I wasn't interested enough to turn around, so we moved on to the next cache.  This was our second attempt to find this one.  We couldn't find it on the first try because there was too much snow.  This time we found it.

Then we stopped at the equestrian center to visit Gabbrielle.  Apparently, she isn't learning her lesson, because she has even more scars on her body from other horses kicking and biting her.

We found a second cache fairly easily and moved on to a third.  I didn't know that the road I had to take to get there was a dirt road.  I wish Google maps would differentiate between the two.  Part of the reason why I chose to go geocaching was because I thought it was an activity I could do safely without my lousy luck forcing me to vomit up another several hundred bucks to fix an unexpected problem.

We found the third geocache in some sage brush and my husband said, "I'd like to kick the butt of the next person who hides a cache in sage."

It is terrible.  When you move a branch, the stink gets up deep in your sinuses and you get an instant headache.  I've had a runny nose and have been sneezing ever since this trip since 2 out of 3 of the caches were hidden in sage brush.  So, while I was signing the third cache, my husband was playing with some red ants that were trying to move a stick.  I noticed that the ants were crawling on our shoes and trying to get up our pant legs, so I said, "Let's get out of here before we get bit," but it was too late for my husband, and of course, he's allergic to ant bites.

So, that was the end of our trip.  We had to go straight home for the Calamine Lotion.  That was when my husband found that while off-roading in my mother's car, we broke a heat shield in the wheel well and it was hanging down dragging on the tire.  Dang it!  It's not something that can be fixed with a few screws, because the other half of it is broken off and missing.  We will have to take the car into a mechanic and get the part replaced.

I'm at my wits end with these unexpected expenses.  I just can't take it anymore.  I'm going to climb into bed and stay there until someone comes to me with good news, which hopefully will mean that my luck is turning around for the better and I can get back to living my life minus the endless drain of my pocketbook.  The best news I can offer is that we've got lilies:

My poor son came home from his sports camp half a day early with a violent stomach flu.  He was so sick that he couldn't even speak to me.  He just said he was sick, ran for the bathroom, and then passed out on his bed.  He didn't look like my son, though, because some boy at camp took some electric clippers to his hair while he was sleeping.  The kid said he didn't like my son's rat tail.  The boys in this area are very anti rat trail and anti mullet.  For some reason long hair on men scares them.

So, in order to repair the damage, some kids finished shaving my son's head and gave him a Mohawk.  He's fuzzy on the sides and has a thick shock of hair in a stripe right down the center of his head.  He does look handsome in it, but he's as far from being a punk rocker as anyone I know.  He sure is going to give the students at his new university the wrong impression about who he is.

If there is anything I've learned this year, it is that I have absolutely no control over my life.  If bad things are going to happen, they are just going to happen and I can't do anything to stop it.  In fact, the harder I try to avoid problems, the harder they seek me out.  I just want a little simplicity in my life.  I want to be able to drive a car without breaking it.  I want to be able to hand-water my pasture without tripping over the hose.  I want to be able to take a shower without getting attacked by a spider.  I want to be able to eat a sandwich without dripping something down the front of my shirt.  I want to be able to pump some antibacterial soap into the palm of my hand without it ricocheting off my palm and splattering all over my shirt, or worse yet, into my eye.  Okay.  I'm done with that rant.

Now onto what happened this afternoon.  I walked outside to get the mail and didn't see any vehicles on the road.  I always look around, because sometimes my nosy neighbor takes me by surprise and follows me to the mailbox either on foot or in her car.  She did it to me the other day when I heard an engine start up and saw that she was parked behind my barn.  Anyway, as I began walking across my lawn I heard voices laughing very loudly in a mocking manner.

I looked around, but didn't see anyone.  It felt like they were right next to me.  Then I saw a green car slowly moving behind the pine trees on my driveway.  I knew it was one of my nosy neighbors' friends.  This woman has been practically living at their house, and if she catches neighbors out and about, she forces religious pamphlets into their hands.  I wanted to avoid her, so I headed in the opposite direction.  Once she passed, I finished my trek to the mailbox.

I passed my husband on the way in the house, as he was out hand-watering some dead spots on our lawn.  He came back into the house a couple of minutes later and said that the Sheriff was back and he was looking my husband over really well.  I looked out the window and saw that the Sheriff was standing on my nosy neighbors' porch talking to them.  He had his back to me.  The woman started pointing at my friend's house and the officer kept looking over there.

Then the woman started pointing at my house, and the officer turned around and looked directly at the window I was looking out.  I don't know if he saw me or not, but he kept looking back at me.  Then the woman went back and forth between pointing at my friends' house and pointing at my house.  After about ten minutes, he got in his patrol car and left.  I was half-expecting him to knock on our door, but couldn't imagine what the heck was going on.

I find it rather telling that the officer showed up just minutes after the neighbors arrived home with their friend.  I suspect my friend reported them for something and was watching for them, and was able to notify the Sheriff's office when they got home.  That would explain the timing.  But I don't know what the complaint would have been beyond the strange wrecked car showing up on their lot or perhaps the little boy being allowed to have the run of the neighborhood.  I know that my friend has complained that the woman has been letting the little boy she babysits run over to her farm and pester her all day long.  He hits her up for conversation at the crack of dawn, because his parents drop him off at the neighbors' house at 5:00 AM and his babysitter doesn't want to have to deal with him, so she just shoos him outside the second his parents drive off.  I know because they always happen to drive up right when I'm in the horse paddock in my pajamas, and they do their usual park and stare.

Ha ha!  I like it.  Instead of being a Park and Ride, my nosy neighbors' front lot is a Park and Stare.

Anyway, I'm sure I'll eventually find out why the fuzz was so persistent in paying a visit to my annoying neighbors.  Whatever it was, it sure looked like the woman was trying to turn the blame on my friend and me.  I know for a fact that she is incapable of taking responsibility for her own actions, because when I've asked her to stop some of her more annoying behaviors in the past, she just pointed the finger at someone else and said, "But he is worse about it."

Tarpe Diem

I laid a tarp over the round pen railing to fill in the gap where my nosy neighbor was previously parking, so I could have more privacy. 

Unfortunately, the tarp idea won't work permanently, because Bombay keeps trying to eat it. He likes to shred tarps, and one time I had to pull a piece out of his throat. I just kept a close eye on him while it was up and did some desensitization exercises making the horses move over the tarp on the ground, but I can't leave it out there.

I used the target and clicker method of getting them to walk onto the tarp for a treat.  I also lunged them across the tarp together.  Neither Bombay nor Lostine was terribly concerned.  I think working them together helped build their confidence.  A herd of horses might try to trample a threat, but an individual horse will shy from it.  Gabbrielle is really the one who needs this training, but she's away at school.

