Wow, has it really been that long since my last post? Yikes... First, thanks you so much to everyone for your comments on The Dude's anniversary post. I am grateful for the well wishes, even if it took me this long to respond.
My excuses for my absence are probably best explained with a complete update on the horses, the house, and the Three Left Behinds (me, brother #1, and brother #2).
The horses have been doing well. The weather turned cold and frequently foggy/rainy/frosty several weeks ago so Mira's meals are all made with hot water now. (Andolu gets stuffed with grass hay to keep him warm). I've ridden Anatolian several times but haven't gotten into a routine yet. Bad me! He isn't making grumpy faces any more when ridden, which is a real relief because it tells me his occasionally bad attitude before the laminitis attack was from his feet, and now they feel better. I had measured his mouth a few times in order to get him a new bit. Mira's 5" snaffle always seemed too snug at the corner of his mouth, and besides I wanted a french link (double jointed) bit, since they can be really nice and mild. I bought this bit, but the 5.5" is definitely too large. Oh well, the joys of mail order! I need to return it for the 5" now. He did like it, though. I actually tried riding him in his rope halter (just in the driveway for a couple minutes) and he was quite responsive in that, too. So far so good. If it'll stop raining long enough I might get to ride tomorrow - I hope so!
Andolu was a bad boy in one thing though this last few weeks. I am almost finished replacing all my fence so that it is all 2" x 4" welded wire with electric tape on the top - I only have a couple hours and about 150' to go. However, with all the new grass Anatolian decided at one point that the double shock from a section that was still just two strands of tape was worth the grass... and yes, he pushed the posts and tape enough that he got through. I heard the dogs start barking really loud and looked out and absolutely freaked to see him milling around on the road. He was perfectly easy to catch, but I think it scared a couple years off my life! That part was immediately replaced to keep him from getting more ideas. Eek. Not a funny trick.
Mira recently popped a splint on her right hind. It is right below the one she had two years ago. At first I was totally mystified why she was lame - no obvious cause for a stone bruise, no swelling on the leg, etc. etc. Then I found a little bump below the old splint and realized it was tender. So that got iced for a few days and I am still trying to keep her from moving much, but she has been trotting around as normal as one can in this mud we have. However, it seems like every time I go out there I think the bump looks bigger than a couple hours ago and I always have to feel it to make sure it really is the same size. I swear Mira likes getting fussed over, though. The more I hover around and poke and prod and come out every couple of hours the happier she is.
The boys and I are going to go in on a new camera, so hopefully pretty soon I'll be able to show you guys pictures of the horses again!
Now, imagine this picture - everywhere I go outside nowadays there is a gray tabby running right in front of me, a fat pure black cat running all around me, and a smaller pure black cat lurking at a distance, all meowing at intervals and giving me meaningful looks. I am now the Feline Pied Piper. When the parents left I took over feeding the cats, which happens at least twice a day, sometimes more if it is extra cold. I haven't really spoiled them a whole lot; I do stick to a schedule, but I guess they are always hoping for more, because they won't leave me alone!
Brother #2 and I also feed and water and walk the dogs every morning and water plants (fortunately not necessary lately). With the animals and various other outdoor chores, it has been quite a juggling job to get everything done at the right time every day and still do my other responsibilities. It's funny, parts of the house are staying super clean and organized and parts... need some work right now. We've also discovered that none of us "kids" seems to remember to build a fire until it gets to be about 50 degrees inside. Once we start a fire, we do keep it going all day, but we haven't gotten in the habit of doing it every day yet!
I never thought of myself as someone who loved to cook for fun. I enjoy it, but there are always other things I would rather be doing. Well, I've been discovering that I really like running the kitchen and making healthy things. I've been making soup the traditional way regularly and am having a lot of fun with other dishes also. When I get the time I plan to try making eggrolls. Any other fun dishes you guys want to suggest I try?
Christmas was quiet but good. It snowed on Christmas day, twice! That happens about once in a blue moon in this area! That was fun. The parents up in Washington had over 20" by Christmas day, and my siblings are enjoying it, although it is weird to have to shovel pathways. It's mostly melted into mud now around here, as yesterday was mostly sunny.
Overall, it has been a very hectic couple of months as I have been adjusting to life "sort of on my own." I really didn't have time to blog, and maybe it was a good thing to take a break for a while. A little vacation. That is my story and I'm sticking to it! Anyway, I'm finally back!
L
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Friday, November 14, 2008
A Whole Year!
Wow, it has been exactly one whole year today since I got Anatolian! I can hardly believe it has already been that long. He's such a smart guy and I'm so happy to be able to ride him again... Phew! I'm working on building his fitness up carefully again.
One of my favorite things about the Racehorse Dude is that he enjoys laughs and will work to get them. Thus, he taught himself how to do various things like his lip flapping trick because everyone always laughs when he does it. He likes to test his boundaries a lot, but the longer he's here the smaller the "tests" get - which is good, because I didn't like it when he used to try to nip! He kind of rules Mira too thoroughly (and she's too timid), but it has been very good for her to have him around, in a lot of ways.
One of my favorite things about the Racehorse Dude is that he enjoys laughs and will work to get them. Thus, he taught himself how to do various things like his lip flapping trick because everyone always laughs when he does it. He likes to test his boundaries a lot, but the longer he's here the smaller the "tests" get - which is good, because I didn't like it when he used to try to nip! He kind of rules Mira too thoroughly (and she's too timid), but it has been very good for her to have him around, in a lot of ways.
He's a good boy, and as he is only 6.5 years old I hope to enjoy many more anniversaries with him.
