New Year

Half way through the first month of a new year, nee a new Decade... I'd say we are well overdue for a little blogging...

So far the best description of 2010 would be the coldest year of my life... Granted we are only 14 days in, but of those 14 days we've only had like 3 above freezing (and those have all been this week!) This unreal cold stuff just doesn't work for me. If Global Warming means that we are going to begin to have regular winters like this one... I may be heading south to Texas sooner rather than later.... Being a bum in Luckenbach, TX might hold as much happiness for me as being a productive citizen in Oklahoma....

Speaking of Texas - I heard a new song today and was immediately taken by a certain line in it - "Home is where my Horse is" - Hello!! That sounds like me. It is a new song by Lyle Lovett - and after reading the lyrics I thought they made wonderful poetry - even w/out music... I may post them here later.

Speaking of the ponies (sayeth the segway queen LOL) I have managed to keep everyone alive and well through the unbearable cold... So far anyways. I won't say they were happy especially with all the barn time - but they tolerated it pretty well after I allowed them to choose how the arrangements would be... yes... them - or some ghost doing me a favor... still not sure.

You see, at Mazie we have an open faced barn with two stalls. One is about twice as large as the other. Now my horses like each other just fine unless you make them stand in close quarters. Since there were four horses I put two on one side and two on the other - and everything seemed fine. Fancy and Chase get along fine. Dolly and Strait get along fine. Everyone can see everyone - it's all good.

That is for about an hour. Then Fancy turns into the world biggest bitch and decides she will just kill chase and proceeds to try. Okay, that clearly isn't working - so I put Strait in with Fancy. Strait LOVES Fancy and she tolerates him very well. Dolly hates Chase, but they are in the big stall and Dolly is old and not as committed to Murder these days as Fancy. That seemed to go fine.

For about anothre hour. Then our psycho bitch decides that she must also kill Strait, who for the record is three inches taller and outweighs her by a good 150lbs. So, back out into the cold I go. I put the three innocent horses one side of the barn and left the psycho bitch alone in her stall. The boys - who rarely get along at all seemed to understand that their options were limited.... And once again, all seemed well.

An hour later - and all still seems well.... 2 hours - all well. So went the checking - and but for a few minor skirmishes - everything seemed fine. So I finally turn the light out about 1am and get some sleep. I set an alarm for 3:30 and a quick check (it's nice to have a barn w/ a light directly behind my bedroom window - I will miss that feature) and all still seems well. So, I go back to sleep till 5.

I awaken at five, turn on the barn light and even before i get my glasses on I think i see two horses on each end of the barn. This is NOT the arrangement we had sorted out before I went to sleep. With my glasses i'm able to see that not only are there two horses on each side - they have all swapped themselves around. Dolly and Strait in the small stall together and Fancy (who as you recall was in the small stall alone) and Chase are now occupying the large stall. I am guessing they have torn down the divider fence so I rush out to the barn. No fence down. No gates open. No possible way for horses to have changed stalls but for one of them to have opened the gate between the stalls... and (and this is the impressive part) when the changes were made SHUT THE GATE.

However, everyone seemed happy with this arrangement and this is how they remained for the next four days.... Tolerant if not happy.

So... either i under estimate the intelligence of my ponies - or I had a ghost wrangler helping me out.

Either way it works!

Okay enough rambles... Carry on...