The tarp training didn't go so well at first simply because even with treats I could not hold the horses' attention.  A bunch of neighbors started coming out of their houses to see what I was doing, and the horses were focused on them sneaking around my barn to get a good view.  I wish I could live on a huge acreage where I could be free to train my horses my way without curious onlookers watching and judging.

The nosy neighbor next door was sitting in her car watching me when I first came out to work with the horses.  I hate it when that happens.  If I see her climb into her car, then I am aware that she's there, but if she's already in her car when I come outside, I don't notice.  I think it's just an empty parked car.  Once I realized she was there, I sat behind the tarp just to block her view of me and frustrate her.  She did a lot of door slamming, and then eventually drove off, but not without first stopping, shutting off her engine, and making a point of locking her front gate to her property.

I heard her engine start up, heard her moving at a crawl around her front lot as if looking for a location where she could park and see me, and then heard her shut off her engine.  Every time she or her husband start to drive off somewhere, I feel elated because I know I can then train my horses without interference.  Then, inevitably, they stop and shut off their engine before getting all the way down the street.  Or they turn around and come right back, and I get upset knowing they are probably going to be in my face for several more minutes or even hours.  In this case she shut off her engine to close the gate.  That in itself is odd.  Most normal people would leave the engine running, put the car in park with the emergency brake on, and then close the gate.

Also, as far as I can see, there's no reason for them to lock their gate every time they leave since they have no more animals that can escape.  Plus they always left the gate open even when they boarded animals.  I suspect that she's locking it now because she's angry about Animal Welfare coming onto her property to check on the goats.  I still don't know who took the remainder of them away -- if it was Animal Welfare or the original owner or new owners.  All I know is that the pressure us neighbors put on her helped the goats have a better life elsewhere, since anywhere is better than the situation they were in before.

After going through all that trouble to pull each of the huge rolling gates shut and locking them up, the woman ended up only being gone for about five minutes.  When she returned, she went through the whole routine of unlocking the lock, pushing each heavy, rolling panel off to the side, driving in, pulling each panel shut and locking up again.  It was like something you see in movies where a drug manufacturing warehouse has a fortress around it.

I wonder if they are hiding something valuable on their property now.  I mean, it is strange that they've lived there for five years and have never closed that gate until recently.  They used to take week-long vacations and leave that gate open.  This change in locking their gate coincided with when that wrecked vehicle showed up on their lot.  I'll bet someone without insurance got into a car accident and is trying to hide the vehicle in order to avoid taking responsibility for the problems they caused.  I saw another neighbor try to do that a couple of years ago.  People kept coming to our door asking if we knew where our neighbors hid the vehicle. 

I noticed that they parked this latest wreck at an odd angle where no one from the street can see the license plate or the worst of the damage.  Maybe I should report the license plate and suspicious activity to the police.  At this point, I'm looking for every opportunity I can get to make life next door to me as difficult as possible for these people so that they will be more than happy to move away.

My days have been a roller coaster of encouragement and disappointments lately.  I was relying on either my mother's house selling or the certified death certificate being issued before my kids started college in August to keep us out of a very uncomfortable financial situation with me being out of work.  We had one buyer for the house and he backed out after seeing the home inspection report.  Now my real estate agent wants me to come up with the money to replace the roof, the fireplace, relocate some gas pipes, rewire the electrical system, and replace some support beams that have termite damage.  Yeah, right.  Like I've got a spare $40,000 just sitting around my house while I'm unemployed and I have two kids in college.

Then, of course, I ended up spending money on things I didn't expect these past few months, such as vet bills, moldy hay, horse trailer repairs, and doctor's bills.  It was looking like my husband was going to have to go in for shoulder surgery again, but fortunately the tendons popped back into place as he was on  his way to the doctor's office.  I call that Divine Intervention.

Every day unexpected bills arrive in my mother's name.  It has all been building up while our bank accounts have been going down at a rapid rate.  I was starting to get scared for the future of my family.  My mother set money aside to help us after her passing, but the law wouldn't let us access any of it. 

I had been calling the Coroner's office every few weeks asking for the status of the death certificate, and they wouldn't tell me much beyond, "Just wait."  Easier said than done when you have way more money going out than coming in.  I decided to change tactics and call the doctor who did the autopsy on my mother.  I figured that dealing with the person who handled my flesh and blood would be more effective than dealing with someone who just pushes paper.  It turned out to be a fateful decision.  This doctor got really angry when he found out that I've been unemployed while settling my mother's estate, I somehow have to pay for two kids in college, and it has taken 120 days for the Medical Examiner to close the case.  The doctor said that based upon my hardship, he would make sure that the case was closed and the certified death certificate was issued that very day.

I felt so relieved until I called the cemetery to inform them that the document was ready for them to mail to me.  They said there is a two-week process for the State to turn the online form into a hard copy.  Say what?  They can't just print it out?  Argh!  So, by the time this process is done and they mail it to me, it will be the middle of August.  Then I have to turn around and mail copies to all the companies that are holding my inheritance and wait another several weeks for them to process it and mail me a check.  By then we are looking at the beginning of September. 

This means that absolutely nothing can go wrong that will cost us large amounts of money for the next two months.  That means no horseback riding for me.  I'm even afraid to go to the Animal Shelter, because the last time I went, a dog tried to bite my forearm three times.  Had he broke the skin, I would have had to get medical care and the dog would have been sent off to a kill shelter.  The county's insurance would pay for my medical care, but I don't need the hassle.  I just don't want to take any risks that could result in us getting into deeper financial debt or in me getting disabled on any level.  I still have to make at lest one more 800-mile round trip to my mother's house to clean it out.  I'll need my arms to do heavy lifting.

I feel like I lost a year of my life when my mother died.  That's why we must always seize the day.

Report From Around the Ranch

Mr. Skunky still stinks, but we got most of the stench out of the house. I've given him two special baths and hosed down the location where the skunk sprayed him, but he still goes outside and rolls in it. Ugh.

Midge is so disgusted with Scrappy's preference for yucky smells that she just avoids him.

In the mornings I wake up to be greeted by the horses and my neighbor's pile of junk vehicles and trailers. They are on another junk vehicle collection binge. Another trailer piled with junk appeared against the fence this past weekend and now they have a wrecked car up against my horse paddock. It has dents all over it and the trunk won't close. What are they thinking? Do they think they are going to fix it up and sell it when they can't even pay the mechanic to repair their own truck? Ahhh, the mysteries of the human mind.  I think I understand animals better.

Despite parking my truck and horse trailer to allow me to sit on my patio without the neighbors being able to stare at me from their front porch, they have figured out where to park their latest vehicle so that they can sit in it and get a perfect view of me on my patio between my truck and horse trailer.

Peek-a-boo, I see you.

The privacy trees I planted a couple of years ago on the other side of my property have all died, save a few shoots. We had two hard winters and my husband says I over-pruned them.

