Archive for April 2016
Overwhelmingly Loved
I am living a charmed life lately. Really. It’s a bit overwhelming. How do you adequately thank someone for loving you?
Pequenita has been dishing out so much affection for me that I am almost feeling smothered by her. At the same time, who can resist the charm of a cat who repeatedly seeks a perch somewhere on top of you?
She can be so insistent for attention when I get home from work that I have to pick her up to protect my legs from becoming her scratching post. If I make the mistake of choosing to lay down with her for a few minutes at that hour of the day, I usually become the victim of an unplanned nap.
She oftentimes finds a suitable spot on my legs and joins me for a snooze.
My lovely wife has been spoiling me with extra special attention by choosing healthy options for my goal of eating a reduced sugar diet, and tweaking her bread recipes to incorporate more diverse grains with extra substance. Lately I have a thing for millet in bread, along with a fondness for wheat berry and sunflower nuts, in addition to the usual whole grains.
Yesterday, Cyndie nailed it with a couple of excellent loaves, hot out of the oven at dinner time, while she was simultaneously whipping up some fresh homemade pasta to serve as a base under her delectable leftover beef bourguignon that was recently pulled from the freezer.
It certainly feels like being loved, to be fed like that.
My mom gave Cyndie some special training on how to make the bread I grew up with. Talk about love!
Last night, while looking at the beautiful loaves she created, I suddenly noticed an insight about how my father must have felt about the bread mom baked for him throughout their life together. Mom told us stories about how she first learned to bake bread when they were newlyweds stationed in a fire lookout tower in Glacier National Park.
By the time I was born, over 10-years later, she had definitely mastered the craft. Her homemade bread was a staple in our kitchen. Dad was a stern scolder when we didn’t cut straight slices. We toasted it and fried it, and I recall Dad used a slice to soak up the juice on the meat platter when the menu involved steak.
My parents weren’t very demonstrative of their love, but looking back, those years of homemade bread reveal a pretty good version of it.
Now I am blessed with the same. It is overwhelmingly lovely.
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Much Improved
One of the first things I notice when I come up our driveway is how the temporary fence around the arena space is holding up. I’ve figured out that it is in a spot that is particularly prone to a beating on windy days. Logic would suggest we could solve that issue with a permanent fence, but we aren’t ready for that level of commitment yet. This location is growing on us, but it was far from a certain thing when we chose to mark off the dimensions.
It was refreshing to discover Sunday that we could fix, and even improve the current set up without needing to spend a lot of money. We already had most of what was needed to accomplish adding better anchor posts and getting it connected to the existing electric fence.
Now I don’t need to use the solar-powered fence charger that the horses had taken a liking to nibbling on last fall, and I can still keep them from messing with the plastic posts.
I pulled the webbing tight when I finished on Sunday, and it was still looking great when I got home yesterday, despite a reasonable breeze.
Now all it needs is Cyndie and a horse out there doing some dressage routines.
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Green Alley
I didn’t start the day Sunday with a plan to spend the entire day reworking the fencing around our arena space, but that is pretty much how it played out. We thought we were going to make a run to purchase parts that would allow us to finish the new divider fence in the back pasture. After that, we hoped to take a crack at turning some brush piles into wood chips for our trails.
Instead, I started fixing the sad-looking step-in posts we had used to mark out space for an arena, most of which were heavily battered by wind and soft spring soil. That spawned an idea to also put up the short barriers to the hay-field. This creates an alley between the paddock and the arena space, which we can then give the horses access to, saving me the chore of needing to mow it.
The grass in that space is actually further along than in the back pasture, so we adjusted plans and focussed on getting that space ready first. While I toiled away on details to electrify all the new fence webbing, Cyndie made the run for parts that would allow us to finish both the pasture divider and the arena area.
When she got back and I had the barriers done on each end of the alley, we decided to give the horses their first few minutes on fresh grass right then and there, while we finished up a few details on the arena fence. They stepped through the gate in a very mannerly way, spending a few minutes nibbling the first blades available. In no time, they were wandering well into the space, Legacy hanging close to us, and the three chestnuts moving the other direction.
We needed to limit their time on the grass, which involves the challenge of asking them to go back into the paddock. That’s not always easy, but they demonstrated impeccable self-control last night and headed back inside of their own accord, when Cyndie was preparing to set out their evening feed.
Of course, they subsequently showed great interest in both of the main gates we tend to leave open for them later in the season. They were cooperative about coming in, but they were obviously interested in getting back out again soon. They’ll get that chance today, and for twice the time. We add 15-minutes a day during their transition times onto spring grass, up to about 4-hours. At that point, we can leave the gates open all the time, allowing them free choice all day and night.
Lucky for them, the alley grass is plenty green and growing fast, so they have that to start with while we wait for the back pasture to catch up.
