Unfinished Business

 (I just checked my pO2 to see if this forgetfulness* of mine, which seems to be worsening here recently is related - I don’t think it is because my pO2 is 96 right now, oftentimes when I check in in the evenings after hard day’s work, it’s 93 or 94 but I can raise it to 95–96 with a little deep breathing)

* I sat down with my coffee after a brief scan of ye olde social media & then forgot my title, which to me is the most important part of getting my writing juices flowing

At any rate I guess I’m just fatigued - while I’m glad I went ahead & hauled home last night, again it was a lot of work & effort when, in the end we came in overtime. Ugh! At some point it will reach a point of diminishing returns, especially with diesel hovering close to $5/gallon - ouch!!! This translated into roughly $200 in fuel costs for our 500-mi haul. When I add up the fuel, the food, the horse motel stop we did Thursday night**, & our entry fees, this little weekend jaunt cost me just under $600 - that’s presuming the relief vet that I hired to hold down the fort for me Friday paid for herself (I’ll have to look at those figures mañana). At any rate, it’s only money ain’t it?!?

** it was “only” a 6-hr haul, so I decided to break up the trip Thursday by hauling roughly halfway, stopping at an RV park in East Texas which had a nice little rustic barn. I contemplated doing the same thing last night, but I’m glad Catie pressed me to come on home - she’s sleeping in this morning, but I’ve already got the trailer unhitched & the first load of laundry going

& now “the rest of the story” - we have not had a endurance ride in Louisiana for 20 years. At that prior event, I rode good ol’ Quigley, while Christina rode Zach’s awesome little red mule Midge. Midge powered on through, finishing just under the time limit but Quig & I got pulled for lameness. I also had Zack that weekend - at 7 yrs old, he was not quite ready to do a 55-miler so I just took he & his friend Willy so they could play & explore those piney woods… The trails are sandy loam with a lot of zigzagging in & out of creek beds, interspersed w/old railroad berms. These trails are shared with a dirt bike club, if that tells you anything about their technical nature - in other words, fairly tough!

So I’m proud of Twoie & Baraq for powering through yesterday - even more so of Catie, who was worried about doing 25 miles when she hasn’t ridden much recently! (She did great, fueling up on milk & cookies during our break) I’m going to finish my coffee & go generate some breakfast for us; we’ll meet her mama at the clinic this afternoon to do the handover so she can take her bunnies home - I spayed & neutered a pair for her. Photos to follow!

In the meantime, let me see if I can post a video link of my friend Kathy’s -

https://fb.watch/FSyrU0ZOy-/?fs=e

 

Springing Forward

 (Which in my case is more like plodding wearily forward, but hey, at least I’m still moving!)

This spring time change always hits me much harder than “falling back”… I was at my long-anticipated Shanghai trail ride - purely a social event, not for any points or mileage. Still a lot of work & a lot of driving - I don’t know how much longer the benefits will outperform the wear n’ tear? It was great to see all my friends, not to mention my friend Tina was effusively thankful that I hauled dear ol’ Silas to be her mount. Silas himself was proud of being selected - he’s such a good, unassuming, quietly competent gelding! Mr Twoie performed admirably also - I don’t seem to be able to share the video clip of him leading the way across our last obstacle, the scary metal bridge! but I took a couple of screenshots that I will add later. Fearless Leader Cindy’s horse balked, her granddaughter’s did the same - dear Twoie sidestepped right around to pick up the lead.

And Saturday night, I saved a life when I almost stepped on a juvenile rat snake who had apparently gotten accidentally backed over in the driveway. He got a little “squished” with some head trauma & broken teeth but thank goodness it was mostly soft sand. I brought him home with me for treatment but I should be able to return him to his home turf at the end of this month when I go back for our endurance event at Pierce Ranch.

                                             The beautiful Pierce Ranch at sunrise

                                            The Dirty Dozen before our final obstacle (the metal bridge)

                                                   Cicero the Texas rat snake

Retail Therapy

 I am abashed to admit that I was not really looking forward to my “Girl’s Day Out” Saturday with my friend Janay & her daughter. Janay & I are fellow veterans of ye olde custody wars: we met as fellow victims of an unscrupulous custody evaluator who had a real axe to grind against mothers! (Out of a group of five, I was the only one who retained primary custody; his actions were truly unethical & horrifying) I’m thankful we were able to band together, file complaints, testify at a board hearing & get that man disqualified from performing custody evaluations…

Janay & I have stayed in touch; in many ways we continue to deal with the repercussions of our family implosions decades after-the-fact, trying to help our children as we handle our own issues. Are the kids all right? For now, things to be seem to be headed in the right direction.