The two little trees in pots outside my bathroom window are still alive, though not thriving. I may try to transplant them to where the dead trees are and perhaps buy a few more younger Emerald Cones for the bathroom window and rest of the fence line.

I'm still waiting for the finances to settle, though, so it probably won't happen until fall or spring. Yesterday I received the property tax bill for the house I inherited payments on, and the Coroner still hasn't issued the certified death certificate, despite it being well beyond 120 days after the autopsy. 90 days is supposed to be the deadline for them to issue it. I've never owned a home before, so it shocked me to find out that taxes are paid in July.  This is going to create trouble for me when the mortgage company finds out that the house changed names, but the mortgage didn't.  If they want to refinance and put the mortgage in my name, I won't qualify because I'm out of work.  Why does life have to be so complicated?

I've spent the past few days just resting at home, doing the bare minimum in order to avoid creating more problems. However, today I plan to venture out to spend a day out of the house away from the endless bills that keep pouring into our mailbox, in hopes that not seeing the mail for one day will relieve some stress.

My son is at his sports camp this week. His hair has been getting long, so I wanted to trim it before he left for the triple-digit heat of Arizona. He called last night and told me that I can't cut his hair now, but wouldn't say why. I'm guessing his roommates at camp gave him a hazing and shaved his head. I guess I'll find out at the end of the week.

Nuzzling Muzzles

Yes, the title of this post is the title of my blog.  Sunday morning I threw on some sweats and skipped the hair and make-up.  I made up my mind that I wasn't going to go anywhere or do anything.  I just wanted to recover and avoid leaving myself open for more trouble.  I did take my sleeping pills the night before and finally got a good night's sleep.  I went outside to sit on the patio in the shade and read a book.  By now I had my horse trailer back to block my neighbor's view of my patio.

After sitting out there a while, I realized that my neighbors had padlocked their front gate shut.  That's something they rarely do, suggesting that they planned to be away a long time.  I decided to move my chair over under the awning of the barn so that I could sit with the horses while I read, since there was no one next door to come to the fence and pester me.

After a while Bombay moseyed on over to me and started inspecting my book with his muzzle.  Before I knew it, he was grabbing my book with his teeth and we were fully engaged in a tug-of-war.  I won.  He kept trying to take it out of my hands, so I gently bopped him on the nose with it each time he tried.  He gave up on that task and moved on to trying to tip me out of my chair.

He grabbed the top of the back frame of the fold-up chair and began lifting and tipping.  I shooed him away.  He returned and I told him to be "nice, nice".  He responded by licking my hand and nuzzling my head.  I gave him a lot of lovin' and then he proceeded to try ripping the backing of my chair with his teeth.  That was it.  I had to remove the chair from the paddock, because he was in full-on mischievous mode and he was on a mission.

But first, I set the fold-up chair on his back and threatened to ride him side-saddle in that chair.  He just smirked at me, calling my bluff.  I then had a chat with him regarding how brave he is about accepting strange objects, and how fearful he is of riding in the horse trailer.  I said, "No horse I know besides you would ever let me put a fold-up chair on his back."

I walked up to Lostine to demonstrate, and she took off for the hills as soon as I lifted the chair toward her back.  "See?" I said to Bombay.  "You're the bravest horse I know, so why can't you ride in the trailer?"

I then noticed Lostine sadly licking Gabbrielle's stall window.  I walked over to her and rubbed her head and neck, explaining that Gabbrielle will be back at the end of summer and she is just away at school.  I think Lostine has been worrying that Gabbrielle may never come back.  She does get attached to her mare friends.  It took Lostine years to stop yearning to be with the mares at her old farm across the road.

Bombay's cut is healing well on top, but the bottom of the cut keeps breaking open and bleeding.  I've been wiping off the scab formations and cleaning it with Betadine solution, water and soap each day.  Then I surround it with Swat since the flies are starting to come around.  The vet thinks that if I keep up this daily treatment he may not even have a scar.  He was just concerned about letting scabs form, because bacteria can build up under them.

I've been exercising Lostine when I can, but have avoided doing anything with Bombay in order to let his wound heal.  I'm sure that getting him running would just tear open his wound more.  It looks like this will be the summer of very little horseback riding.  Hopefully, next year will make up for it.

Bubble Wrap, Please

The last 48 hours have been beyond ridiculous.  Here are the highlights:

1.  Friday morning I was woken by my husband calling for help.  He had a cut that wouldn't stop bleeding and he wanted me to get the blood out of the carpet before it dried and stained. 

2.  Saturday night I was determined to get a full night's sleep, but was woken at 3:00 AM by the dogs barking.  They usually bark at that hour either because one of them desperately has to go to the bathroom or because someone (usually a nosy neighbor) is trespassing on our property.  I opened the back door a crack and sniffed the air to make sure there weren't any skunks about.  The air was crisp and clean.  I let the dogs out and ten seconds later Scrappy was fighting for his life after a baby skunk sprayed him straight in the face, clogging up his mouth, nostrils and eyes with skunk oil.  We had to race him to the bathtub and wash his face so that he could breathe again.  You know the rest.  I got to spend the remainder of the morning bathing dogs, washing towels and clothes, burning vanilla candles...

3.  I tried to do the marketing obscenely early in the morning to avoid people, but half the population was on the road and in the supermarket despite my efforts.  Each time I walked past someone, they whipped around and stared at me, because I obviously still had skunk stench stuck to me despite taking a shower.  But what was really funny was that two old ladies followed me to my car, pushing their cart behind me.  I stopped and opened my trunk to load my groceries, and they stopped at the back of my car as if they were about to start loading theirs too.  I looked at them and they looked confused and disoriented, as if coming out of a skunk stench stupor and suddenly realizing that my car was not their car.  They found their car in another isle and it was a big white suburban -- nothing like my little putt-putt.

4.  I tried to pay my mother's bills before racking up late fees, but before I could finish, the mail carrier came and went, and my son said that he wasn't going to get his student loans because we never completed filling out all the forms.  I was running back and forth between paying my mother's bills and filling in my son's online forms, but we couldn't get the paperwork printed because my printer wasn't being detected.  While troubleshooting that problem, I lost my monitor.  Before I knew it, my entire computer system broke down twice.  My husband was asleep on the couch and I had to wake him up to fix it.  It literally took the majority of the day to troubleshoot all these problems and print out the forms, only to have us find out that there were still more forms we had to fill out.  Hopefully, we will meet the deadline by the skin of our teeth, because otherwise we don't have the money to send my son to college.

5.  While trying to resolve all these problems that were being thrown my way literally every few minutes, inanimate objects started flying at me.  I'm not kidding.  I couldn't even spit out the words for what I needed when asking for help, because things like art easels were randomly falling on top of me.  By the end of that problem-solving session, there was junk all over the floor because I was too busy to be able to even pick up the poltergeist's mess. 

