Close Meditations of a Visual Kind

Monday past, since I didn't go to Tioga Town Centre Farmers/Craft Market, got out to feed our critters on Evening Rounds early enough to find this.

( Pot O' Gold )

Model is Autumn Sage.

Sometimes you wake up and wonder what happened, what was it that woke you. Particularly if it's quiet still, you wonder, was there one big loud noise now nothing? Houdini woke me around 03:30-ish and I knew the weather would be getting interesting. Not long after he woke me the rain started, and at first that's all we got. Then the thunder kicked in.

Stayed there in bed for a bit, giving him calm strokes. He did fine with that until Herself woke up too, then he got up to go sit with her at the water closet. After that, according to Houdini, time to be up arrived. So we got up and Herself started the coffee. A true power Blip raised our eyebrows, but coffee got made without any interruption in electrical service, and the biggest problem proved to be heavy enough rain that the Sky TV received no signal. Instead of watching the Weather Channel, we watched previously recorded material... and checked the Weather Channel on our iPhones while we sat there. Oh Look, we'd say, and show each other the newest weather map update during a lightning flash.

It slowed down to steady rain by the time I needed to leave for my doctor's appointment this morning, follow up with a urologist to see if regular visits will keep Mr. Stone(s) away. Heading down the private road, the Horses stood in the drive by their feed barrels. They're not supposed to be there. They're supposed to be in their paddock, so something happened. They stood calmly as I drove by, and I stopped to close the gate behind me. Then I looked about and saw the spot of fence down, posts pushed over. Most likely, I though, Someone (Stormy) was reaching across the fence to graze grass on the other side. Someone might have been spooked by the weather, though. Texted Herself to let her know.

Drove slow along the road and scoped out that fence line, then pulled off the road by our east side to see what I could see along the east fence line. Didn't see anything else down. Answered the phone while sitting there, Herself Calling, getting some details about what I'd seen and what it looked like. Then continued on into town for appointment.

Got a bit of a shopping list sent to me later. Antibiotic spray and leg wraps for Stormy. Sage also received a couple small wounds, but Stormy obviously got her front legs a bit tangled in the fence wire, a couple of small evulsion injuries on one leg and some punctures on the other. Halters on, lead line on, and in turn they stood while I held them and Herself washed and dressed the wounds. They are her horses, don't you ever forget that now. But for some reason they stand and hold a bit better when I'm holding the line and talking to them...

Fence patched, needs more maintenance. And of course this happens when I'm on a stretch of weekend shifts, and prepping for an out of town event. The fence is patched. It should hold them in. It does need some maintenance. Then again, we put it in some (mumbly mumble) years ago. Bit of a story, that. Not for today.

Good news from the urologist. No stones, no indication of any stones, blood work indicates no changes so what we did do to change things six months back seems to be working. We'll keep doing that.

Also stopped on the way home to pick up the last pre-cut mats I need to finish matting for the Necronomicon show. Then bag and tag, and we'll be good to go.

Exciting, not so much.

Oh, and Happy Canadian Thanksgiving, eh?

( Hotai and Teh Horses )

Hotai (well, at least the statue) was a gift from a couple of friends when we offered Teh Ranch as a place to spread the ashes of one of their dogs. Luger had established a relationship with Hotai, having mistaken him for an intruder one day... then ever after going and spending part of the day with his buddy Hotai.

Today's post is from the archives because getting home, there were some chores to do (ranch maintenance) and the current round of kids to feed. Dinner this evening is fishy... salmon, specifically. We've locked the Otterz Mob into Studio for our own peace of mind.

Installation of TurboTax took 1 hour 30 minutes. Most of which was the search for, downloading, and intallation of the "updates" since the CD was made and shipped. And that on a high-speed Internet connection. Oh, I just lerves me some software bloat, I does. Software bloat: the Microshaft Virus.

Herself is off to a local SCA horse-related event. Those as attend, with horses, will be qualifying to partake in medieval re-creation equestrian events at the upcoming Gulf Wars. Possibly I will be driving over and photographing some things, as a day trip. Then again, possibly not. I've the Ranch Critters watch, and there are things I really, really want to see done around the house. They are hiking up on my annoyance value list as something which, when done, will help make life more pleasant.

We'll see. One reason for going to the event is could I partake of Roast Hogge, one of the two which we ... hmm, didn't mention that here. OK, brief aside, for those of my LJ readers/friends who may be vegetarian/vegan or simply feel strongly about animal rights. I am a rancher. We raise livestock, and I've been known to say these animals are not pets, they are shares in the "live stock" market. I, too, believe in animal rights; my animals have a right to a healthy environment, to be protected from predators (wild and domestic), to not be abused. We raise our animals essentially "organically", meaning we know what they are being fed, there are no pharmaceutical supplements in the feed (steroids or antibiotics), there are no animal by-products in the feed, and much of what they eat is natural range which grows on our ranch. They do receive pharmaceutical supplements if and when they need them because of their health, and only so long as they need them for that reason.

And as I said, they are not pets. I believe in taking care of them well, because, well, "Gglückliche Schweine sind geschmackvolle Schweine." And on Monday two of them became "geschmackvolle Schweine." Past this date, if there's any discussion about such more... earthy ... aspects of our owning the Ranch, I will put up a notice and a cut. If this aspect of my life is distasteful to you, I understand and accept that.

It will not change the fact, though, that one of the reasons for me going to this event will be to partake of some "geschmackvolle Schweine" prepared by a cook who prides herself on her ability to do true medieval period recipes and have them be very tasty. In this case, very tasty pig. Meanwhile, it's time to go take care of those critters.

