SEPTEMBER 2019

Happy September 1 !  

I rode Ivan last night in the field in front of the barn.  Our arena is full of lumbar and tools and a few deep holes where posts have been removed, too many risks for silly horses to be in there.   Our slower-than-ever carpenter is supposed to come tomorrow, Labor Day, to do some actual labor on it.  We can't start the hay barn until the arena is finished.  May be next year.....   Anyway,  Ivan was good and we got a little exercise.  

Our arena:

Saturday, a cousin and his family came for the day. Yesterday, a neighbor couple were having a gathering of some friends. Today, the lake has been busier - the last hurrah of the summer. Tomorrow morning, it will be completely quiet around here.

Happy Labor Day
Fall is coming fast....

I'm praying Dorian doesn't hit land and that it reduces to a category 2..........preparing for
a hurricane is very stressful.........I did that in RI and always worried when the horses
were in the barn............the rains during a hurricane are like nothing you can imagine
unless you've been in one.

ELLEN, glad your lake is returning to normal and the birds will be, too.

ARK, I love the pictures. Those mini donkeys are great...........

Everyone have a good day..........

So far, it appears that Florida has mostly dodged the bullet. The Bahamas weren't so lucky. I hope the Carolinas don't get hit too hard.

The storm surges will be very damaging all along the coasts.......sending hope for those that will be
involved.........

I just heard from a reporter who is from the Bahamas that there were only two of the 700 islands that were seriously damaged. The rest are mostly okay. People have had enough time to get to a safe place; hope they were smart enough to do that.
More and more of the houses in Florida are being built to withstand hurricane force winds.

A couple of years ago on DIY, Vanilla Ice/Rob VanWinkle, did a complete remodel on a house right on the ocean just south of Melbourne. It was a beautiful place when he got done with it. He put in lots and lots of glass in windows and doors, all of it hurricane glass. I have wondered how well that all held up.

Still hoping for those in the path of the storm..............

The Bahamas looked TERRIBLE after Dorian.........WOW.

God bless........everyone get in a group hug............

We don't expect anything from the hurricane except clouds.  This is good and bad.  Good because we have haybales on the ground waiting for us to pick them up and store them in the barn.  Bad because we are so dry here that I am afraid of fires.  If someone drops a cigarette on us, the  forest is going to burn.    Somehow we have managed to miss most of the rain this summer, it went around us.  We have trees and undergrowth directly behind our barn that are dry as toast.  You know it's dry when the weeds are drooping.  Our weeds are drooping.


Today is cooler than yesterday's 91 degrees, which will help with picking up the hay.  It will be in the low 80s.

Stay cool!


Later: We put up 99 bales of hay into our barn loft. We are frazzled.....

Good for you, Ark. Are you going to have enough to get you through the winter?

ELLEN:
No, we will have to buy 300 bales. Our upper field usually has as much hay as the lower, but has next to nothing this time. We aren't going to mow it. Donnie is starting to plan on some irrigation for the upper field for possibly next summer. It is sloped and dries up where the lower field is flat and has a creek next to it that keeps in moister. Our creek is a year round one and never dries up. We should be able to pump water up from it in dry weather. Anyway, for the second year in a row, we got about half the yield of hay we normally get.

A couple of my neighbors have rigged up pumps that pump water from the lake to water their grass. The hose can be used for other things too, cleaning docks, boats, etc. It's a very simple system that works well.

I got a horse....im going to train a blind horse to be usable...then i will train someone to ride him. I have a project. Hubby will work with his buddy horse also while she is here. Gelding is in teens. He is a chestnut with a blanket...the mare is a dark grey with a blanket.
Ill be busy...along with remodeling stuff. If i have to light for awhile i may as well be busy.
Glad all are safe from storms. I saw SC had flooding bad along the coast.
Be safe everyone.
Ive posted two other times but its like no one can see my posts...not one comment. Hello to all.