6.  I broke every fingernail on each hand, some more than once over the past 48 hours.  It seemed every time I simply touched something, I'd hear a snap and see a nail go flying.  I was contemplating putting my manicure kit on a chain around my neck to save time.

My goal for the day was actually to take some sleeping pills and try to make up for all the sleep I have missed in the past 48 hours, but I guess I'll have to postpone that plan for a while.  I haven't cleaned manure out of the stalls or paddock since Tuesday night because of my insane schedule.  I'd like to do it right now, but the annoying neighbors have five vehicles in the driveway at the moment and there are strangers just wandering around aimlessly next to my horse paddock.  I've been stared at enough for one day, thank you.

My husband told me that while I was away, he stepped into the garage to get something and heard the ruckus of tires spinning on dirt.  He looked up to see our nosy neighbors racing out of our driveway.  He had no idea what they were doing on our property again, but he suspected they were looking at some tools he had just bought and set on the garage floor.  I know there have been instances in the past in which I heard noises in our garage when I left the garage door open, only to find items knocked off shelves or moved around.  These people are so strange.  They act like our stuff is their stuff.  Not only do we rarely speak to them, but we never lend them our stuff, so I have no idea why they keep doing these strange things.

The other day I was starving, but I didn't have time to do a marketing, so while running errands I stopped at Subway for a sandwich.  As I was walking out of the store I saw my neighbor's truck driving right toward me.  I jumped out of my skin, because it really creeps me out when I see them following me around town.  I looked at the truck a little closer and convinced myself it wasn't them.  As I was climbing into my car, the truck turned and I saw that it was my neighbor woman driving.  She stuck her middle finger out the window at me and drove off.  I was floored!  This is the mother of our local Baptist minister, and she gave me the finger!  Worse yet, she followed me into town to do it.  She didn't even stop at any of the stores in the shopping center where I was at.  She just did a drive by.  How sick is that?

On second thought, since I stink like a skunk, I may as well go outside and treat their guests to the aroma while I shovel manure.  I'm sure it won't deter the staring, but perhaps it will make them lose their appetites. 

On the Bit with Princess G

Here's a short video clip of Gabbrielle's trainer riding her on the bit at the trot...

I didn't get a chance to take any still shots, because I needed to use my flash and got there a little late, so there wasn't time to desensitize Gabbrielle to the flash. The trainer was already riding her. There was also another horse in the arena that I didn't know. K said Gabbrielle might have issues because this was her first time in the indoor arena with another horse. Sure enough, Gabbrielle kept backing up to try to get closer to the other horse, so K kept working her shoulders to unlock the legs and get her moving forward again.

I'm really pleased with the way she moves up into the bit. I didn't expect her to be this far along in her training. She's also moving without a limp, but K did say she felt the stiffness in the right shoulder that I was telling her about. She thinks it is due to Gabbrielle spooking sideways when she sees things out of her left eye. That side of my horse needs more desensitization than the right side. She thinks she's literally hurting herself when she spooks and causing that stiffness in her shoulder.

On this day the equestrian center was bustling with people and horses preparing for a show. There was a dressage class going on in one outdoor arena, groomers bathing horses in all the bathing locations, people just watching, and Gabbrielle had two helpers in addition to the trainer. K and her father showed me various things they've been doing to desensitize Gabbrielle. One was slamming a feed door shut over and over next to her. K's dad said he had to do it until his arm hurt, but eventually she learned to tune it out. You'd think with all the door slamming my neighbors do next door, Gabbrielle would be used to it by now.

K said she cantered her all over the farm yesterday and tried a few obstacles, such as crossing water. G refused to cross, so K tricked her by backing her into the water crossing. I thought that was brilliant! I'll have to try that with Lostine.

I've never been one to kick my horses. I prefer to get forward movement through squeezing my calves and clucking, but K kept G moving by constantly bumping her with her heels. She said that G takes the heel jabs and taps from the riding crop really well. She had never blown up over it. She also said that when G gets scared or confused, she tends to stop and lock up or back up, which is a lot better than taking off and bolting.

K is really big on keeping horses soft in the mouth, so she doesn't train them the stop by pulling back on the reins.  She trains them to stop when she takes a deep breath.  Isn't that cool?  I always thought a horse had to be fairly seasoned to learn to be that sensitive.  

After today I'm under the impression that they probably did not work with G much during the first two weeks, but more than made up for it in the last two weeks. They said they noticed that she's scared of the water, so K has had her groomers bathing her every day by spraying her hard with the water and also spraying things that make noises when the water hits them. All of my horses squirm when I bathe them, but I thought Gabbrielle was actually pretty good with her baths. I guess it's all relative when you are used to working with big warmbloods.

Normally, clients are charged extra for grooming and baths, but I guess because I didn't specifically ask for it, and that they decided it would be a good part of her desensitization training, they are just including it in my flat monthly rate.  I did notice that G had a couple of healing circular cuts on her side.  K said they were bites from the other horses, but they've been keeping an eye on it, and the aggression level hasn't reached the danger zone.  They consider it a normal part of the herd dynamic, and she says the other horses are good about not taking it too far.  I'm a bit nervous about that, because my herd never leaves a mark on another horse.  They push each other away with body language and air bucks that don't connect.

The horses in the barn were HUGE. Gabbrielle looked like a puppy next to them. I think it is great that K is willing to work with horses of all different breeds, because I suspect that Gabbrielle is getting better training and exposure at K's barn than she would get at an all Arabian training barn. Since I don't show my horses, it's not important to me that they get training specific for Arabian horse showing. I just want my horses to be level-headed and confident on the trails. K is training Gabbrielle for the trail and endurance, since endurance was what she was bred for.

Since I was so happy with how far along Gabbrielle has come in a month, I did go ahead and pay for another month. I really can't afford this, but I'm taking the financial risk because I trust that some day my mother's estate will be settled and I will be reimbursed for all the money I've been losing this year. I just didn't want Gabbrielle to lose another year standing around in the paddock while I'm out running around like a chicken with my head cut off.

K said that cars have been coming and going all day, but when I drove up, Gabbrielle put her ears forward and nickered.  That surprised me, because I was driving a car that G has never seen me drive before.  I guess we just have that spiritual connection and she sensed it was me, despite me being in a different vehicle?

Guess Who's Back?

No, not Gabbrielle. My trailer is back. The entire experience of getting it repaired was a bit awkward. I was originally told it would be ready before I left on my trip, because I needed it to haul back some furniture from my mother's house. However, they didn't finish in time and just had to hang onto it until I got back and now I have to make a second 800-mile round trip to pick up what I had to leave behind.

Thursday morning I had to drive into Reno anyway to drop my daughter off at the airport, so I stopped at the trailer place on the way back to pick it up. They open at 9:00 AM and I arrived at about 8:20 AM. I decided to hook the trailer up to the truck while I was waiting for them to open, and looked up to see an angry guy in a quad and a big black Pitbull mix glaring at me.

