March 2017

March 2017

Nearly Spring!!





Smell it arriving??

Welcome to March! I don't know where the winter went this year. It will probably arrive tomorrow. We had the warmest February on record this year. While enjoyable, it is a little worrisome. Right now we are under severe thunderstorm watches, but the storms are traveling thru faster than they said, so maybe they will zoom thru before causing too much damage.


I have been watching that pregnant giraffe all week. I think she is torturing all her fans by staying pregnant as long as possible. Have you all been keeping up with her? The baby eagle I have been watching is about to fledge, so I am going to have to find another nest to watch. I am easily entertained....

 Hi.  Heavens, March 1st.  Can that be right?

CB, glad you & your cousin made it through the storm.  Boy, that storm was wicked in some areas..........

Painter here and so far, it's really nice.  She's like JO, she also does huge murals.  I don't happen to want or need one, just interesting to talk to.  She also does stage production designs and does a lot at the university.  She likes painting simple walls like mine as they are very relaxing she says...........  Not me.  It's work to me, AND, I' m not good at it.

So, the day is going along.  I'm relaxing watching the horses stand head to tail, heads down, hind foot cocked, snoozing n the sun.
To me, that's medicine.

Hubbys horse neighs a big ol whinny everytime he sees us ir hears us move! He tells anyone that will listen that we are starving him to death! He needs fed NOW!

I love being able to watch the guys munch or just stand enjoying the sunshine. It is medicine GM. 

Boy, had a hard time letting go of my blood this morning, im already black and blue....ugh...but tech finally got enuf...yay.
Insurance adjuster finally showed up....yesssss...now we can move forward with repairs i hope.

Whew! It was 60° when I got up this morning. It gradually dropped to about 50°, all through the day. In the last half hour, it has dropped another 10 degrees. Supposed to be cold tonight and tomorrow then ease back into more tolerable temperatures after that.
The wind is blowing ferociously, making it feel a lot colder.
March winds? For sure!

Coming in like a lion, will go out like a lamb....we can hope, huh.

20 degrees cooler here today than yesterday....going to be 34 tonight and then be warmer....i just dont want hot.
Not ready for HOT....but spring would be nice.

Painter back tomorrow..........does 2 coats...........not quite finished.

No other news.

Brrrrrrr! Got cold last night....last cold one for the next week tho.
Farrier comes today and tomorrow is devoted to a ride to see if my bod will tolerate and i can still walk.....if not then we have discussed and rolled it all around what we will need to do.....this gettin old sucks.

It is cold here this morning too. I hope my tulips survive it.

This morning was the final follow up appointment with the orthopedist. I'm good to go.

Thats some good news, Ellen! 
Hope your flowers make it too. Lots of flowers out here and i hope the last 2 nights didnt do them in.  
Farrier is here and red was perfect, rocky is being a real turd....hes had this done lots of times...so dint know why he is being a butt.

Not much going on here in PA either. The weather took a nose dive, 27 this morning, 12 tomorrow night. BBRRRRR My poor tulips and buds on the lilac bush. Hope they survive.

Check this out. Canceled & rescheduled our appointment for the recall on our SUV..then a woman calls and asked me why we didn't show up...tell her I canceled and rescheduled. George takes the SUV to the garage on the rescheduled appointment and they ask him why he is there, we didn't have an appointment and we skipped our other appointment. OMG does no one do their jobs nowadays? They took him anyway. Thank God. It could have gotten ugly at the garage.

Off to a birthday dinner tonight for our friend Jill. No cooking for me. YIPPEEEEEE

I recently changed car insurance, ive talked to 10 different people....who hadnt a clue as to what a truck camper is! Round and round we go.....finally adjuster showed up, took pics and now am waiting again.....
Last time i made an appt for oil change on truck, took it in, 3 hours later i asjed if it was done and they said no, they would fit it in when they could as i didnt have an appt. I did come unglued, got truck in asap and oil change was free. Asked for manager, and he made some mechanics MOVE.
Got cold here last night, water froze in hose to camper...weatherman wrong again.
Babysat Harper last night, she wore us out....but when bedtime arrived, she was ready! She was leading me to her bed, lol. Love that lil girl.