L
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Rain and mud and other fun stuff
Wow, it's been really hectic around here! The parents are leaving tomorrow... Sheesh! Today my sis will get one last ride on Andolu. I feel bad that he finally gets rideable again just before she has to go away. Neither of us has gotten to ride him much yet, and now it'll be quite a while before she gets to. Oh well. Her dog is staying here too. But they'll have a lot of fun up there, especially as there are a bunch of kids their age really close by up where they are going. We've had a lot of company the last couple of weeks as everyone tries to say goodbye to each other.
The horses are doing well. It has rained a lot in the last couple weeks, which has been nice. Of course, it's amazing how uniformly brown they both look now. I think Andolu especially loves waiting 'till I come and knock the dried mud off and then sneaking off to roll again. :-D They really love the pea gravel I bought and have been spreading around and Mira loves lying on it, so I'm sure I'll be buying more eventually to put in even more spots.
I have wheat planted and a few other things. I am not finished yet with what I wanted to grow this year, though. I'd still like to do potatoes and a bunch more peas! The grass is already up and I have been taking the horses handfuls; can't wait to take them out to graze. One of these days I do need to get pictures up again soon.
Well, later y'all. I shall return after the excitement dies down around here.
L
The horses are doing well. It has rained a lot in the last couple weeks, which has been nice. Of course, it's amazing how uniformly brown they both look now. I think Andolu especially loves waiting 'till I come and knock the dried mud off and then sneaking off to roll again. :-D They really love the pea gravel I bought and have been spreading around and Mira loves lying on it, so I'm sure I'll be buying more eventually to put in even more spots.
I have wheat planted and a few other things. I am not finished yet with what I wanted to grow this year, though. I'd still like to do potatoes and a bunch more peas! The grass is already up and I have been taking the horses handfuls; can't wait to take them out to graze. One of these days I do need to get pictures up again soon.
Well, later y'all. I shall return after the excitement dies down around here.
L
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Happenings
The below article is my last post on politics for a while. I try to keep my blog just a fun place to talk about horses, but I wanted to get this out. Please feel free to not read it if you will get offended. I am not trying to bash anyone, just stating my viewpoint about what our country needs versus what it has chosen.
Well, we have a new president now. I am glad the suspense is over. I am just going to hope that either Obama is very ineffective or that he manages to get a whole bunch of his agenda done at once. If he gets a lot of his agenda accomplished quickly it will make Americans very, very mad and maybe wake people up. This country is like the frog in a boiling pot that has not noticed how bad things have gotten. I still can't believe we actually voted for a socialist/communist to run what is supposed to be a free country, but we did and now we get to experience the joys of socialism. It's worked SOO well in places like Russia, Cuba, most of Europe (with its extremely high levels of depression, an almost majority of people who never even try to get jobs, and hardly any children being born - getting taken over by immigrants), and all those other places it's been tried. (Yes, the sarcasm is a little heavy!) And don't quote China as a socialist place that is doing well. Their increasing prosperity is DIRECTLY correlated with every move they make towards a free market society.
Oh well. At least some good bills got passed, for a change.
I had a hard time before the election just leaving things to God. I know He is ultimately in charge and whatever happens is in His plan, but I felt like I was watching somebody stab themself over and over and I couldn't make them stop. Watching my country deliberately do such self-destructive things is really hard, but now it's done and it is the time for me to pray harder and keep living my life and doing the things I know I am supposed to do. One of which includes respecting the office of the president and showing some class towards the new president with whom I have almost nothing in common, unlike the majority of liberals the last eight years. I don't want to call names or things like that.
I also hope that this might actually clean up the Republican party. They have gotten so liberal leaning and so wishy-washy lately that it is disgusting. We need people with spines, who will articulate what and why they believe and who don't go around trying to make people like them but who actually do the things they are able to do and don't back down just because someone accuses them of being mean. If you believe something is best for the country, then TRY TO DO IT and don't let whiners stop you! At least now the GOP can see that pandering didn't help them win.
At least one good thing is that we have finally elected a member of a minority as president, so hopefully that will settle a great deal of the angst about racism and associated issues.
I am going to miss President Bush. I really am.
In the toughest of tough political climates with a media that functioned as an opposing lobby and with very little support from his own party, he still managed to do some amazing and audacious things. He stuck by his principles and his decisions consistently during the whole eight years and was consistently gracious to hateful people who stopped at nothing to smear him. Having been very involved with the Iraq War news and Iraqi blogs for about two years (not so much anymore) I am still dumbfounded at the completely biased way the media has misrepresented the efforts over there and what really has and hasn't "been found" and all the straw-men that were used to discredit our strategic purposes over there. I am amazed at how everything, even the weather, has been spun so as to try to find a way put blame on Bush, and cannot believe the way people would actually openly wish for bad things to happen to America just so that they could use it against Bush. I also am quite disgusted with the Republicans for not having the courage of their convictions and for not really trying hard to get the conservative message out.
I still am amazed we were lucky (blessed) enough to have President Bush for eight whole years and I hope the rest of his life is good. I disliked his big-government policies, but I respect him a great deal and am not looking forward to having a new president who is wobbly and inexperienced on some things and on others firmly set on courses that will be very, very bad for our country long-term.
Finally, the current financial crisis is something we all share responsibility for. It has been building for decades and warned about thousands of times. The problems come from a combination of programs trying to fix things by throwing money at problems, laws trying to regulate things to make them safer and less risky and/or more fair, and a general (natural) human desire to get fun stuff before the right time. The government can fix its share of the problem by allowing citizens more freedom (and thus opportunity), by not trying to "make" fairness happen, and by not trying to solve every problem for everyone. Then it is up to us, The People of the United States, to work on our own problems with the tools we have, which are many.