I explained that I knew I was early, so I was killing time by getting my trailer hooked up to my truck until they open. The guy said not to worry, that he could help me. I probably interrupted his breakfast or something. He helped me back right up to it and hooked it up for me, and then pointed out that my hook up was illegal.

Who knew? I'd been driving it that way for 10 years. There was this cable woven through the chains and I never knew what it was for. It turns out that it was a cable attached to a pin that works as an emergency release should the trailer detach itself and get out of control being pulled just by chains. The cable was supposed to be connected to my bumper. He kindly gave me the parts needed to hook it up.

The interior padding and wall mat were replaced where Bombay went nuts...

I noticed that the newer padding was softer and with less grip, which might help in the future should a horse start pawing.  The hoof should just slide right down the mat without pulling it out of the wall.

The old mat is a lot gummier and groovier.  They fixed the broken window and repaired the window frame so that the wind can't blow it open and let it fall onto a post and break the glass again.  That fix was a long time coming.

I had asked them to slap a reflector on my tack room door, because that fell off years ago.  I know I could just buy my own reflectors and do it myself, but I figured since they had the parts, they'll may as well do it.

I was happy with the service until I walked around to the other side of my trailer and realized that they just pulled my own reflector off one side and attached it to the other.  It looks like I'll have to go to the automotive store today and look for another reflector after all.

That's the way these guy's operate.  They pull parts off one trailer that's up for sale and put them on other trailers to fix them.  When I first bought my horse trailer in 2001, they had to retrieve a water hose for the water tank from another trailer, because it was missing.  Oh well, I guess they get points for resourcefulness, but I don't understand the logic of removing a reflector from one side of my trailer and gluing it to the other side.

Just to make it even more awkward, they misplaced my bill and the dad had to call his foul-mouthed son and wake him up to ask him where he put it.  He couldn't find it, so he took down the information on my card, so he could charge me once they found the bill.  The son left a voicemail for me while I was driving, informing me of how much they charged my card.

The trailer bill didn't cost as much as the vet bill, but it was pretty close. My vet is coming out this afternoon to see what he can do to better the healing process, and to remove the rest of the stitches. I tried doing it myself, but my little scissors were still too wide to get up underneath the line without poking the sensitive laceration.

I also spoke with my horse trainer and explained Bombay's trailer phobia. She said she will try to borrow a stock trailer from someone and bring it out to my place and work with him in it to see if it is worth my while to trade my luxury trailer in for a stock trailer. They said they'd give me $6,000 for a 10-year-old trailer that I paid $8,000 for, so that's a deal. The stock trailer I am interested in is just over $6,000. I'm still waffling on losing my lovely tack room. I really rely on my current trailer for storage under lock and key. I also still have to be in a position to buy a more powerful truck before I trade in the trailer.

The fact that the house was going to sell within a month gave me hope, but that fell through. At least I can trailer Lostine out and ride her while I'm waiting.

I've been talking on the phone with Gabbrielle's trainer. The first time I spoke with her she said that Gabbrielle was moving forward at the walk and trot well, but wasn't moving on the bit or into her turns, so she wanted to focus on teaching her to make effective turns before anything else.

The second time I talked with her, she said that Gabbrielle was turning great and both walking and trotting on the bit now. She said that she is very smart, remembers everything from the last lesson, tries to improve on it, and anticipates what is being asked of her in the next lesson. The trainer was really pleased with the speed at which she was learning and said I've got myself a really nice horse.

I loved talking with her, because at that point in time my trainer was the only person who had good news for me. She also said that she might be interested in hiring me to do some equine photography around her place. She wants to make her website look more professional and has several clients who would like to be photographed while they ride. That is exciting, because this means I might actually make my first dollar from this business I tried to start well over a year ago, but kept getting waylaid by other responsibilities.

I will finally get a chance to see her work with Gabbrielle from the saddle tomorrow. I'm planning on bringing my camera. I may have to desensitize Gabbrielle to the indoor arena flash first, before the trainer rides. The trainer did mention that she and her groomer do spend a lot of time desensitizing Gabbrielle, which doesn't surprise me. When she was a yearling and two-year-old, she was fearless, but now that she's a full grown mare, her prey instincts have kicked in full gear.

A List to Keep In Touch

I have returned from my blitz... I mean my estate sale.  So, much has happened over the past six days that I have to condense it into a list for you, but maybe I'll put together some funny anecdotes in the future when I'm not so tired.

1.  I had strangers showing up at the door for days before the estate sale requesting a preview.  I turned them all away, because I wasn't willing to risk getting raped or robbed.  They were probably all legitimate antique dealers, but I needed every second I could get to set up for the sale and couldn't honor any distractions. 

2.  What people were and were not willing to buy surprised me.  The items I expected to sell didn't and those I didn't expect to sell did.  People bought our beds, chairs and dining room tables right out from underneath us.  Sleeping and eating off a hard floor is not fun at my age. 

3.  You wouldn't believe how many times I had to rescue our toilet paper and groceries from people who thought they were for sale!

4.  I had more people blocking my driveway in those six days than I've had in the past year at my ranch, and I thought the driveway blocking problem was excessive in Nevada. 

5.  A lot of stuff got broken.  I don't understand why people feel the need to pick up delicate china and turn it around in their hands.  By the end of the day so much of the stuff had chips and cracks that I couldn't give it away. 

6.  In the end, we made so little money that the only reward was giving gifts to those who helped my mother and me in some way in the past or present.

7.  The home inspections didn't go so well.  There is so much termite damage that some major support beams between the first and second floors have to be replaced.  There is also a lot of water damage, the roof needs to be replaced, every room in the house needs spackling and repainting, and the chimney needs to be replaced.  My home buyer got scared off by those inspection reports, so the deal is off and the home is back on the market.

8.  Right after receiving that bad news, some antique dealers stopped by to pick up the remaining antiques that were not purchased at the estate sale, and they left empty-handed because they claimed that antique oak furniture is worthless.  So, now I have to make the 400-mile trip again next weekend or the weekend after to finish either selling, donating, or burning those beautiful antiques.

9.  I met with some estate clean-up reps after the estate sale, and they wanted to charge me most of what I made at the sale for their service of taking everything off my hands.  Why should I pay them to resell some great furniture and get 100% of the profit?  They should pay me.  I know part of their job is to clean up and take truck loads of garbage to the dump, but the money they make off the good stuff should more than pay for the job.

10.  After sleeping and eating off floors, I got home to discover that my husband started remodeling our bathroom, but the pink wallpaper refuses to come off, so he couldn't finish the surprise in time.