I try to be a nice person to the people I deal with, but sometimes you have to get right uppity to get their attention.
Around here, one of the main offenders is the cable company. Mediacom (mediacrumb) will tell you they are coming at a certain time. They may or may not get there on time, and invariably, it will be one who is not authorized to FIX anything. He just looks to see what needs to be done, and then a few days later another guy comes to try to fix it, maybe correctly, maybe not.
The only time you get anything done is to ask for the disconnect line. Then they get a little more interested in the problem.
Sheesh. 3 hours for an oil change? Nope. Should take 30 minutes, tops.

ELLEN
Good news about your wrist!! Yesterday I was walking along in front of the barn and tripped over a small rock jutting out of the ground. I felt like I had been lassoed by the ankles and fell like a top heavy tree. Luckily, I only hurt my pride.

TRUDY
I get so aggravated at incompetence in a workplace. This week we went to a Verizon store to get a SIM card for my new, and smarter, Iphone. The guy promptly changed my grandfathered in phone plan before discovering he didn't even have a card for my phone. Once changed, that was it. So I had a more expensive plan and a phone that wouldn't work. He said a new SIM card would take weeks to order. Basically, he was trying to get rid of us. So Donnie went to a different store the next day and the guy there had one, knew what he was doing, and said even if he didn't have one, it could be overnighted. Customer service.

I gotta get going. I have to go to a neighbor's funeral in a little while. Our favorite farmer's dad died earlier this week.

Here in Warsaw, we have two Verizon stores. One of them seems to be some kind of franchise store, the other is a company store. The franchise store has one guy working in there who may or may not know what he's doing. The company store has about 6 or 7 people working there, and they seem to know how to solve problems.
I think too many companies don't take employee training seriously enough.

Maybe its the younger class or generation of workforce who seem to want to only do just what they have to do...to collect that paycheck.  A few who try hard are sorely outnumbered by those who could care less unless it concerns themselves.  
Ark, sorry you tripped, but if you were gonna do it anyway, should have been seen by at least one foop...
Lazy day here....

Oh headache go away, and dont come back another day!

My knee is swollen again out of the blue....didnt do anything but on the phone with insurance, and finally got the check cut....just has to come now so we can get er done, and i did my dishes, and cooked dinner....and it still swelled. Nuts! Hubby is back on the hit list of no horses again....im hurting so its not a battle i can argue right now....double nuts!

I could just cry....think i will...

CB
I am so sorry you are feeling so bad. Did your knee get evaluated by the doctors? Is a knee replacement on the horizon? I hope your headache and swollen knee get better....today.


The funeral was nice enough. The two speakers spoke well about the man who died. It was a low key, but nice, funeral. I have been to some fire and brimstone funerals that barely mentioned the deceased in the past. This wasn't one of those. Thank goodness.

I had to drive thru a blizzard to get there. Such weird weather this year.

Ark, sorry about your neighbors father passing. Glad the service was nice.  

Ive had injections in both knees several times in last 20 years, my tendons are wearing out, not bone on bone enuf to replace yet.....and no i shouldnt be riding.....
Still have stupid headache....not going to be a good day.
We need to start cleaning out our storage unit and have a last yard sale.  

The birds r singing and my horses whinnying fir breakfast, they r so demanding.

So sorry about your knees CB but wicked Mr Athritis is not a fun character to think about or have.  As TRUDY said, Johnny Walker is worse.  I'm so thankful for the memories of riding all over the country and seeing the real west between two ears.  I ride now working Eli and am glad to be in the saddle moseying around...........my mountain riding is close to home and around 2 hours............now I do the big rides in my head or scrapbook.  Sadly, age just adds up..............I'm glad for the numbers climbing and my pretend rides in my head. HUGS as you think your own plan..............


