Archive for December 2013
Why Now?
Of all the possible times for this problem to occur, the week before Christmas while we are hosting a family of guests from out-of-town, seems a bit like unnecessary roughness to me. We awoke on the second day of the visit by our friends from Guatemala to discover that one of our windows had spontaneously fractured. Unfortunately, it is the window above the Christmas tree, one of two that adorn each side of the fireplace up at the second level facing the back hill.
It is the inside panel of the double pane window. It created a beautiful pattern that has a certain similarity to a pair of wings, but otherwise it’s a total nuisance, sprinkling glass dust, flakes, and shards of lethal sharpness on everything below.
I called the service number for Andersen Windows and was told I needed to look in the corner of the window to find their manufacturing information etched into the glass. Up the ladder I went, camera in hand. Back and forth our communication commenced as I followed their instructions, sending them pictures of what I found. No surprise to me, they said it is out of warranty.
The most exciting part was, trying to pull the trim off without bringing the whole pane crashing down. As I timidly hammered a chisel to get under the wood, pieces of glass continued to fall. Very unnerving. Luckily, our friend, Marco, suggested I put some tape on the window. I would have thought of that at the moment all the pieces let loose and came crashing down.
Instead of thinking of the tape, my mind was busy hanging a tarp under the window to protect the Christmas tree from falling glass.
At least I now have something special to put on my Christmas wish list: we need a new window!
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More Everything
Yesterday was a fantastic day filled with a little of everything that caught our fancy the day before, and more.
Waffles window horses snow sledding fire iPhone camera photos Delilah music guitars mandolin walking sunshine rainbow labyrinth cloud jump turn shovel more snow burn campfire cookout hot chocolate wood smoke bratwurst book nap shower hay feed horses drive truck Guitar Center shop more shop laughter love sounds essence energy burgers Five Guys snow cold not cold slideshow home together bonding growing being loving knowing up late planning showing calm quiet wind down sleep soon to do all and more again. 
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Leading Legacy
I have devised a way to check whether you are aging, or not. It is nothing particularly complicated, even though the subject in and of itself can often be ridiculously complicated. It doesn’t hurt to have the availability of someone approximately 40-years younger than you to aid in setting up for this check, but it’s probably not required.
All you have to do is go outside and engage in routine outdoor winter activities like you have done your entire life without difficulty. Next, go back inside and sit down for period of time, something along the lines of how long it would take to eat dinner. At this point, you should be well prepared to run the aging check. Simply attempt to move your body from one place to another. If you have lost the ability to move, that is a strong indicator that you have aged.
Much of the day yesterday can be described as being an acclimatization day for our guests. We had a pretty short night of rest on Tuesday evening and they had traveled all day long to get here, so they deserved a day of rest. We found a few activities to do in the snow and cold, but we also did some lounging inside, watching a movie, playing guitars, and doing some napping.
The back yard is now a series of sled runs that have been firming up all night. I expect that today will present the opportunity to crash into a few trees, as we test whether the sleds which resist being steered will follow the routes we have laid out.
Our animals seem quite pleased to have company giving them good attention. I have already learned some new skills for communicating to Legacy that although he is the “alpha” leader of the herd, he does not lead me. It was insightful, causing me to recognize where I have been neglecting to assert my authority and allowing him to behave in ways that might give him the wrong impression.
He tests his herd with some frequency, to communicate his dominance. One way he might do this is to chase them off their food. It seems like much ado about nothing to me, but the horses accept this message easily, and then just as quickly as the fracas starts, they all calmly return to eating. Message sent and received.
I have not had any such urge to chase Legacy off the food I just delivered for him to eat. It would be very horse-like of me if I did, to let him know that I am in charge. He wouldn’t hold a grudge. He would go right back to eating, message received.
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Got Company?
Our guests have arrived! Let the fun begin.
Delilah was so excited to meet them, she peed. We stayed up later last night than I have been awake for as long as I can remember. Did I even make it to midnight last New Years? I don’t think so. When we finally went to sleep, it was already this morning, that’s how late it was.
Temperatures should be mild today, so we will be able to give them a soft introduction to our northern version of winter.