11.  While I was away, Bombay tore out half of his stitches and is now limping again.

12.  When I got home I found that all the goats next door were gone.

Those are just a few highlights.  I'm hoping to turn off my cell phone and email and spend some time at the river just relaxing with my kids tomorrow.  I don't know if it will happen, though, because other people won't let me rest.  They keep scheduling tasks for me as if I work for them and not the other way around.  I'm so tired that I wish I could just check myself into a hospital and hook myself up to an IV.

Use It While You Got It

I'm talking about time here.  Use it while you got it. 

My schedule for the next two weeks is tight.  Having an estate sale is like opening up your own shop for business.  I've given myself two days of travel time, two days to set up for the estate sale, one day for the sale itself, and one day to clean up.  I know that in reality I'm going to need a month to get it all done, so whatever I can't get done I will hand off to some business that specializes in such things.  The days leading up to it are being spent advertising, making prearrangements, and packing.

Holidays always mess me up, because it is important that I receive my mail and can do business.  It's hard for me to just sit on my hands while I wait for a holiday to pass, so that I can get back down to business.  So, when Tuesday morning came, I was happy to finally be able to kick it into gear again and start making phone calls.  However, before the business day even opened, I got a phone call at 7:45 AM.  I cringed.

I knew it would either be bad news, more responsibility and work for me, or just something that would knock me off course.

Back track for background info:  Our temps are getting up hovering close to 100 degrees now.  Nothing compared to Arizona, but I do like to open all the windows and doors before the sun comes up to let the cool air into the house and then lock everything up tight as soon as the heat sets in.  However, on this morning the neighbors' goats were bleating so loudly that they were waking everyone in the neighborhood.  I decided to film and audiotape the racket for evidence in case worse comes to worse with these neighbors.  Then I had to shut all the windows and doors to regain our peace.



Shortly after that the phone rang and it turned out to be another neighbor who just couldn't stand the goat bleating anymore.  She was practically in tears over it.  She can't sleep because the noise comes right into her bedroom and she knows they are screaming so loud because they are hungry and not being fed often enough.  She wanted to know if I talked to an animal control officer.  I told her I did and I conveyed the results of our conversation.  I suggested that she talk to them too, because perhaps if the neighbors get two complaints, animal control might take it more seriously.

She told me that the neighbors had asked her to feed the goats once while they were away during a 24-hour period, and she ended up feeding them three times because they were so hungry.  She pointed out that the bottle-fed baby is about 4-inches smaller than his twin.  The goats do seem very anxious and even my horses are anxious.  Bombay stands guard at the goat pen and worries.  I'm about ready to start throwing hay over the fence myself.  I've also never seen them attempt to clean up the poop in the two months that they've had the goats.  It's literally spilling over into my yard.

Somebody has got to do something about these people.  They are a nightmare.  This other neighbor said, "They should not be allowed to care for any animals at all."

I totally agree.  I don't think they should be allowed to care for children either, but they do. 

Anyway, it took me a while after the phone call to get back on track.  My main goal today was to put out advertisements for the estate sale.  Within a few minutes after I submitted payment for an ad in a very big newspaper, I received an automated fraud alert phone call that told me to call another number.  I called that number and an automated system asked me to verify that I bought the ad.  I pushed the button that verified that I bought the ad, and then it told me to contact the newspaper because they had my transaction on hold.

I called the newspaper and was put on hold for a long time.  I finally got through to one woman and she was completely confused by my problem and didn't know what I was talking about.  She transferred me to someone else who answered in Spanish.  I said, "Hello", to let him know that I speak English, and he hung up on me.  Argh!  Why do simple things have to turn into such fiascos?  I suspect the fact that I input my mobile phone number instead of my home phone number into the form caused the fraud alert.  Now I won't get my ad for the estate sale into that paper.

This is the kind of situation in which I wish some kind of concierge service for the general public existed, so that I could call them and say, "Look, I tried to do this simple task, and it's turning into a huge fiasco that's snowballing out of control, and I don't have any more time or patience to put into correcting the problem.  Can you help?"

There have been times in my life where I've seriously considered hiring a personal assistant.  I'm not a movie star or businesswoman -- I just am fed up with being overtaxed.  I need someone to play the role of my buffer.  I thought my estate attorney was going to play that role when I first started working as Trustee, but I quickly found that all he did was create more work for me.  I need someone who will say, "You sit down and relax.  I'll take care of this.  Don't worry."

Nuttiness

Last night I walked into the kitchen to fill up a glass of water at the sink.  The kitchen lights were on and the blinds were still open.  There was a little bit of light left outside after the sun had set.  I caught some movement outside and looked up just in time to see my nosy neighbor running behind the thickest part of my trees.  She stopped and tried peering through the branches into my house.  I glared back at her and pulled the blinds shut in her face, and then turned around to find my husband standing behind me in his underwear, so she apparently got an eyeful.  I said, "We've got an audience.  The neighbor is trying to get a good look inside our window again."

My husband just laughed.  None of this bothers him.  Then I found out that my husband and son know who has been smoking on our property and leaving cigarette butts and packages behind.  It's a guy who lives in a house across the highway.  His wife and kid are the ones who trespass on my property to pet my horses.  I guess trespassing is a family affair with them.  My husband and son just say hello to the guy as he stands next to our pasture and smokes.  We have a lot of dry, flammable brush out there.  I don't know why they don't inform him that he's trespassing and littering on our property.

Yes I do.  It's because they don't have to clean up his mess.  I'm the one who always has to suffer that consequence.  He also leaves beer bottles and cans behind.  Why can't he smoke and drink and litter on his own property instead of walking across the highway to mine?

I saw a news report about a man who kept finding tea bottles in his yard most days.  Some of them broke on his driveway, and he'd have to get out there right away and sweep up the glass before a tire got punctured.  He collected 2 years worth of tea bottles until he finally got fed up and set up a surveillance camera in his yard.  He caught the culprit on camera throwing the tea bottle out the window of her car on four occasions and took it to the police.  It turned out to be a woman who lived 2 miles up the road from him and her story was that she didn't mean anything personal by it.  She just happened to be driving by this man's house when she finished her tea.  The police charged her with 4 counts of littering, because that's all they had on film, even though she had been doing it every day for years.

Who does that?  What is the mentality of throwing your garbage out the car window?  If you can afford a car, you can afford a trash can, right?  And this lady was driving a pretty nice car.  Don't people know that bottles can create a magnification effect in extreme heat and start fires?  I'll bet that lady expects someone else to wipe her hiney when she's done doing her business, because throwing trash out your car window and polluting the environment is as bad as taking a dump and running off, letting others see, smell, step in it and clean it up.  I think we need to crack down on litterbugs and make them live in their own fouled nests, preferably a tiny cell with no trash pick up and just a bucket for a toilet, and only let them out in order to pick up garbage that other litterbugs tossed out along the highways.