Anyway we met for brunch & set off from there to go to good ol’ NorthPark Mall (Janay & I have such fond memories of this mall from our own childhoods; it was one of the first in the Metroplex!) & do some “retail therapy”. I bought some jewelry: a necklace & earring set for Ashley as she is retiring after 28 yrs of grooming dogs for me! We are having a big “clinic family” dinner Wednesday night so Dr M & her husband can attend. I was contemplating how “the joy is in the giving” as I also bought little stuffies for a couple of my employees’ kids & thank-you cards which I need to pass around. Then I came across these great thoughts from Dr Deb as I skimmed FB this morning:

I write because it is therapy for my brain and helps me make sense of what I see and do everyday and it helps me grow as a human.  I write because I have been there and done that and if my story helps someone not make the same mistakes I have made than it was worth the time to write.  I write because if we never share what we have learned then we are responsible for the future generation’s failures.  I write because then people can read or not read and hopefully if they do read they will open their mind up to consider what and why they do what they do and maybe learn from my mistakes or lessons.  I write in hopes that one day my children will read my writings and learn from my mistakes and not have to go through the same struggles and stupidity lessons.  I do not want to be doing the same things and acting the same way a year or five from now because growth is constant and if we never do any self inspection, we never grow and who wants that life?!

                                            The Three Muskateers juicing up!

                                              (I wish my baby would still hold hands w/ME ;-)

                                                       The stuffed toy

                                      A real nudibranch (Addyson really loves 'em)

Reassessment

 I know full well it’s flu season; Covid continues to circulate as I do my best to avoid “the crud”. Poor Peran was in the early stages of what Dr Val diagnoses as the flu (not that he’ll go to a clinic & be tested for anything!?!), while Victoria appeared to be in the final stages of her illness in Vegas. (Zach called me once while they were on their honeymoon, and I didn’t get to talk to them very long when I delivered Tyson back to his parents Monday night** but he didn’t mention any further complications secondary to illness?)

What’s more disturbing is the fact that, for whatever reason, Andy has determined that I am the source of all bad things?!? While Andy behaves like your prototypical irascible old Jewish guy, I have a soft spot in my heart for him because he reminds me of my ex’s stepfather, with elements of M’s adoptive father mixed in… Andy had a meltdown at Zach (fortunately none of his ire was directed MY way at that time!) Saturday night as we were trying to line up an Uber back to the Wynn hotel. Zach had called an Uber for he & Victoria (the newlyweds!!!) while Andy saw absolutely no reason we should not carpool. Peran escaped the chaos early on & set off to hike what was about 3/4 of a mile back, but I was tired, my knees & lower back hurt, & most of all I was worried about getting Adela safely back as her cane had disintegrated - she cannot afford to fall again. Everything had seemed to work out as Zach’s Uber was a big Suburban & we were all able to pile in…

I thought it had all worked out, but apparently Andy continues to hold some sort of grudge against me?!? He was texting me both Sunday night & Monday, asking about me bringing Tyson home - Adela was going over to their house to feed the cats (which was great, one less thing for me to worry about!). I assured him Tyson was fine & we were treating his ear infection besides - somehow the text messages darkened that Adela had gone to feed the cats, clean the house & do some laundry, but now she was sick in bed. I mentioned “the crud” going around, with Peran being sick & suddenly Andy accused me of wishing for “mission accomplished” if Victoria had been too sick to carry on?!? No, it didn’t make much sense - I will try to post the text string to see if it’s just me? But honestly I think it’s just more proof that text messaging is a horrible means of communication - you cannot infer humor, sarcasm or almost anything else!

(upon review, the flaw appears to be in my use of emojis - Andy was texting me over the course of a busy busy Monday, so at one point I sent a short string of emojis instead of a verbal reply: zany + ROFL in 2 iterations. Looks like I've fallen victim to that old canard that Boomers don't understand emojis! I wasn't "laughing" about the illness being spread around; nor was I pleased at the fact that poor Adela was sick - this was in reference to what I perceived as Andy's joke about it being some sort of "Texas tradition to pass around the crud"... Ai yi yi!)

** I drove up to Dallas to deliver Tyson Monday night - the hilarious thing is, Zach went to the back door of my car & Tyson growled & barked at him! Talk about not being able to infer meaning - I joked to Zach that Tyson had become a ladies’ man, but guess what? he didn’t reach in the back of my car to grab his leash! I got T out, he finally recognized daddy but seemed much happier to see Victoria. I wouldn’t take any chances with a big dumb 90-lb pitbull either 😳

Definitely my error came in the form of using those darn emojis; Andy thought I was amused at Adela's illness when those were in reference to "passing around the crud" as a Texas tradition... Oh well - our communication has gone dead silent so we shall se if he says anything on the next occasion that I see them (which probably won't be until the end of April for Victoria's BD)

Vegas Photo Dump

 (while I have been forbidden to post photos on social media, surely I can share a few w/y'all here!)