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Anxiously Waiting
We knocked off a good number of satisfying chores yesterday, taking full advantage of perfectly summer-like weather. In fact, it was so summery, I found myself mowing grass. We also put fence posts in to split our back pasture, so we will be able to rotate the horses back and forth, allowing us to provide the turf occasional rest from the voracious foursome.
The herd spent most of the day lined up at the gate, anxiously awaiting access to the new green smorgasbord that is sprouting beyond the confines of their paddock. Cyndie captured a wonderful shot of them eyeing her as she walked past, sending their message of bewilderment over being neglected all this time.
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They won’t have too much longer to wait. We have shut them in for a few weeks to give the grass a head start, protecting it from both their heavy hooves while it’s wet, and their devouring ways.
While I was getting machines prepared for the day’s work, Cyndie drove the truck down to one of the older rock piles at the edge of our woods and selected perfect specimens to create a border for a new native wild flower garden that she is creating in the spot where we recently removed all the old barbed wire, stump, and brush.
Visitors will be greeted by a colorful splendor as it comes into view over the crest of the first rise in our driveway.
Cyndie has some of her own anxious waiting to do, for her vision of new growing flowers to become established and in full bloom on this wonderful spot she is creating.
It seemed like more additional work than I saw a need for, but once again, her ability to make things happen is bringing about another enhancement to Wintervale that will add even more charm to an already precious place.
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A Spell
When I experienced a brief period of mishaps yesterday, it brought to mind having “one of those days.” It also had me wondering about the possibility of a TIA or some other medical malady. Mostly, I felt a sensation of being under a spell that temporarily had me not fully in control of my usual faculties.
It started as I was about to leave work. I think I was tired. I had my car keys in my hand, along with my wallet and an envelope, as I reached to grab the strap of my lunch bag. With a gesture that pretty much made it look completely intentional, the keys flew out of my hand and landed on the back corner of my desk, then slid down to the floor, settling in the most difficult to reach spot possible.
I had to get down on my hands and knees and crawl under my desk in order to stretch my arm to the limit so I could retrieve them. It wasn’t all that difficult, but seemed significantly so when factoring in the feeling of embarrassment over having “dropped” them with such purposeful gusto.
I barely made it out the door when I realized I still had on my reading glasses, which I normally keep in my desk drawer. One fluster led to the next. The second time I walked outside, I pressed the key fob and accidentally set off my car alarm. Upon starting the car, I prepared to back out of the parking spot, except I had put the car in “Drive” and it rocked forward.
I thought these things were supposed to come in threes.
On the drive home, I discovered my phone had slipped from a side pocket in my pants. While feeling for it on, and beside the seat, I knocked it out of reach to the floor below. When I later stopped to pick up some tools, I forgot about the phone on the floor and went inside without it. Too bad I needed it to check with Cyndie about a purchase.
At the checkout station, I tried using my new bank card with the chip in it, but failed multiple times because I didn’t know what I was doing. You don’t swipe these cards, you insert them into a reader. While messing with that, with my wallet in my hand, I turned the wallet upside down and dumped my license and medical cards all over the floor.
It was beginning to make me feel like I was having one of those days.
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Old Fence
Here are a couple more images from that old barbed wire fence that got swallowed by a tree.
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Scarlet Elfcup
Cyndie caught a moment of nature’s colorful glory that has sprouted on our property. The first time I walked past this gem, I paused with the intent of picking up what I thought was something manufactured that had blown onto our land. It displayed such an artificial intensity of red, that I automatically assumed it must be trash.
A little research turned up the likely identity as sarcoscypha austriaca.
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Brake Lesson
It was another one of those days when I started with one thing in mind, and quickly ended up with a whole new project demanding attention. Starting with a goal of filling another low spot by using old hay bales that have some mold and the composted manure and bedding from the barn, we were going to use the Grizzly ATV.
Before using the Griz, I needed to remove the plow blade and change the tires to the less aggressive summer tread. I pushed the button to extend the cable so I could disconnect it from the plow, but nothing happened.
Hmm. It worked last time I used it, …about 2 months ago. Oh well, that was easy to work around. Next, I jacked up the Grizzly and removed the front tires. That’s when I noticed one of the brakes wouldn’t release. I have never done any work with disc brakes. The only things I know about brakes are the words, caliper, brake pad, and brake fluid.
I called George for advice. At dinner on Thursday, he described the work he was doing on a tractor he recently bought, which reflected just the kind of skills my new problem needed. With him giving me the confidence to start removing bolts, we started analyzing the situation.
There is definitely a problem with the right brake not releasing. Unfortunately, there is also a problem with the caliper slider pins being seized in place. The left side wasn’t much better, but at least we were able to get the pins out. That revealed the pads were definitely in need of replacement.
With George’s help, I now have a good idea of what needs to be done. All I have to do is find a way to break the corrosion bond in the right brake so I can get the dang thing apart.
Freeing corroded bolts seems to be a theme developing with this machine. If I can win that battle, this will be a chance for me to finally learn the nuances of working on hydraulic disc brakes.
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Relative Something 