One of my neighbors took in a new horse boarder and this lady has proven to be an incredibly intrusive person.  She has a golf cart and likes to race it up and down my dirt road just for fun.  I've also seen her racing it around in my driveway.  She rides her horse on my property without permission.  My neighbor told me that the woman walks right into her house without knocking.  She said one time she was taking a nap and woke to find the boarder standing over her bed staring at her.  How creepy is that?

So, my neighbor had to draw some boundaries with her.  Because I used to board a horse with this neighbor, I know she is very gracious and makes people feel welcome, but I also know that she likes her privacy and appreciates a little notice if I plan to ride on her property.  If I have to speak with her, I call her mobile phone or knock on her door and tell her who I am while I'm knocking.  She is of a generation that makes great hosts and hostesses, but much of it is an act.  If she says, "You are welcome here anytime," what she means is "You are welcome to ask if you can come over any time, and I will see if it is convenient for me.  I appreciate it if you ask for permission to use my riding facilities."

I've seen this happen time and again to her.  She lets a stranger board a horse or take a job as a ranch hand, and next thing she knows they are living in her house, helping themselves to her personal stuff.  I'll never forget years ago when she hired a woman to take care of her property when she was away.  I had arranged ahead of time to visit my horse at her ranch while she was gone.  As I walked past the back of her house, I heard someone singing and turned my head to see this woman standing in my friend's bedroom going through her dresser drawers and holding up my friend's underwear!  I came to a screeching halt and waited for her to notice me.  She got embarrassed and put the underwear away.  When my neighbor returned I warned her that she may not want to hire that woman again because she was going through her stuff.  I didn't get into specifics, because it was just too weird and I didn't want her to feel violated.  She did end up firing her for some other reason.

I had entertained the possibility that the lady was just doing my friend's laundry, but it didn't make sense that she was pulling the underwear out of her drawer and holding it up to examine it.  I'd expect her to be pulling the underwear out of a laundry basket, perhaps folding it, and putting it away in the drawer.

Then tonight I was sitting on the garage floor painting signs when I kept hearing a noise in my driveway.  It sounded like someone was digging through my trashcan, but each time I looked over at it, no one and nothing was there.  This noise was originating just 20 to 30 feet away from me.  My husband's car and my truck were blocking my view of whatever was making that noise.  It got quiet and I fell back into my meditative state while painting, figuring the horses were making those noises in the paddock.

Someone slammed a car door right next to me and I jumped out of my skin.  I looked around, but no one was at my husband's car or my truck.  I figured some neighbor was having a 4th of July barbeque and people were parking in the street.  There were several more car door slams over a period of about five minutes.  The noise level of the door slamming seemed so excessive, so I jumped up to see what the heck was going on, only to find my nosy neighbors driving away from my driveway.

I have no idea what they were doing on my property again, but I wish I had jumped up when I first started hearing those weird noises and busted them.  I've been chomping at the bit to catch them in the act of some of their more offensive actions and chew them out royally.  Bombay was standing at the fence closest to the area where they drove off from and I wondered if they were feeding him.  Then I remembered that my son left his pole vault pole attached to the side of my truck.  They probably stopped to investigate what it was.  Whenever we leave something new outside on our lawn or driveway or walkway, these nosy neighbors can never resist stopping to see what it is.

I think I'll go fling some poop in their yard since they are gone now.  If they complain, I'll blame it on the goats.  You wouldn't believe how many goat pellets are in my horse paddock now.  It's disgusting.  The goats press their butts against the chain-link and just shoot 'em out like bullets from a machine gun.

A Little Seepage

I've been washing Bombay's wounds, squirting them with antiseptic and spraying them with AluSpray each day, but today I stopped the AluSpray and rubbed some Neosporin antibacterial gel on them.  Some hard scar tissue is starting to form, so I wanted to soften it up because once the hard stuff breaks, he starts bleeding again.  Today some green pus started seeping out of the bottom of his biggest wound.  He's walking normal, but it was obviously still sensitive when I touched it.  He picked up his leg and I was worried if I touched the wrong spot he might try to kick me.  The stitches are supposed to be removed in a week.  I suspect Bombay will have to be sedated for that job.  Personality-wise, he's still the joker he's always been.  He hassled me the whole time I tried to clean the paddock this evening.

I received a bill for $524 in the mail for this accident.  That almost cost as much as Gabbrielle's month of training.  I really couldn't afford either right now, but I had chosen to go ahead with Gabbrielle's training simply because I needed to feel like something was getting done this year.  I've had so many setbacks and discouragements that I just wanted to feel like progress was being made in one small area of my life.  Wouldn't you know it... as soon as I part with the money to train her, Bombay runs up a huge vet bill.  I have no idea what the bill will be for the trailer repairs and just thinking about it makes me nauseous.  I worry about money a lot because I know what it is like to be without it, and life sure is easier when you do have money. 

I'm going through a phase right now in which I'm questioning whether it's all worth it.  Maybe my family would be better off if we didn't have all these unexpected horse-related bills.  Whenever I tell non-horse people about my horse problems they always have to say, "Well, you wouldn't have those problems if you didn't have horses."

It bothers a lot of people in my circle that I do own horses.  It's sort of a sore spot with them, so I have to train myself not to talk about the horses around them lest I set myself up for snotty retorts.  I suspect their annoyance is stemming from envy.  A lot of people believe that only the super rich own horses.  (HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!)  I think they are jealous in the same way that one might be jealous of someone who drives a nice car.

I didn't question owning horses when I was employed, but now that I'm stuck in a position in which I work every day, but without a paycheck, and have no time to get a paying job, I worry.  But I'm sure it will all work out.  It always does. 

Almost as if the universe didn't think I had enough bad luck, I realized today that my Canon PowerShot XS10IS camera was missing.  I asked my husband if he or my son borrowed it, but they didn't.  I know I had it with me when I did the photo shoot using my Nikon camera at the animal shelter last Monday.  I had to think back to what car I drove.  I opened the trunk and there it was, hot as an open flame.  Somehow its case had popped open and the camera had rolled out in the trunk of the car.  It sat there in hundred plus degree heat all week.

I tested it out and it doesn't take pictures every time I press the shutter release.  It's also sluggish in starting up and auto focusing.  I'm annoyed to say the least.  Did I really need this?  Was it really necessary?  Is there some kind of lesson I'm supposed to be learning from all this loss I've been experiencing?  I mean, it's not like I was robbing a bank when the camera fell out.  I was volunteering my time to help find homes for homeless pets.  It's true that no good deed goes unpunished.

Oh yes, it could have been worse.  It can always be worse.  But let's not discuss that, because once you mention worse possibilities, you create them.  I'm trying really hard to keep my eye on the prizes in life and put blinders on to avoid acknowledging the existence of bad stuff, but the bad stuff keeps jumping in front of my face.  No, actually it's more like the bad stuff keeps biting my leg.