Most of my readers are horse people. Hay prices have gone dramatically up in recent years. The price spikes are actually quite predictable (and have been predicted many times) due to policies that started during the Great Depression and that have gotten more involved over time. Farmers in our country produce a great deal of the world's food - in fact, America produces 25% of the world's GDP every year! However, being either a small family farmer or a big farmer in this country presents many, many challeges. Meat and dairy inspection laws in most states favor only the large producer, such that a $500,000 state-of-the art slaughter plant would be required if a family wanted to sell 20 chickens a year to their neighbors, already processed. The laws could be modified so that farms could produce and process meat (and dairy) just as hygienically in a clean room with stainless steel and concretee and good refrigeration. However, the tangled bunch of laws keep getting more tangled. When the powers that be decide that too many farmers are planting corn in a year, thus bringing the price down, the government will PAY some farmers NOT to plant corn. Huh? What is with that? As a result of all the tinkering by the USDA and other buraucracies, milk prices paid to dairy farmers have stayed almost the same as in the 50s. Everything else went way up, though, so farmers now have a very, very small margin of profit on each cow, and must have thousands rather than dozens of cows, and feed antibiotics and growth hormones to try to get slightly more profit out of the cow before she dies at 4 or 5. If the government had not been messing with the market economy in farming, we would be paying a lot less taxes, but quite a bit more at the grocery store. However, the food we bought would be from farmers who were actually earning a living most years and who were able to raise the food in a healthy manner with far less pollution, chemicals, and environmental impact. We all want that, but we keep electing people who make laws that take us farther and farther away from any chance of that. Hmm.
Below are various random links:
http://www.blackfive.net/main/2008/11/may-have-been-t.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/04/AR2008110403872.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
http://www.forbes.com/businessinthebeltway/2008/11/05/congress-obama-senate-biz-beltway-cx_bw_1105legislate.html
http://www.forbes.com/opinions/2008/11/06/coburn-obama-conservatives-oped-cx_tc_1106coburn.html
http://www.floppingaces.net/2008/11/04/dateline-2012-the-waning-days-of-the-failed-obama-presidency/
http://thisainthell.us/blog/?p=4853
http://www.stockmangrassfarmer.net/
Anyway, enough with the ranting now and thanks if you managed to read it all! I'll get back to planting wheat and playing with the horses. Hopefully I can do a more fun post about The Spoiled Ones tomorrow.
L
Well, we have a new president now. I am glad the suspense is over. I am just going to hope that either Obama is very ineffective or that he manages to get a whole bunch of his agenda done at once. If he gets a lot of his agenda accomplished quickly it will make Americans very, very mad and maybe wake people up. This country is like the frog in a boiling pot that has not noticed how bad things have gotten. I still can't believe we actually voted for a socialist/communist to run what is supposed to be a free country, but we did and now we get to experience the joys of socialism. It's worked SOO well in places like Russia, Cuba, most of Europe (with its extremely high levels of depression, an almost majority of people who never even try to get jobs, and hardly any children being born - getting taken over by immigrants), and all those other places it's been tried. (Yes, the sarcasm is a little heavy!) And don't quote China as a socialist place that is doing well. Their increasing prosperity is DIRECTLY correlated with every move they make towards a free market society.
Oh well. At least some good bills got passed, for a change.
I had a hard time before the election just leaving things to God. I know He is ultimately in charge and whatever happens is in His plan, but I felt like I was watching somebody stab themself over and over and I couldn't make them stop. Watching my country deliberately do such self-destructive things is really hard, but now it's done and it is the time for me to pray harder and keep living my life and doing the things I know I am supposed to do. One of which includes respecting the office of the president and showing some class towards the new president with whom I have almost nothing in common, unlike the majority of liberals the last eight years. I don't want to call names or things like that.
I also hope that this might actually clean up the Republican party. They have gotten so liberal leaning and so wishy-washy lately that it is disgusting. We need people with spines, who will articulate what and why they believe and who don't go around trying to make people like them but who actually do the things they are able to do and don't back down just because someone accuses them of being mean. If you believe something is best for the country, then TRY TO DO IT and don't let whiners stop you! At least now the GOP can see that pandering didn't help them win.
At least one good thing is that we have finally elected a member of a minority as president, so hopefully that will settle a great deal of the angst about racism and associated issues.
I am going to miss President Bush. I really am.
In the toughest of tough political climates with a media that functioned as an opposing lobby and with very little support from his own party, he still managed to do some amazing and audacious things. He stuck by his principles and his decisions consistently during the whole eight years and was consistently gracious to hateful people who stopped at nothing to smear him. Having been very involved with the Iraq War news and Iraqi blogs for about two years (not so much anymore) I am still dumbfounded at the completely biased way the media has misrepresented the efforts over there and what really has and hasn't "been found" and all the straw-men that were used to discredit our strategic purposes over there. I am amazed at how everything, even the weather, has been spun so as to try to find a way put blame on Bush, and cannot believe the way people would actually openly wish for bad things to happen to America just so that they could use it against Bush. I also am quite disgusted with the Republicans for not having the courage of their convictions and for not really trying hard to get the conservative message out.
I still am amazed we were lucky (blessed) enough to have President Bush for eight whole years and I hope the rest of his life is good. I disliked his big-government policies, but I respect him a great deal and am not looking forward to having a new president who is wobbly and inexperienced on some things and on others firmly set on courses that will be very, very bad for our country long-term.
Finally, the current financial crisis is something we all share responsibility for. It has been building for decades and warned about thousands of times. The problems come from a combination of programs trying to fix things by throwing money at problems, laws trying to regulate things to make them safer and less risky and/or more fair, and a general (natural) human desire to get fun stuff before the right time. The government can fix its share of the problem by allowing citizens more freedom (and thus opportunity), by not trying to "make" fairness happen, and by not trying to solve every problem for everyone. Then it is up to us, The People of the United States, to work on our own problems with the tools we have, which are many.
