• Ramblings

    And I’ll Find Strength in Pain

    This weekend we started repairing the pasture fence. Some of the poles were bent over so far that half the barbed wire was touching the ground. How does that happen? Brian was in charge of disentangling the dangerous barbs from the railroad tie corner posts. Whoever put the wire up was extremely thorough. They twisted and wrapped it in every direction, tying it a dozen times around each massive chunk of wood. I was in charge of removing the wire from the poles and then removing the poles from the ground. Those that the stampeding elephants plowed through were easy enough to remove, popping out of the ground without effort. The rest… Not…

  • Creatures,  Ramblings

    Stand up When You Hear Your Name

    Right now our new friend seems to respond to tongue clicking, the rattling of the food bag, and “Hey, good boy!” I couldn’t very well refer to him as SHUSH-SHUSH-SHUSH here, and I didn’t want him to get accustomed to Good Boy as his name either since there are quite a few wild cats around, and if another happens to start enjoying my company I’ll probably say “Hey, good boy” to him as well. We can’t have everyone thinking their name is Good Boy. This isn’t the Foreman house; everyone here gets their own moniker. So, after nearly three weeks of going back and forth with names, we finally settled on Pickwick. Hopefully he’ll acknowledge…

  • Ramblings

    Riding Wildfire

    It’s been beautifully springy here recently. We’ve had the windows open, airing the place out. Now everything is covered in a thin layer of dirt. The winds were gusting at 60-75 mph today, blowing everything from dust, leaves, and horse poop into the air. We were lucky enough to avoid the power outages the poor folks in Billings are dealing with, for which I am especially grateful. I hate being without power when living on a well. My first thoughts when the lights flicker are 1.) I better use the bathroom now and 2.) I should fill the bathtub so we can flush the toilets later. With the electricity in our…

  • Food,  Health & Fitness,  Ramblings

    Only Ripe Vegetables, Fresh Fruit, and Whole Wheat

    There have been a few times in my life when I’ve weighed more than I liked. Once, I tried my aunt’s collagen drink, which was touted as an extremely healthy way to shed weight. I don’t know if it was or wasn’t but I can tell you that the product I tried was vile and I knew, if that’s what it was going to take to lose a little weight, I’d rather work out. So that’s what I did; I cut my calories and increased my exercise. There are a lot of “secrets” to dieting but burning more calories than you intake seems to be a no-brainer strategy and it’s…