It's not even the 4th of July yet and we've already got wildfires going, probably started by idiots illegally playing with fireworks.  Every year Nevada advertises all over the place that fireworks are illegal, but some dumb jerks always have to get their rocks off by making big noises and burning down our state.  It won't surprise me if some day we burn down our entire country celebrating its independence.  Really?  Can't we think up safer traditions to show our appreciation for our freedom?

In other news, my son turned 18 this weekend!  I have no more children -- just adults who are my offspring.  He also won first place in a pole vault tournament and broke his personal record.  He's clearing the bar at 14' 9" now.  Since good things are happening for him, I'm living vicariously through him. 

As the World Turns, The Problems Multiply

I'm a doer.  I get a feeling of fulfillment when I complete tasks and have something to show for it.  I realized this while having a family dinner the other night.  While my husband was discussing his exercise workout in detail (a reflector), my son was reading text messages on his phone (a socializer), and I was thinking about my To Do List and planning what I would attempt to get done the next day (a doer).  "Attempt" being the key word.

Many times I think I'm done with a task only to have someone else not do his or her part, and then I either have to do their part myself or give up on the task and accept that it's just not going to get done or not going to get done within my timeline.  For example, when I took my trailer in to be repaired, I asked when it would be ready.  The salesman's response was, "Why?  Do you have somewhere you need to go?"

I explained that I'd be out of town next week and would like it back before I leave.  He said he'd have it ready by Friday.  So, then he called on Thursday and said he had everything done except the window and he wanted to know if I would finish the job of fixing the window myself.  Ummmm.  That window has been broken for several years.  Don't you think that if I had the time to figure out how to remove it and take it to a glass repair shop, I would have done it a long time ago?  (Plus I'm afraid of my local glass shop.  They've screwed up every job I've ever given them.)  I asked him to fix it himself.  He told me it would take up an hour and a half of his time to do it.  So?  I'll pay the labor.  I have so many problems to fix that I have to pay other people to fix some of them.  There aren't enough hours in the day for me to fix every problem myself.

Friday came and I didn't receive any phone call from the trailer shop.  I called them and asked if my trailer was ready.  No, because the glass place can't get around to fixing my window until next Wednesday.  Sigh.  I explained again that I would be out of town, so they'll just have to hang onto the trailer for a couple of weeks.  The guy said I could come pick it up today, and then return it when I return from my trip for them to install the window.  No thanks.  That would take up six hours of my time, because their shop is way, way far away from where I live.  The gas expense would probably cost more than the repairs to the trailer.  So, this means more waiting until the trailer problem gets solved.

In the meantime, the horses have to behave themselves and cannot get injured, because some of my veterinary supplies and most of my tack are locked up inside the tack room of that trailer.  I did remove a few items before dropping the trailer off, but I didn't think I'd have to wait two weeks to get it back.  Obviously, this also means no trail rides on Lostine for a while.

After looking at the option of trading my luxury 2-horse trailer in for a stock 3-horse trailer, my husband pointed out that my truck is actually at its towing capacity just pulling the luxury 2-horse trailer.  Once I put a horse in there, I'm over the limit and putting stress on my truck's rear end.  If I move up to a 3-horse bumper pull, even it if is stock, I'd have to buy a more powerful truck.  Sigh.  One problem leads to another.  Nothing is ever simple.  All I can say is that I will have to get rich in a hurry if I'm going to be able to solve Bombay's trailering phobia.

Then there's the horse trainer -- the one that many of you thought might be able to solve Bombay's trailering issues.  I called her and left a message that I wanted to watch her work with Gabbrielle during her under saddle training, something she offered to do for me when I first dropped off my horse for training, and it's been a couple of days and she hasn't returned my call.  I suspect she's on vacation now, because of the three-day weekend.  I also sent her an email a couple of weeks ago, and she didn't respond.  All I can say is she better be worth her weight in gold when it comes to training my horse, because otherwise I'm bringing G home when the month is up and finding another horse trainer.  (Although the thought has crossed my mind that perhaps she's so unavailable because she's in the hospital thanks to something my horse did to her.  Actually, G is really gentle with riders.  She's just spooky.)

I am grateful to have G away at another facility at the moment, not just because there's one less mouth to feed and a lot less poop, but because Bombay can heal in peace.  The cut on his stifle is healing nicely.  He moves normal at the walk now, but he won't try to move at any faster paces because it still hurts.  There's no more swelling and he finished off both his dosages of pain medication and antibiotics.  He was really good about taking his meds.

The doctor wanted him to not be on stall rest, but to move around so that the muscle and skin would fuse in a way that is natural to his movement.  If Gabbrielle were here, she'd be chasing him around, bucking and biting at him at feeding time.  Lostine understands that he's hurt and she just does things to try to make him feel better.  She's a very maternal horse.  Once she thoroughly inspected all of his wounds, she stopped licking them and is leaving them alone.

Anyway, whenever someone says, "Just do this..." to fix a problem, I roll my eyes because I know that solutions, especially obvious solutions, never fix the the problem.  Solutions usually end up with a handful of new problems that need solutions.  Especially in my area, because most of the people around here are incompetent, have no work ethic, don't give a damn about customer service, and have no education.  Sometimes it is better to do nothing, because then I at least am keeping the number of problems down to manageable level.  Problems are like the goats and rabbits next door.  They multiply until you are overwhelmed.

The baby goat has developed this outrageously loud bleat.  Because it was bottle fed, every time it sees a person, it starts bleating.  The sound is ear piercing.  It's like a kid screaming at the top of his lungs.  So, my solution of going outside at the crack of dawn or earlier to feed my horses without an audience no longer works, because as soon as I step outside, that damn goat wakes up everyone in the neighborhood.  I'm sure the neighbors are thinking, "Why does that lady have to come outside so dang early and get that goat going?"

I was here 17 years before that goat.  I'd like to have my peace, quiet and airspace back.  Then there's the billy goat.  They keep him tied to my fence and he climbs up onto this mound of rocks that is as tall as the fence and he stands there where he can poke my horses in the eyes with his horns.  I keep expecting to come outside one of these days and find that goat in my horse paddock, because he can easily jump the fence from that mound.  Of course, my neighbors are incapable of spotting potential problems, which is why they are always creating them for me.

If he does get into my horse paddock and it happens when I get my trailer back, I'll be taking a "lost" goat to animal control.  I figure anything that comes from their yard and ends up in mine is mine to do what I want with.  These people are so low class that they drop garbage out of the back of their truck as they drive down the street hitting potholes.  They clearly see the garbage in the road on their way back, but they won't take responsibility for it because now it is on my property.  There's an old air filter that has been lying in the road for about six months now and they walk and drive past it 20 times a day and pretend like it isn't theirs.  I'm not picking it up out of stubbornness.  I'm fed up with spending my weekends cleaning up my neighbors' garbage off my property.  They are being equally stubborn.  So, it's a standoff.  May the best neighbor win.