. Okay all you Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Atlanta, New York City etc, I know a "bad day" for you is when you go to a cocktail party and someone else is wearing a dress like yours or you find out that someone else is using your personal hair stylist and you hate the gabby broad who is puttin' some trash out on the streets about you or you break a nail as you get out of your limo to go to brunch with Mrs. Whoever. WELL........us Real Housewives of RURAL Missouri have our normal challenges too. I have had "Murphy's Law" hangin' out with me yesterday and want to share with you what "an imperfect day" looks like in the country.
Yesterday, I got up at...UGG...4:30am to go ridin' with a couple of buddies of mine. I haven't been ridin' in 3 months because of the heat. We finally decided to try and ride early to beat the heat. Ya....great idea but I didn't think so when that danged alarm went off. I had caught up my mare, Cory, the night before along with one of her buddies and put them in a small trap. (Def - small trap = small little section of pasture, fenced off with hot wire, in most cases). I have had trouble in the past catching Cory when I wanted to go ridin'. For some strange reason, I can approach her and love on her in the wide open pasture when I don't have a rope in my hand, BUT.......when I have a rope she takes off a runnin' and I spend from 20 minutes to 2 hours catching, cussing and threatening to do terrible things if I catch her. Hmm do you suppose she is trying to tell me something? Like, "Hey I don't want to haul your big butt up and down canyons and hills for most of the day only to get a stale carrot at the end of the day!."
Well, so I put her in a small trap with her friend to keep her entertained for the night and she would be easy to catch the next morning at 5am. The alarm goes off = BUZZ! Coffee = check, boots = check, neck scarf = check, ridin' bra = check, comfy cotton shirt = check, favorite ridin' jeans = check, spurs = check. Out to the pasture IN THE DARK and with a rope in my hand. The mares start trotting back and forth, running circles around me. They are both sorrel (red) and both a little fat so it is hard to tell them apart, especially in the dark. They ran and trotted and ran and trotted and I refused to get mad at 5am in the damn morning. Okay, got them cornered and figured out which one was Cory. Started to walk up to her when Sancie, her buddy, reared up and broke through the hot fence which opened into a big beautiful green, dark, not moonlit pasture. She took off and Cory stood for a moment, looked at me as if to say, "See ya later!" Well you know the rest of the story. Now my horse, my precious Cory, my, now, ex best buddy, is racing into the night, laughing all the way and I am without a horse for my ride. CRAP! Go wake up my poor happy sleeping husband. "Honey, Honey? Are all the gates closed around the big pasture? The mares broke through the little pasture and are in the big pasture and I am afraid if the gates aren't closed they will get into the hay pasture." A moan comes from under the CPAP mask and the next words I hear are - "A Honey, everything is just fine - go ridin' and have a good time." What a great husband, even at 5am. In reality, he can't remember if he shut the gates but he doesn't give a hoot and just tells me what I need to know to get me out of his room so he can go back to sleep. Do I know this? YUP but I want to believe him, so I go off with some peace of heart and will blame it on him if I come back and they are in the hay pasture.
Okay, I am not going to let this ruin my day so......I turn around and see Raindancer, my paint gelding (male horse with nuts cut off). "Here Raindancer, here Raindancer!" "Do you want to go with mommy today and have fun and get a carrot?" And he is saying, "Shit, here she comes and she wants me to haul her big butt around today when I am so enjoying this cool morning, crunching on this fresh grass, Shit!" Well he only has shoes on his front feet. They are supposed to have shoes on all feet to go ridin' but it's a long story so I won't bore you with the details and riding him with just two shoes will be fine where we are going. He is such a BIG, I mean BIG sweetheart. He is about 16.2 hands = that interprets to a long damn way down to the ground if you don't stay on top and this ole girl needs a step stool, a big log or rock to get on him.
GOTCHA!!!! Good boy, Rain. Okay, still dark, coffee in mug with fancy creamer in the truck and hot. Rolled flour tortilla with peanut butter, cut in half for lunch and stuffed in saddle bag along with gloves and knife and a bottle of gatorade. Everything loaded, horse loaded.......lights.....action and I put it in drive, grabbing my cell phone and trying to plug it in, opps! Windshield fogged over, turn on wipers, fogged on inside, turning on defogger and..................OH CRAP...........where did that damn tree come from......slam on brakes. I am not even off the ranch yet.. In all my early morning foggy confusion I drove up on the center lawn and was about to the end the life of my beautiful 12 foot silver maple. HA!
Okay dummy, pay attention, defog your windows, drive off the lawn and around the tree. Wonder what my husband will say when he gets up and sees the big tire tracks on the center lawn? Okay, open the gate with the remote........oh.....it's the remote is not working, of course. Maybe it doesn't function very well at 5:30 in the friggin' morning either.......so put the truck in park....get out and open the gate.