Hi CB...........glad you have a project. Sounds like a good one and it will give you
GREAT satisfaction. Keep us up to date.

The storms are awful all the way up the coast...........I hope Rick & Rose will check
and let us know first hand what it was like for them.

Today T visited the computer geek who unlocked a virus scam that looked like Microsoft.
It wasn't but it's all fixed now. What a mess. BUT, then we went out for dinner............

Hope all are well & safe.................

Hi CB. I was wondering where you were. Your project sounds like a good one. Let us know how it goes.

I've had that scam Microsoft thing show up on my computer a few times. So far, I've been able to get rid of it by hitting Cntl/Alt/Delete. That brings up the task manager. Click on Microsoft Edge and then End Task.
I can't help thinking that the idiots that create the viruses could do so much good if they would use their skills for something good instead of messing up other people's lives.

That didn't work Ellen...........I think they had to strip it and put each program back in after
testing each one. It took overnight. Anyhow, it's fixed for now.

I wonder if the Carolinas have electricity yet.

Everyone have a great day.............

HURRICANE DORIAN was a "non event" for me. We are so far inland that storms of that nature generally don't turn our way. Rose's situation is different of course. Never had an electrical flicker.

I'm scheduled for shoulder surgery this coming Tuesday with anticipated 6 weeks recovery. That will make a total of 12 weeks from fall. Seems I have a couple small chips floating around trying to wedge into large joint. This creates sharp stabbing pains. Doing stuff one handed is getting old real quick.

Take care … Love Rick

I'm sure glad for you RICK...Sure hope your shoulder heals quickly......6 weeks isn't so long,
it should go by quickly after you get into PT. Easy for me to say, but we all want good things
to come...............

Hope we hear from ROSE...........

Rick, I'm sorry that they didn't do that when you first hurt it. But, the healing will really start after the surgery.
Glad to hear that you didn't get any storm damage.

Rose, where are you?


Yesterday afternoon, I looked out and saw an old, small rowboat drifting along, empty. No motor, no registration numbers, no oars. It finally bumped into my neighbors' dock, so I snagged it and used the rope that is on it to tie it to a pier post. I hope the owner will eventually find it.

Hey, ELLEN, maybe you have a new boat...........

I wish more people would check in for roll call.................

I'm checking in, it's about time I know. Sorry for worrying everyone. We had some stiff winds and a lot of rain, heavy at times but faired pretty good. I had my generator ready, cash in case of power outages and sandwich makings, dog and cat food and lots of water. I was afraid of another Matthew and I just couldn't handle another like that. Lori had braided the horses id tags into their manes, she was prepped for another dreadful Matthew also.

If the rain holds off I'm going to ride tomorrow. I will take it easy and hopefully Jack will too! Fingers crossed.

More later. Thanks for the concern my friends.

Rose, it's good to hear from you and that you survived the storm in good shape. Enjoy your ride tomorrow.

ROSE:
Oh, good. I am glad you didn't get as much storm as the last one. Have lots of fun riding!! Good for you getting back in the saddle!!

RICK:
Dorian was a non-event for us, too. We got some nice breezes, that was it. I'll be thinking of you next Tuesday!

CB:
Congrats on the new horses! Yep, you may as well stay busy. Hope it works out great!

ELLEN:
Congrats on the stray boat! You need a project, right? Maybe a summer person set it free when they left for home.
I think Donnie is ready to make something to pump the creek water up to our field. He doesn't like it when his hay fields don't do well. The lower field was pretty good, despite the lack of rain.

GRAYMARE:
I think DONNA may be more affected by the hurricane than expected. I heard they were getting pounded. I wish she would check in when she can.


I think we may have hitched our wagon to a star with this new carpenter... When he is here, he works pretty hard. He is hardly ever here and never calls to let us know not to wait for him. He worked about 4 hours all last week. Today Donnie and I started working on the arena fence ourselves. We'll get it done way before he will. He should have had the arena fencing about done by now....sigh....