Most of my readers are horse people. Hay prices have gone dramatically up in recent years. The price spikes are actually quite predictable (and have been predicted many times) due to policies that started during the Great Depression and that have gotten more involved over time. Farmers in our country produce a great deal of the world's food - in fact, America produces 25% of the world's GDP every year! However, being either a small family farmer or a big farmer in this country presents many, many challeges. Meat and dairy inspection laws in most states favor only the large producer, such that a $500,000 state-of-the art slaughter plant would be required if a family wanted to sell 20 chickens a year to their neighbors, already processed. The laws could be modified so that farms could produce and process meat (and dairy) just as hygienically in a clean room with stainless steel and concretee and good refrigeration. However, the tangled bunch of laws keep getting more tangled. When the powers that be decide that too many farmers are planting corn in a year, thus bringing the price down, the government will PAY some farmers NOT to plant corn. Huh? What is with that? As a result of all the tinkering by the USDA and other buraucracies, milk prices paid to dairy farmers have stayed almost the same as in the 50s. Everything else went way up, though, so farmers now have a very, very small margin of profit on each cow, and must have thousands rather than dozens of cows, and feed antibiotics and growth hormones to try to get slightly more profit out of the cow before she dies at 4 or 5. If the government had not been messing with the market economy in farming, we would be paying a lot less taxes, but quite a bit more at the grocery store. However, the food we bought would be from farmers who were actually earning a living most years and who were able to raise the food in a healthy manner with far less pollution, chemicals, and environmental impact. We all want that, but we keep electing people who make laws that take us farther and farther away from any chance of that. Hmm.
Below are various random links:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122611181065310615.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122584386627599251.htmlhttp://www.blackfive.net/main/2008/11/may-have-been-t.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/04/AR2008110403872.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
http://www.forbes.com/businessinthebeltway/2008/11/05/congress-obama-senate-biz-beltway-cx_bw_1105legislate.html
http://www.forbes.com/opinions/2008/11/06/coburn-obama-conservatives-oped-cx_tc_1106coburn.html
http://www.floppingaces.net/2008/11/04/dateline-2012-the-waning-days-of-the-failed-obama-presidency/
http://thisainthell.us/blog/?p=4853
http://www.stockmangrassfarmer.net/
Anyway, enough with the ranting now and thanks if you managed to read it all! I'll get back to planting wheat and playing with the horses. Hopefully I can do a more fun post about The Spoiled Ones tomorrow.
L
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Major Changes
Big things have been happening here lately.
Backstory: For the last couple of months my dad has been out of work. Not one of his usual clients have had work they were ready to give him yet (a couple of them had projects they wanted to do but weren't able to go ahead with yet.) Obviously, my parents have been kind of stressing about it. Dad was searching all over for some more clients and my mom even looked for work, which she has not done since my older brother was born. Now that the two youngest are teenagers they don't need very much attention while doing their schoolwork, etc., so she thought now might be a good time to get a job. However, nothing was available at all in the area for either of them. Meanwhile, their ministry partners in the state of Washington have been having a lot of change happening. My parents and their partners do part time family ministry, with my parents focused on Hispanic families and their partners involved in several specific groups right now. So, they kept telling my parents they should come up there for a while and help out with all the things that are really "popping" up there right now. Everyone was praying about it and door after door kept closing down here. Eventually, dad felt that he had gotten confirmation to go to Washington. (Interestingly enough, the next day after the decision, his favorite client called up and wants him to start on a project, so it turns out dad will have his favorite kind of job to work on while they get settled in up there!)
So, my parents and my sis and youngest brother are moving to Washington for an indefinite amount of time - Brothers # 1 and #2 and me are staying here and running the place and we're going to be really hoping the grandparents all stay healthy and don't get hurt!
I finally get to run a house and make menus *almost* on my own now! It'll be interesting and fun in a lot of ways, but I am really, really going to miss them! I'm sure it's going to be really difficult to adjust to. I told my best friend that she was going to be hearing a LOT more than she ever wanted to about horses now. She says (now!) that she won't mind. Hopefully not, as I usually blabber to mom and sis about horses and they at least are somewhat interested, whereas my best friend is not really an animal person...
Feel free to give me suggestions for getting used to living independently! I expect to get along pretty well with my brothers, but advice on making the change to no parents around is welcome.
Signed, Rather Jittery,
L
Backstory: For the last couple of months my dad has been out of work. Not one of his usual clients have had work they were ready to give him yet (a couple of them had projects they wanted to do but weren't able to go ahead with yet.) Obviously, my parents have been kind of stressing about it. Dad was searching all over for some more clients and my mom even looked for work, which she has not done since my older brother was born. Now that the two youngest are teenagers they don't need very much attention while doing their schoolwork, etc., so she thought now might be a good time to get a job. However, nothing was available at all in the area for either of them. Meanwhile, their ministry partners in the state of Washington have been having a lot of change happening. My parents and their partners do part time family ministry, with my parents focused on Hispanic families and their partners involved in several specific groups right now. So, they kept telling my parents they should come up there for a while and help out with all the things that are really "popping" up there right now. Everyone was praying about it and door after door kept closing down here. Eventually, dad felt that he had gotten confirmation to go to Washington. (Interestingly enough, the next day after the decision, his favorite client called up and wants him to start on a project, so it turns out dad will have his favorite kind of job to work on while they get settled in up there!)
So, my parents and my sis and youngest brother are moving to Washington for an indefinite amount of time - Brothers # 1 and #2 and me are staying here and running the place and we're going to be really hoping the grandparents all stay healthy and don't get hurt!
I finally get to run a house and make menus *almost* on my own now! It'll be interesting and fun in a lot of ways, but I am really, really going to miss them! I'm sure it's going to be really difficult to adjust to. I told my best friend that she was going to be hearing a LOT more than she ever wanted to about horses now. She says (now!) that she won't mind. Hopefully not, as I usually blabber to mom and sis about horses and they at least are somewhat interested, whereas my best friend is not really an animal person...