Herself and I went on a date last night. Now, some folk might not consider tis a particularly romantic date, but that's their issue. We've got a history of this kind of date. In fact, our very first date involved the basic concept.

We went to a tack auction, over near Anthony, at a place which does this monthly. Friday evening is the tack and other horse care supplies night, Saturday is horses themselves, and Sunday is "Leftovers" whether it's tack, supplies, or horses. Matters not whether you think this is romantic, Herself rather enjoys it when I take her out to things like this. You could say, "shopping."

The gathering starts around 19:00, and the auction starts shortly after 19:30, Southern Local Time. Additional supplies available for auction included grooming tools, feed and water buckets, riding crops (we picked up three; I'm not planning on using any with a horse, there's other places in mind), lunge lines and leads (we did pick up two leads), bits, bridles, halters, headstalls (we picked up some odds and ends of these), stock whips, lunging whips, saddle and horn bags, leather tools, and the odds and ends of horse-related trivia like a truly ugly table lamp made from a pair of old western boots.

Around 30 or so saddles, ranging from pony saddles through fairly big horse western, and a few english. Mostly these are used saddles, some of them more used than others. At least last night, all of them were in fairly good condition. The pony saddles are rather cute; looked at from one point of view they could be considered "scale model" saddles.

Now, I've not ridden a horse for years, and I've still got to measure myself for a saddle, or measure a saddle for myself. Whatever, I don't yet know what will constitute a comfortable saddle for me, other than general principles gleaned from reading. To whit, when sitting there should be one hand width between the base of the horn on a western saddle and my crotch (to put it bluntly), plus some things about how the saddle should fit your horse. And saddles, even used, do not qualify as an inexpensive purchase, particularly one which is still in usable condition, though an auction is a good place to get one fairly economically. Since I've not measured this out yet, I'd no intention of buying a saddle yet.

Herself, it seems, did. Here's what happened.

The saddles are the last thing on the auction agenda. After all, they are the big ticket item here. And inevitably, there's some of those miscellaneous care and tack items left over, things which people decided they:

A: didn't need
B: didn't want
C: know that eventually something like this is going to happen.

Maybe between a half-dozen and a dozen saddles had been auctioned, singly or in pairs. Sometimes what would happen is two-three saddles would be set out, and the highest bidders would get their choice of the three in turn. Sort of a Dutch auction, but not exactly as I am under the impression that, say you bid $150 and I bid $125 for a pair, you'd get the pick first, and we would each pay our bid for what we got.

So there's two saddles out on racks. Then the auctioneer announces it's a Miscellany Pile auction and staff start piling brushes, hay bags, leads, and such leftovers from the earlier auctions into a pile in front of the saddles. Says I, "Myself, could be an interesting auction."

Now the bidding is going up slowly but steadily. Now one of the staff picks up another saddle, and drops that on the pile. Says I, "Myself, this is going to be an interesting auction." Bidding picks up a little, but not much. So this guy picks up another saddle and drops it onto the pile (four saddles in the auction now, winner takes all), and Herself starts bidding at ... wait for this ... $250. Right. $250 is all the bidding is up to by this point, for four saddles and a pile of miscellaneous horse care and tack supplies.

Bidding picks up seriously at this point, and when it actually starts to slow down around $500 (with, I might add, Herself the top bidder), this guy drops another saddle onto the pile. Just like kerosene on a fire, things heat up again with the bids bouncing back and forth between four people. One of them drops off when the bid reaches $750, but the three still in the bidding keep it going on up to $890 and it's down to two bidders. The bid is going up still, but in small amounts of $5 - $10, and the guy drops a sixth saddle onto the pile and they'll add in one of the folding racks the saddles' are displayed on for auction.

In short order and bid jumps of $25 - $50, we're up to an even grand. One Thousand Dollars will take home six saddles, one folding rack, and a pile of other small stuff. Other Bidder keeps trying to call it at $1000, but the auctioneer keeps reminding them that Herself bid that before they did. If the auction is to keep going, they need to bid $1025. No going on this. $1020. Nope. $1020? Nope. $1015? Nope.

Sold at $1000.

Look at it this way. If there's one saddle in that batch that fits me, and the other five are re-sold at $200 each (not an unreasonable amount, as I said while used all of the saddles auctioned are in usable shape, and these six are in fairly good to very good condition), the pile of miscellany and that saddle are... free. Paid for. Or, if there's one saddle that fits Herself, and that she likes better than the one she's currently got, it's a swap, and the same conditions apply.

And it's amazing how many saddles one can fit into a Subaru Outback, eh? Along with two piles of miscellany, one we assembled, and one the auctioneer assembled for us, and a saddle rack.

I've now taken an opportunity for a face-to-face meeting with Sage. She's about four years old, supposed to be a quarter horse but looks to have some thouroughbred in her. She's decided I do good ear scritching, and I provide nice treats as well as food. Wait 'til I start bringing her carrots and apples. *G*

We did get a chance to meet this morning; on my way out she was by the fence alongside our private road, and I paused to talk to her out of the car window. But it was early, and foggy, and I also needed to get on down the road to Hospital. They're funny about that, want you to actually be there and work in order to pay you.

Our neighbor's son, T, has a horse in her pasture that adjoins our property, and Sage & Him have been getting to know each other on opposite sides of that fence. Still, she did come trotting over for evening meal.

Pretty gait.

Now remember, this is Ruthie's horse.