That’s it. I don’t have time to write more. We’ve got company!
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Sloppy Surprise
There you go. Two days in a row, shoveling required. We received about 2 inches of powdery snow yesterday. Shoveling was easier to accomplish on Sunday, when I was home all day. I got very little of the snow cleared after work yesterday. First priority was cleaning off the front steps and walkway, then I was off to feed horses before they grew testy. Last to come was rescuing Delilah from the confines of her outdoor kennel.
I know she means well, but she caused me some real pain that I never saw coming. At this point, I don’t even recall what I was doing as I bent over in the fading daylight inside the kennel with her. I was either fussing with her leash, or picking up her water dish, which had frozen around the edges. Of course, she is always overly excited to see us after being alone all day, so she jumps on us and does circles around us as we put things in order before opening the gate to set her free.
When I walk toward her doghouse in the back end of the kennel, she runs away to the door, and runs back to me, as if she believes I must have gotten lost. Back and forth, round and round, up and down. I lost sight of her for a second yesterday, as I crouched down, and then it hit. BANG! She unleashed a sloppy wet tongue across my open eyeball. Yikes, that hurt!
That can’t be sanitary. I know people say that a dog’s mouth is cleaner than a person’s, but I have seen what she puts in her mouth. That adds sting to the sting.
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Anxiously Awaiting
We are absolutely thrilled to be just days away from the arrival of our friends from Guatemala, Dunia and Marco, and their sons, Marco and Jose. Cyndie was busy all day yesterday adorning our home with decorations of the season, and cleaning rooms to set up beds with her typically fabulous flair. When I wasn’t lending a hand indoors, I was out cleaning snow off the areas of the driveway that I didn’t hit when I plowed on Saturday, shoveling the deck, clearing a path to the woodshed, hauling wood to the rack by the house, packing the labyrinth path with snowshoes, and lastly, (this especially for Dunia and family…) making the first attempt to establish a path for a 2-turn bobsled run down the hill in our back yard.
I have visions of building up a big enough pile of snow just beyond the deck after a few more storms, so that eventually we can start from up on the deck! In order for that to work, we would need some really big banks of snow at those two turns, so there will be plenty of snow-construction we can work on when we aren’t off on some other local adventure.
My driveway plowing on Saturday turned into a bigger project than I planned. It was my second chance to practice maneuvering the Griz while moving snow. The ATV is working as well as I had hoped. I am learning some things about getting it to shift easily, and apparently becoming increasingly aggressive as I gain experience. I over-stressed the winch cable that lifts the plow blade and broke it, twice! Maybe I’m a slow learner since it happened a second time, but I guessed that the first break was due to the cable being old and weakened, so I didn’t change my behavior.
After I cut off the bad portion of the cable and re-clamped a fresh end, I figured it would be as strong as ever. When that broke almost immediately, I decided I must have been trying to lift the blade beyond its stop point. After applying the fix a second time, I paid a lot more attention to the process of lifting the blade, and as a result, had no more problems the rest of the way.
Now, with all the snow cleaned and ready to entertain guests, the forecast is predicting flurries tonight and snow showers tomorrow. The difference between the two main seasonal chores of mowing grass in summer and shoveling snow in winter is that you know after mowing that you have at least a week before needing to cut the grass again, but with shoveling, you just might have to start over again on the very next day. There’s no rest for the weary.
Usually, after a snow storm, we get smacked with extremely cold air, but since this is just a small system of passing showers, it looks like our daily high temperatures will be going up! As of now, Wednesday is predicted to reach a degree short of the melting point. That will make creating the large banked turns of the bobsled run as easy as baking a cake.
Dunia, Marco, and sons, we hope you are able to enjoy your day of travel tomorrow. We are looking forward to greeting you at the airport in the evening so we can whisk you away to our Wintervale wonderland where our creatures, great and small, are all looking forward to getting to know you.