Feel free to give me suggestions for getting used to living independently! I expect to get along pretty well with my brothers, but advice on making the change to no parents around is welcome.
Signed, Rather Jittery,
L
Update on the skinny bay oldster
Initial post here:
When my vet was here doing the boosters and checkup on The Spoiled Ones, I asked him if he had ever been able to catch a glimpse of that horse when driving by. It turns out the owner of the vet just called him and had him come over last Friday! Apparently several other people besides me have called Animal Control and so they called him. The owner told my vet that the horse is about 29 or 30 and he has had him since he was 2. The horse is apparently still bright eyed and moving around, just has been hard to keep weight on, and he wanted advice now that people were calling Animal Control about it. So the vet has given him some advice and I am VERY relieved to know that at least the horse is getting something to eat, got medical care, and should hopefully look a lot better soon! Now I don't have to lie awake on cold nights worrying about if that horse has anything in its stomach and if it has anybody that cares about it - I'll keep an eye on it, but I think it should start to look better soon with some supplements and help. Phew!
L
When my vet was here doing the boosters and checkup on The Spoiled Ones, I asked him if he had ever been able to catch a glimpse of that horse when driving by. It turns out the owner of the vet just called him and had him come over last Friday! Apparently several other people besides me have called Animal Control and so they called him. The owner told my vet that the horse is about 29 or 30 and he has had him since he was 2. The horse is apparently still bright eyed and moving around, just has been hard to keep weight on, and he wanted advice now that people were calling Animal Control about it. So the vet has given him some advice and I am VERY relieved to know that at least the horse is getting something to eat, got medical care, and should hopefully look a lot better soon! Now I don't have to lie awake on cold nights worrying about if that horse has anything in its stomach and if it has anybody that cares about it - I'll keep an eye on it, but I think it should start to look better soon with some supplements and help. Phew!
L
Laminitis Update: 8
Hopefully this will be the LAST laminitis update I have to do on the Racehorse Dude! The vet was out here a couple days ago and cleared him for exercise and normal horse life once again! Phew, what a relief... It was really weird having the vet out for a NORMAL vet visit, which sounds bad, but after all the disasters this year I got used to seeing him on half an hour's notice and with all sorts of worries going through my head. I forget how many times he's been here this year, but starting with Mira's eye injury saga last January I've spent a lot more than I want to think about on vet bills.
I asked him to check their teeth and float them if needed, so he looked at both their mouths. He informed me that Mira was missing a lot of teeth (sassy me thinks, "what, they didn't grow back yet!?!") and that even though she has all sorts of interesting bumps and ridges in her mouth, floating would just make her mouth worse. OK. Andolu's mouth was in great shape and didn't need anything. Cool.
I had asked him to give them tetanus and rabies boosters, but I also asked him to show me how to give them their shots myself. So I did three of the injections and it turns out horse shots are much easier to give than dog and cat shots. Another useful skill learned now. Andolu didn't even stop chewing!
I can hardly wait to start riding again! Yippee!
L
I asked him to check their teeth and float them if needed, so he looked at both their mouths. He informed me that Mira was missing a lot of teeth (sassy me thinks, "what, they didn't grow back yet!?!") and that even though she has all sorts of interesting bumps and ridges in her mouth, floating would just make her mouth worse. OK. Andolu's mouth was in great shape and didn't need anything. Cool.
I had asked him to give them tetanus and rabies boosters, but I also asked him to show me how to give them their shots myself. So I did three of the injections and it turns out horse shots are much easier to give than dog and cat shots. Another useful skill learned now. Andolu didn't even stop chewing!
I can hardly wait to start riding again! Yippee!
L
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Update on the bee project
Initial post here.
Shortly after that first post, my mother actually posted our info on a local beekeeper association bulletin board saying that we would like to offer our property as a place to store hives during the downtime from pollinating crops. We had two beekeepers call up right away and they acted very interested, but neither was able to come up and check our property out at the time. I suppose the one guy must have found a place for his extra 20 or so hives or didn't think it was worth coming all the way up here to drop off a few hives, but we haven't talked to either one in a while. One of the beekeepers did give us some very useful information though, about a new/ancient kind of hive that is MUCH easier and less stressful on the bees and produces LOTS more honey.
There is even a variation of the hive built with the Fibonacci sequence that has been found to have dramatically more honey production than would be expected of a hive with that total number of inches inside. Isn't that funny? Fibonacci sequence is so fascinating to me!
Anyway, the current status of the bee project is on hold, due to the fact that we were not able to get alfalfa started. Now that I know it needs hard ground, we'll see what we can do next spring... Until then, I don't think there is quite enough food for a hive in this area. I still really want bees, though.
The only bad thing about bees is their unaccountable prejudice against barnyard animals and the smell of manure. Sheesh, what's wrong with manure? :-D We'll just have to put their hive(s) near the pond and away from the horses when I do get them.
L
Shortly after that first post, my mother actually posted our info on a local beekeeper association bulletin board saying that we would like to offer our property as a place to store hives during the downtime from pollinating crops. We had two beekeepers call up right away and they acted very interested, but neither was able to come up and check our property out at the time. I suppose the one guy must have found a place for his extra 20 or so hives or didn't think it was worth coming all the way up here to drop off a few hives, but we haven't talked to either one in a while. One of the beekeepers did give us some very useful information though, about a new/ancient kind of hive that is MUCH easier and less stressful on the bees and produces LOTS more honey.
There is even a variation of the hive built with the Fibonacci sequence that has been found to have dramatically more honey production than would be expected of a hive with that total number of inches inside. Isn't that funny? Fibonacci sequence is so fascinating to me!
Anyway, the current status of the bee project is on hold, due to the fact that we were not able to get alfalfa started. Now that I know it needs hard ground, we'll see what we can do next spring... Until then, I don't think there is quite enough food for a hive in this area. I still really want bees, though.