OKAY, now we're finally on our way. Wait a minute-----what is that RED LIGHT???? There is a red light shaped like a battery on the dash, blinking! Hmmmm I am going into the wilderness and if this light means trouble, I will be really unpopular if I have to call my husband to try and come find us when I am 60 miles away. OKAY....OKAY... turn around.....go back through the gate that won't open automatically like it is supposed to. Park the truck and trailer.......HONEY? HONEY? There is a funny red light on the dash. He groans, as only a tired husband can without cussing. He takes off his CPAP mask, puts on his slippers and undies and trudges......I mean trudges out into the cold dampness of 5:30am. "Well, it could be an alternator, but you can go ahead and go on today and I will look at it when you get home. "
Off I go, down the road, radio on and me sipping on my coffee with fancy creamer. No more troubles. I am runnning a little late but that's okay. Got to Jeannie's house across town. We loaded her saddle and tack (all the other stuff you need to ride a horse), her beer cooler, lunch, her big HUGE tankard filled with coffee and her horse, "Tomar". Shut the trailer doors, climb in the truck, turn the key and all I hear is = Errrr, Errrr, Errrrr, clickitty, clickitty, Errrr, Errrr. CRAP! The truck won't start.
Okay so we unload both horses, unload the saddles and tack and load everything into her truck and horse trailer and off we go. As we turn onto a road, the sun is coming up and very intense and shining straight into our eyes, so bright you can hardly see where you are going. There is something on the inside of the windshield which is preventing her from seeing the road. I roll down the window to keep her from driving off into a ditch. I find a neckerchief and try and clean it - there is some oily substance on the neckerchief which makes it worse. During this attempt, the big tankard of coffee Jeannie had set on the seat, turned over and spilled into my purse - RIGHT INTO MY PURSE - wallet, cell phone, tortilla/peanut butter sandwich .......YUP! Okay, I pour the coffee out of my purse, rescue the cell phone. It's okay. Set the tankard down on the floor between us as we limp towards the highway where the sun will be from a different direction and we will be able to see better. We continue down the road with me using a different wipe, trying to clean the windshield. It is clearing up. We turn onto the highway and...........the Jeannie's tankard of coffee, which didn't empty out all the way, NOW turns over and spills into her purse. YUP that's right. Ah...now it's empty.
I told Jeannie, I think God is trying to tell us we shouldn't go riding today. A few minutes later she notices her tank is running on empty. Conveniently there is a gas station at the next road. We turn into the gas station and gas up. Now we are an hour late to meet our friends, who are now on the trail and riding and the day is heating up fast. Jeannie looks at me and says, "God just doesn't want us to ride today, let''s go yard sailing".
I hesitated, about.....5 seconds and agreed. We turned around, went to Jeannie's unloaded the horses, took her other truck and went lookin' for yard sales and junk stores. Leavin' my dead truck and trailer behind, my horse in onen of her stalls in the barn. We found some good deals for stuff we didn't need, ate some great pizza and had a COLD beer. We arrived back to Jeannie's 4 hours later. I called my hubby and he directed me on how to jump my truck using Jeannie's truck. I hate jumper cables, they spark at ya and scare the heck out of me. Well, I did it and the truck started. I loaded ole' Raindancer and we headed off home. Everybody was happy. I got good deals for some great junk, Raindancer was happy because he got some good hay and got to flirt with a pretty mare.
NEXT DAY - Today
Going to try again, as a friend of mine is celebrating her birthday with a horse ride. SOOOOO up again at 4:15am. Coffee smells so good. I handcuffed, hog tied, bound up and tied down Cory in a barn stall so she would be there when I came to get her. Not really. I did put her in the barn with her favorite buddy, Denver! Denver is a 15 yr old UGLY (he is so ugly he is cute) buckskin mule. He is in love with Cory. They spent the night together in the stall. She was there when I went to get her and I am ready AGAIN. We put a battery charger on the truck the night before to recharge the batter. I put on my jeans, boots, spurs, favorite ridin' shirt. Got my frozen bottle of gatorade (it melts and is slushy by the time lunch rolls around), loaded my horse, unhooked the battery charger and hoped the truck would start. IT DID!!!!! Off I go......on time, no RED LIGHTS and runnin' smooth. As it grew lighter, I noticed it was overcast with dark clouds which looked threatening. Who cares! Arrived on time, picked up Jeannie, her husband and son and their horses and away we went. We were in the saddle by 7:30 and happy as little clams. We had a grand ride and I think the horses did too. We do spoil them with lots of carrots and rub downs. The butterflies were everywhere, the beautiful woods and vines were so green, the spring was running and thick with watercress (a delicious plant you can eat and put on salads and only found in fresh running streams). Cory is a Missouri Fox Trotter which means when she trots you don't bounce, it is so smooooooth. She is what they call a "gated" horse. We all ride gated horses so we were "gating" 1/2 the time and had a ball.
It was a glorious day! Thank you God.
FARM HOME REMEDIES: Recipe for cough syrup
This recipe is even safe for toddlers. Slice an onion very thin and alternate slices of onion and sugar. Place a bowl or plate on top of the layers and squish them down. Soon there will be juice forming which is very soothing for a cough. Best of all there are no medication side effects to worry about.
COUNTRY RECIPES: Mrs. Bleeker's Waffles
1 qt. of milk, a little sour if possible
butter - a piece the size of an egg
lard - a piece of lard the size of an egg
4 eggs
Mix well with flour enough to make a stiff batter. If the milk is a little sour, enough soda to cover a five-cent piece will be sufficient to raise the waffles; but if it is fresh, a teaspoonful of soda must be used. a teaspoon of salt,
Bake a quickly as possible (she doesn't give the the baking temp)
THANK YOU ALL FOR VISITING MY BLOG AND HOPE YOU ENJOYED IT AND CAME AWAY WITH A LITTLE SOMETHING.
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