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Truth
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it’s to the east
or to the west
up above
and down below
floating past
as if like time
because time does flow
like clouds
a vapor
time disappears
don’t you know
and laughter
and love
ah, but love
it’s always there
just like the truth
doesn’t always show
we know it exists
within our midst
the shape it takes
will come and go
there is winter time
and Christmas snow
then spring brings green
and snow must go
truth just is
and also love
this binds them both
so know this too
they outlast everything
that we can sew
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The Man
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Who’s da man?
Are you talkin’ to me?
Don’t mess with Legs. Check out his ears. He is listening in two directions at once. The man is always monitoring his environment. Some of the time it is to be on the lookout for outside threats to his herd. Most of the time it is the herd themselves, as he executes his ongoing demonstrations of dominance by dictating when they can move, where they should stand –or more accurately, where they shouldn’t stand– when they can eat, etc.
I enjoy watching him deftly adjust his body orientation to home in on an intended target by aiming his hind end directly at one of the other three while he pins his ears back. They might have been acting like they didn’t notice him, but when he assumes that position, their immediate reaction indicates they knew full well he was sending them a message.
I’d choose him for my squad, watching my back, any day.
He’s a righteous dude.
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Stinky Story
It has been a while since I put hours in at the day-job, and as a result, I have a fair backlog of stories to share that they haven’t heard regarding things that have happened at Wintervale. Yesterday, I was waxing eloquent on Delilah’s apparent preoccupation with wildlife scat and horse manure. As I spun my tales, I came to a funny story that I realized was worth posting here, and since I don’t recall having already written about it, I’m hoping I haven’t.
During the period that I was on leave, I worked on several outdoor projects that allowed me to grant Delilah the opportunity to roam freely, off-leash. She demonstrates such elation with being able to run free that it is a thrill to watch her, but since I would be trying to get some work done, there were times when I lost sight of where she was.
That was actually part of the training we have been working on. When we notice she seems to have disappeared, we call or whistle and she needs to return. Every time she does, she is rewarded with a treat or lavish affection, or both. Sometimes it takes a long time for her to return, long enough that I have usually grown frustrated and consider it a failed attempt. That presents a challenge, because she eventually does return, after all, and seems to expect a treat, but I’m reluctant because she didn’t come the first time I called.
Often times, when she doesn’t return immediately, it is because she has wandered off our property and is overly excited about exploring the unfamiliar territory of our neighbors. The plowed field just to our north is a particular favorite of hers. They weren’t able to plant any crop there last spring because it remained too wet for too long into the growing season. Instead, it became the place that our neighbor chose to dump fertilizer. He was putting some pretty stinky stuff on there from the local area dairy farms. I am pretty sure that is why Delilah likes it so much.
One damp day, after she eventually returned from a prolonged disappearance, she came back with what looked like muddy water soaking the fur around her head. It struck me as odd, because her head was dry, but I got the impression she had stuck her face into a puddle. I wondered how she could look wet around her face so thoroughly, but not show anything on her face or the top of her head. When she got close enough to me, I quickly discovered it wasn’t muddy water. She stunk something awful. There must have been a puddle of sewage up in that field somewhere.
It smelled so bad, I didn’t want to be near her. I went back to my project and hoped she would wear it off just by running through the grass, goofing off while I worked. Hours later, when Cyndie arrived home at the end of her work day, I had honestly forgotten about the mess Delilah had gotten into earlier. We all walked into the house through the front door together and Delilah jumped all over Cyndie and her nice suit, behaving like the over-excited puppy that she is, deliriously thrilled to have momma home.
“What is that smell?!” Cyndie choked.
Oops. The afternoon of activity had not done anything to get rid of the odor. It just served to dry the foul mixture into her fur. Delilah was marched right down to the tub for a good scrubbing.
Even after the bath, it seemed as though that stink lingered in her fur for a surprising amount of time. I imagine she was probably pretty proud about that.
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Just This
I am short time to write for today. Why am I short time? I have returned to putting in hours at the day-job. I have been unsuccessful in finding something closer to home, so I have returned to what I know and do best. Unfortunately it is an hour’s drive away from home. Fortunately, my return has been warmly and gratefully received.
In place of any words of wisdom, or descriptions of my follies, I will share another image from the batch I took at dusk just the other day. Here is Cayenne…
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Relative Something 