The only bad thing about bees is their unaccountable prejudice against barnyard animals and the smell of manure. Sheesh, what's wrong with manure? :-D We'll just have to put their hive(s) near the pond and away from the horses when I do get them.
L
Another NHR post
Hopefully this will be a somewhat shorter post... Yeah right :-)
Following up my last post on socialism, I will say that neither candidate has a record of exactly supporting true democracy and capitalism. McCain's so-called campaign finance reform laws (limiting free speech and not reforming anything. Too many hundreds of blog posts out there to pick from to link to) and his records of wanting more regulation on this or that issue do not make me happy, any more than the fact that rather than being a "maverick" he strikes me as more of a "try to please everyone" type of person. From watching him over the last few years he seems to equate making people agree with him to getting things done. I think getting things done means a little more than that and often, unfortunately, getting things done means you will be less popular.
However, Obama really scares me. See this great article for a few of the reasons why. Another consideration - even if you really liked all his social policies, what about the way he would be viewed by other countries and by terrorists? Even if it were possible to prove that he never had any knowledge about the Communist/terrorist work of the various people he worked so closely with, do you think that would get through to Al-Qaida and other organizations? Al-Qaida is a lot weaker now than it used to be, but there are still plenty of people out there who are constantly working on ways to attack us. It is amazing to me that we have not had any more attacks in seven years. It's incredible. If we get a president who is percieved as wanting to be friendly to those people, it is not going to make them decide to like us. They will just decide the time is perfect for a new attack now that our guard is down. What would Obama do? Would he get panicky and use nuclear... would he not react enough and let more attacks happen?
It might be possible to stand a president who does his best to ruin the economy and personal freedom but protects the country's borders, and it might be possible to stand a president who is careless about our safety but protects personal freedom and the economy, but one who actively attacks personal freedom/the economy AND actively weakens our safety is a nightmare. I don't want that nightmare to come true.
Slightly different: What is with this sort of treatment of reporters? For Pete's sake, I can possibly understand charging reporters to travel around with the campaign, but not that much! Limit it to $300 or $400 a day, treat them like human beings, and try to remember what they are there for. Either give them help to do their jobs (i.e. news, information, sound bites) or don't have them there. I do understand that running a campaign is a very difficult job and that leaks can be extremely damaging to any campaign. Newsflash: Leaks inevitably happen. If you build a decent rapport with a press corps, they will be nicer to you in the event of embarrassing leaks. I just cannot understand this seemingly universal abuse of reporters covering campaigns. Oh well. Enough ranting for the day!
L
Following up my last post on socialism, I will say that neither candidate has a record of exactly supporting true democracy and capitalism. McCain's so-called campaign finance reform laws (limiting free speech and not reforming anything. Too many hundreds of blog posts out there to pick from to link to) and his records of wanting more regulation on this or that issue do not make me happy, any more than the fact that rather than being a "maverick" he strikes me as more of a "try to please everyone" type of person. From watching him over the last few years he seems to equate making people agree with him to getting things done. I think getting things done means a little more than that and often, unfortunately, getting things done means you will be less popular.
However, Obama really scares me. See this great article for a few of the reasons why. Another consideration - even if you really liked all his social policies, what about the way he would be viewed by other countries and by terrorists? Even if it were possible to prove that he never had any knowledge about the Communist/terrorist work of the various people he worked so closely with, do you think that would get through to Al-Qaida and other organizations? Al-Qaida is a lot weaker now than it used to be, but there are still plenty of people out there who are constantly working on ways to attack us. It is amazing to me that we have not had any more attacks in seven years. It's incredible. If we get a president who is percieved as wanting to be friendly to those people, it is not going to make them decide to like us. They will just decide the time is perfect for a new attack now that our guard is down. What would Obama do? Would he get panicky and use nuclear... would he not react enough and let more attacks happen?
It might be possible to stand a president who does his best to ruin the economy and personal freedom but protects the country's borders, and it might be possible to stand a president who is careless about our safety but protects personal freedom and the economy, but one who actively attacks personal freedom/the economy AND actively weakens our safety is a nightmare. I don't want that nightmare to come true.
Slightly different: What is with this sort of treatment of reporters? For Pete's sake, I can possibly understand charging reporters to travel around with the campaign, but not that much! Limit it to $300 or $400 a day, treat them like human beings, and try to remember what they are there for. Either give them help to do their jobs (i.e. news, information, sound bites) or don't have them there. I do understand that running a campaign is a very difficult job and that leaks can be extremely damaging to any campaign. Newsflash: Leaks inevitably happen. If you build a decent rapport with a press corps, they will be nicer to you in the event of embarrassing leaks. I just cannot understand this seemingly universal abuse of reporters covering campaigns. Oh well. Enough ranting for the day!
L
Monday, October 13, 2008
Brrr!
It really got cold this last week, down into the 30s. It's been a long time since I could see my breath around here, so it was kind of fun. The horses have been getting extra grass hay at night to keep them warm and they like that. Mira doesn't seem to have as heavy of a coat as she usually does. I could be wrong, but I think it's usually a lot thicker by now. I don't mind if we have a mild winter as long as we have plenty of rain.
My mom made a really cool discovery a few days ago. Apparently there is a kind of Ethiopian grain/forage crop with really, really tiny but nutritious grains that needs heat, very little water, and a short growing season. As long as it gets rained on at least once while it is growing it will produce some sort of crop. If you cut it early it is a great forage for animals (similar to timothy hay, but slightly better) and if you let it grow two weeks more you get a very good grain. It's called Teff and I found a variety that would probably let me grow 2 tons of hay per acre in our area. I plan to order some of this variety soon and plant it next spring. The planting instructions also illuminated what is probably the reason we never got alfalfa to grow - they both need to be planted on firm ground that your foot does not sink into at all. Well, we have plenty of that around here, but we always tried to work the ground a little and make it fluffier before planting the alfalfa. Well, now we know!