                                                      The majesty of Hoover Dam

                                                     Tina Fea Does Vegas :-)

Everything Everywhere All At Once II

 (I knew I had previously utilized this title; here’s Entry the First:)

https://endurovetssparkjourney.blogspot.com/2024/01/everything-everywhere-all-at-onc.html

It feels as if the weight o’ the world is upon me this morning, as I slump exhaustedly in my chair - trying to juice up for another busy day in the aftermath of getting the kiddos hitched…

“How was it?” everyone asks, as I admit there was a little drama (not on my end!!), but overall I think it worked out just fine. While Z & V had originally planned to just elope by themselves, somehow it metastasized into a party of 11: Peran & I, Victoria’s parents & grandparents, her dad’s buddy “Big Joe” & his wife, & last but not least, Z’s best man & former roommate Josef. As things seemed to be spiraling out of control last weekend - Z & V were understandably upset at the inclusion of Big Joe & his wife - I asked Z how I could help? He asked me to buy Josef an airline ticket, which I promptly did. We scooped Josef up on the way to the airport & folded him into our lil’ family group; he is another unofficial nephew after all! (Several people presumed that he was Zach’s brother)

Zach had been tied up at work in OKC all of last week & didn’t get home until Thursday night, so the bride & groom didn’t fly to Vegas until Friday. We had already booked our departure for Thurs, so Jo & I drove out to see Hoover Dam Friday morning - it was awesome as always! (Josef had never ventured out to behold it on his previous Vegas excursions) We met up Friday night for dinner (more minor drama as V’s grandparents felt excluded; of course they were since Z made a faux pas by failing to invite them?!?)) & were given our marching orders to meet at Z & V’s hotel (the Wynn) at 4 PM Saturday to board the party van that the Two Joes (V’s dad & Big Joe) had booked for the wedding party…

On Saturday, we passed the time by going to the Mob Museum which was interesting & informative - also jam-packed for their half-price "celebration" of the Valentine's Day massacre (NV residents were free, all else were half price). I picked Z up a copy of Frank Calabrese's book; he was there for Q & A's & to sign copies. Minor stress as we gathered our party together Sat afternoon, but in the end we all made it onto the van without a hitch. Elvis did his thang & we went back to the Strip for a couple more hours until our celebratory dinner at another fine dining establishment at the Fontainebleau.

Dear Tina Fea was an awesome lil' traveler; but she was so excited upon our return Sat night as she ran about & spun in circles that she made herself vomit! Good thing I had a few bites of leftover steak for her ;-)

And that, as they say, was that - we flew back on Sunday as the kids continue on their honeymoon to San Diego! I'll post some photos when technology cooperates & I have a few more free moments.

Disgruntled

 … is what best describes my mood this morning. Overlying (or underlying?) everything is my low-grade malaise as I recover from the crud that Misti shared with us all last week. 

My original plans to take Victoria out for a “dinner with the old married ladies” had to be scrapped with Misti being sick, Kristy tied up in her own family drama, & Amber having her own date-night plans, so I wound up just taking the kids out to dinner myself which was very nice - how can I refuse Mijo when he invites himself?!? On Saturday I laid low, fasting & drinking lots of vitamin C, & on Sunday I went for a short ride. Dear Tony will always be that glass half-empty kind of person - we had a challenge getting Katie-mule loaded, nor he did enjoy riding her! Yet he has invited himself to my next endurance event in two weeks - we should be able to just share Twoie: he’ll ride him on Saturday, I’ll pick up his reins Sunday… Go Twoie!!! Gotta make hay while the sun shines!

I was a little peeved that I did not get an invite to my trail-riding buddy’s Super Bowl party, makes me feel as if Val is fine for hitting up for free veterinary advice, but when push-comes-to-shove I’m out in the cold like the little match girl. In all likelihood, I would’ve declined the invite anyway since I don’t wanna expose anyone to my crud - but it would’ve been nice to have been asked…

Now I will sulk my way into a shower & get on with my Monday - I can’t believe my son’s wedding is less than a week away! I wrestled myself into my shapewear yesterday and pronounced it acceptable if not ideal…

Never miss an opportunity to see my kiddos; I only hope I didn't expose them to my crud!

I offered to loan Victoria these replica Jackie Kennedy pearls which were my grandma's; she loved collecting Franklin Mint's offerings! If Victoria really likes them, I'll probably gift them to her since I think I've worn them perhaps twice since my grandma's passing in 1999...

& here's another candidate for the "something borrowed" category: the hand-sewn wedding bell which Peran's mum made for me to carry along with my bouquet when we were married...