ARK, glad the funeral was a nice one............they're difficult as there is a reverent atmosphere and some families just aren't.  You can feel it. I'm always relieved when those types conclude.  We were at a funeral one time and I looked at Terry and asked him if the speaker was talking about the same man we knew.  Several asked that later as the deceased was not a particularly nice person. 


The family room is now painted and the fun of putting it all back together is at hand............step by step.  LOL, I hope to finish by the end of March.  


No other news..............nice day outside tho...............


God bless  Prayers for ALL.

CB:
Drink lots of water today. Sometimes I find I have a wicked headache when I neglect to drink enough water. That's usually when I get a fever blister, too. Water is my friend....


GRAYMARE:
This funeral was nice in that it was tailored to the guy. He was an old farmer and both the speakers talked about that. One even read a poem about farmers that fit the old guy. The music lacked quality, but I suspect it was recordings from their church. I don't dare ask about that, I might insult one of their family. Luckily, they didn't play much of it, only two songs.
Donnie and I have attended several funerals that I wish had been recorded. They were so strange. Besides the usual fire and brimstone, the fainting in the aisles, the incredibly strange 'music', and wailing, nothing was actually said personally about the guest of honor. (Other than "You'll NEVER see your mother again"...commence wailing.) One funeral even prayed for the mine union's successful elections.... That generation of family is all gone now, so I am not sure if they are still holding this style of funerals or not. At the time, I was flabbergasted, but am glad I got to see them now. It was like stepping into a previous century. At least they didn't last three days like Donnie said they did when he was young.


It is so darn cold today. The wind is still blowing pretty hard, so it feels even colder. We have to work on Ivan and Areion's feet today and try to fit their boots onto their feet. Tomorrow they are going to Pandapas Pond Park and it is pretty rocky there. We won't make as good time as we did on the flat New River Trail, but it will be a good training ride. Areion seems to get stronger every week, but her feet were a little tender toward the end of the ride. The boots should help with that.

Been drinking lots of fluids, hardly eating, my sugars are going loooow, see the doc on 15th for possible med change..me who had out of control readings is now too low....but i guess lower is better than super highs.
One nice thing is im still losing weight....ill take that with no complaints.
Windy and drizzly day here....

Hmmmmmm.  Does anyone know if Skype is now forcing people to pay for instant messaging?  My account won't work.............Oh well.

 I think I will totally uninstall and try a new account........phooey.

So far, I haven't seen anything that says I have to pay for Skype, at least not for simple messaging.
Not sure what they do with live video messaging. I don't think there is a charge for that either. I have friends who do that and never mention a charge for that.

ARK: Sorry to hear about your neighbor and the funeral. I HATE funerals. Especially anyone in my crazy family, it can turn into a brawl in a heart beat. 3 days of weeping and wailing. At my Niece Patty's funeral the doctor who called her a hypochondriac & didn't treat her for breast cancer had the nerve to show up. He is lucky he didn't join her in the casket, my Nephew went off the deep end. At my neighbors fathers funeral, she went off the deep end after everyone was saying all these nice things (I'm so glad I didn't get up and say anything) she got up and called him a no good alcoholic who treated his kids like crap. The entire room was hardly breathing. She went on and on as her husband tried to get her to sit down. The look on the Pastors face was total shock. Funerals..uuggghhhh They bring out the worst in people.

CB: Try one of those Tommy Copper braces, I think you'll be surprised at how well they work. I have one and George has 2, after wearing it a couple days I can go for weeks without it. They are not very expensive. I have Osteoarthritis in my knee, it swells and I am trying my darnest not to have a knee replacement.

GRAYMARE: You are so right. I have all my very happy memories of riding thru the fields on my horse, playing at the shows, I wouldn't trade them for anything. When I see people riding my heart sings and tries to tell me that I could still ride if I had the "right" horse, but my mind fights and says "johnny walker" and I come back to reality. I have a good friend with MS who is in a wheel chair and she reminds me how important walking is, she would give up everything to be able to get outta that chair and walk across the room.