I am counting the days until Andolu gets cleared by the vet...
L
My mom made a really cool discovery a few days ago. Apparently there is a kind of Ethiopian grain/forage crop with really, really tiny but nutritious grains that needs heat, very little water, and a short growing season. As long as it gets rained on at least once while it is growing it will produce some sort of crop. If you cut it early it is a great forage for animals (similar to timothy hay, but slightly better) and if you let it grow two weeks more you get a very good grain. It's called Teff and I found a variety that would probably let me grow 2 tons of hay per acre in our area. I plan to order some of this variety soon and plant it next spring. The planting instructions also illuminated what is probably the reason we never got alfalfa to grow - they both need to be planted on firm ground that your foot does not sink into at all. Well, we have plenty of that around here, but we always tried to work the ground a little and make it fluffier before planting the alfalfa. Well, now we know!
I am counting the days until Andolu gets cleared by the vet...
L
Sunday, October 12, 2008
A rather different type of post
I try not to get too political on my blog, because I started it as a fun stress reliever. However, I couldn't resist putting this post up. I keep seeing all the panicky news articles on the economy. It's been quite obvious for years that we are due for a very bad depression. The roots of the problem go back decades. For example, when the US and other countries went off the gold/silver standards, that was a bad choice for stability. It does seem to have allowed more rapid growth of the economy, but that came with a price - less security.
The incredible amount of debt that most of the world's countries are in is also very bad for economic health. There are so many things that have contributed to this problem and I am surprised the system has done as well as it has for as long as it has. I have a few basic beliefs about politics that rule my opinions/who I vote for/what I want to see happen. What are your basic, rock bottom beliefs about government and economies?
I believe:
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Translation: Any power the government has will inevitably be abused at some point. Thus, the more limited the power of the government, the more limited its power to do harm. There must be a balance between its power to protect the citizens and its power to control the citizens. Part of the way to achieve that balance is by having as few things as possible controlled by the central government, and as many things as possible controlled by each local community. The local government is closely watched and controlled by the people it is overseeing. It is much harder for the local government to abuse its power than it is for the federal government. And, when it does abuse its power, it will affect far fewer people and is much easier to stop.
The opposite, socialism/statism, where everything is controlled by the central government, has always resulted in multiple disasters affecting millions of people and a general ongoing degredation of the population's standard of living. Even the most cursory knowledge of history proves that point. The current world economic crisis is mostly the result of too much centralized power (which means less accountability and far more abuse). Our sub-prime mortgage mess here in the US is largely due to too much regulation and yet because people are scared and reality hurts there are actually calls for MORE regulation! Sorry, but I grew up in a third-world country and I hate watching my beloved America turn into a third-world country. I remember when my childhood country elected a man they knew perfectly well wanted to be dictator. Our friends said quite honestly that they knew it was stupid to elect someone who would take away most of their rights, but they told us that they needed a dictator to make sure things got done. This is a country that has a hard time developing businesses for reasons like the following example:
Say you start an auto mechanics store. You hire a couple of mechanics and buy some of the necessary parts and put out your shingle. One day when you come back from your lunch break, none of your employees are there, and most of your parts and supplies are gone - headed for the black market. You still have a little bit of money left, so now you hire your nephew and buy some new parts. You hang around the shop as much as possible to make sure he doesn't steal from you, but at least he's not as likely to try because he's related to you. You make a decent living now, but you can never feel at ease going on vacation because who knows what might happen if you are not there personally? And of course it would be quite difficult to start another branch of your store because it is so hard to find employees who won't steal and who will actually show up every day.
This is no joke. I lived there and that is what it is like. In order to pay phone and electric bills every month everybody goes to the offices and pays them in person - you can't send checks through the mail because they usually won't get there. That takes a lot of your time every month, especially if you don't have a car. I loved that country, but even as a child with no responsibilities I could see the effects of all the issues due to people not being trustworthy. If the post office had too many letters they would take some out back and burn them. Hmm...
If you talk to policemen or whatever they will loudly complain about all the corruption in the government and how it really needs to be cleaned up and people need to stop accepting bribes. But it was always "other people" who needed to change first. If you asked them, they would tell you that a man has to make a living so they would accept a bribe even if it was wrong, because, after all everyone else was doing it.
A third-world country is that way primarily because the "lowest common denominator," if you want to call it that, of morality, is too low. The less you can trust people, the poorer the country will get, inevitably. We did know some amazing and incredibly honest people in my childhood country, but they were not the norm. America used to have a lot of people with strong characters. Whatever your theory of why, everybody seems to agree nowadays that there are increasing problems with cheating and crime and and more and more hurting people. I see more and more resemblances to the country I grew up in and it scares me. The bad thing is a lot of the socialist, big brother government-type policies have encouraged less and less personal responsibility and more and more laziness. It seems like we're such a busy country, and we're so used to our comforts, that I wonder how much of the famous American backbone is left. Are we like the Romans now, "give us bread and circuses and we'll be happy" or are there enough of us like our forebears who hated the tax on imported fabrics and so began wearing buckskin to make a point to England? I think Americans want to be a strong, kind, and trustworthy people, but we are so busy and distracted that we don't have time to think about things like that much any more.
We've already lost a lot of our freedoms. Both of the presidential candidates and most of the congressional candidates would like to make a bunch more restrictions on those freedoms. Will we wake up? I don't know, but I really hope and pray that this financial crisis will wake people to the dangers of giving too many powers to the government and inspire more of us to take initiative ourselves. Thus, my continued efforts to learn to grow different kinds of food and my resolve to vote (even if I can't stand what's on the ballot) and do my best to push for fewer laws and more freedoms in this country. I also keep noticing how hard it is to find time for people and even just thinking. Have you noticed the same problem? It's really hard! But, it is essential if I want to experience my life rather than zoom through my life doing five things at once. I keep trying to decide what is vital and what isn't. This type of recreation, or that type? Do I need to do this first, or that first?
A final thought:
Issues such as healthcare and education are prime examples of capitalist versus socialist methods and what works to create the kind of healthy, efficient, working system we all want.
Sorry for the LONG post. I suggest reading Instapundit's blog every day for a month if you want a quick and extremely comprehensive education as to the state of the nation and all sorts of opposing views on issues. It's a great place to clarify one's thoughts and beliefs. Anyway, tomorrow I plan a much more cheerful and easy to digest post. Thanks for reading this far!
L
The incredible amount of debt that most of the world's countries are in is also very bad for economic health. There are so many things that have contributed to this problem and I am surprised the system has done as well as it has for as long as it has. I have a few basic beliefs about politics that rule my opinions/who I vote for/what I want to see happen. What are your basic, rock bottom beliefs about government and economies?
I believe:
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Translation: Any power the government has will inevitably be abused at some point. Thus, the more limited the power of the government, the more limited its power to do harm. There must be a balance between its power to protect the citizens and its power to control the citizens. Part of the way to achieve that balance is by having as few things as possible controlled by the central government, and as many things as possible controlled by each local community. The local government is closely watched and controlled by the people it is overseeing. It is much harder for the local government to abuse its power than it is for the federal government. And, when it does abuse its power, it will affect far fewer people and is much easier to stop.
The opposite, socialism/statism, where everything is controlled by the central government, has always resulted in multiple disasters affecting millions of people and a general ongoing degredation of the population's standard of living. Even the most cursory knowledge of history proves that point. The current world economic crisis is mostly the result of too much centralized power (which means less accountability and far more abuse). Our sub-prime mortgage mess here in the US is largely due to too much regulation and yet because people are scared and reality hurts there are actually calls for MORE regulation! Sorry, but I grew up in a third-world country and I hate watching my beloved America turn into a third-world country. I remember when my childhood country elected a man they knew perfectly well wanted to be dictator. Our friends said quite honestly that they knew it was stupid to elect someone who would take away most of their rights, but they told us that they needed a dictator to make sure things got done. This is a country that has a hard time developing businesses for reasons like the following example:
Say you start an auto mechanics store. You hire a couple of mechanics and buy some of the necessary parts and put out your shingle. One day when you come back from your lunch break, none of your employees are there, and most of your parts and supplies are gone - headed for the black market. You still have a little bit of money left, so now you hire your nephew and buy some new parts. You hang around the shop as much as possible to make sure he doesn't steal from you, but at least he's not as likely to try because he's related to you. You make a decent living now, but you can never feel at ease going on vacation because who knows what might happen if you are not there personally? And of course it would be quite difficult to start another branch of your store because it is so hard to find employees who won't steal and who will actually show up every day.
This is no joke. I lived there and that is what it is like. In order to pay phone and electric bills every month everybody goes to the offices and pays them in person - you can't send checks through the mail because they usually won't get there. That takes a lot of your time every month, especially if you don't have a car. I loved that country, but even as a child with no responsibilities I could see the effects of all the issues due to people not being trustworthy. If the post office had too many letters they would take some out back and burn them. Hmm...
If you talk to policemen or whatever they will loudly complain about all the corruption in the government and how it really needs to be cleaned up and people need to stop accepting bribes. But it was always "other people" who needed to change first. If you asked them, they would tell you that a man has to make a living so they would accept a bribe even if it was wrong, because, after all everyone else was doing it.
A third-world country is that way primarily because the "lowest common denominator," if you want to call it that, of morality, is too low. The less you can trust people, the poorer the country will get, inevitably. We did know some amazing and incredibly honest people in my childhood country, but they were not the norm. America used to have a lot of people with strong characters. Whatever your theory of why, everybody seems to agree nowadays that there are increasing problems with cheating and crime and and more and more hurting people. I see more and more resemblances to the country I grew up in and it scares me. The bad thing is a lot of the socialist, big brother government-type policies have encouraged less and less personal responsibility and more and more laziness. It seems like we're such a busy country, and we're so used to our comforts, that I wonder how much of the famous American backbone is left. Are we like the Romans now, "give us bread and circuses and we'll be happy" or are there enough of us like our forebears who hated the tax on imported fabrics and so began wearing buckskin to make a point to England? I think Americans want to be a strong, kind, and trustworthy people, but we are so busy and distracted that we don't have time to think about things like that much any more.
We've already lost a lot of our freedoms. Both of the presidential candidates and most of the congressional candidates would like to make a bunch more restrictions on those freedoms. Will we wake up? I don't know, but I really hope and pray that this financial crisis will wake people to the dangers of giving too many powers to the government and inspire more of us to take initiative ourselves. Thus, my continued efforts to learn to grow different kinds of food and my resolve to vote (even if I can't stand what's on the ballot) and do my best to push for fewer laws and more freedoms in this country. I also keep noticing how hard it is to find time for people and even just thinking. Have you noticed the same problem? It's really hard! But, it is essential if I want to experience my life rather than zoom through my life doing five things at once. I keep trying to decide what is vital and what isn't. This type of recreation, or that type? Do I need to do this first, or that first?
A final thought:
Issues such as healthcare and education are prime examples of capitalist versus socialist methods and what works to create the kind of healthy, efficient, working system we all want.
Sorry for the LONG post. I suggest reading Instapundit's blog every day for a month if you want a quick and extremely comprehensive education as to the state of the nation and all sorts of opposing views on issues. It's a great place to clarify one's thoughts and beliefs. Anyway, tomorrow I plan a much more cheerful and easy to digest post. Thanks for reading this far!
L
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