Pony, horse, cat

Well the pony is still here. He was supposed to be picked up yesterday but now we have no idea. They say they'll call first and I hope so, but since I cannot count on it I feel the need to stick around and wait. Since the horses are not on the big field, I'm giving them hay. Just like he goes thru water, he has been consuming the hay with alacrity. He hoovered thru half a bale in half a day! In this photo he is getting the last bits out of his morning mash bucket.

A nice visit

The terrier lady and her husband (and terrier) came by and we had a nice chat. I told them about the companion pony who isn't working out very well. She said, "Those two never get close - they keep their distance from each other!" I find it interesting that she noticed that. I told her that the owner bought medicine for his skin condition but for some unknown reason they have not applied it to their horse nor brought over a blanket to keep him dry. I said it's unbelievable to me that someone knows their horse has a problem, and does not treat it. The lady said, "I don't go to church, but I know right from wrong and that is wrong!" : ) We really need to talk to them when they come get him.

Inevitable

Not only am I being attacked by fireants when I do gardening, they have moved in to our house. Good thing my man insisted we buy some good ant killer recently. And good thing they're nowhere near the bedroom or kitchen. It's inevitable, isn't it? Living in the country, eventually you have insect infestations in your home. I keep a very tidy house (I have no job) so I don't think this is a hygiene issue. We'd recently poisoned a nest on the other side of this wall (outside), and now we have dead ones and half-alive ones INSIDE the wall, in our living room. Now I'm thinking maybe we killed too many spiders, and that is why the ants moved in. Additionally, my man's mom removed 5 wasp nests from an upstairs roof window last week. I'll never open that window again, no way!

Baasha

He's somehow calmer these last two days. I brought him in to the stall to groom him and my man noticed, "He's not freaking out." I said, "Yah, maybe it's the fact that he can hear the pony screaming constantly down there. Or maybe he's just learned that he will only be here as long as it takes him to eat his breakfast." See his expression in this photo, I hadn't seen it in a while. Completely calm, and in tune with me (Oh, but he tried his best to hide from the camera, this was one of the only photos with him not turning away from it! I think I got him in the eyes with the flash one too many times! Sorry!!). How is it that a horse 8 inches shorter than him has a halter too big for him?

But he's been affectionate with me these last few days, and not paranoid about where the pony is. Of course, if we take the pony out, Baasha goes nuts. Being left is always harder than leaving.

Don't get any thinner than this, Baasha, before Winter. Until the field is baled and gone, he will be getting hay every day. The last few weeks they'd done well on just grass. I like his body condition and tape him constantly: )

Poor Baasha is itchy all over and very gently tries to rub himself on me, getting closer and closer as I groom, almost stepping on me! This is new. He even rubbed his ear on my arm today.

I'm worried about his skin too now, and the rainrot patch is falling off. I try not to touch it cuz I don't want it on myself (I wash myself up to the elbow after I touch either horse now.) I will be giving him a full on Betadine bath as soon as we have good weather and the pony is gone. This is a photo of rain rot in August. I'd never heard of such a thing, outside of Hawaii.

But in general, now, we call him "Low-Impact Baasha"now after seeing the difference. I had no idea how gentle Baasha was on his environment until now. He doesn't chew or rub on fences, he doesn't make mud by pacing, and he doesn't drip water out of his mouth, *lol*

Hope

I was hoping so much to have corn this year, and then miraculously and suddenly boom, we have corn ears! The precious golden hair appeared so suddenly I did a little dance. Do you know how much an ear of corn costs here? 2 euros. Packaged all up like it came from far overseas, who knows, I'm not buying it! I remember on Oregon's beach last year, I bought corn 8 for a dollar.

Now I'm a corn farmer. Call me Lyle.*

* Lyle was my online identity anytime I needed to be a guy (to keep guys from being interested in me - hey, it worked).

21:24

As I type this, Carsten finally arrived in his tractor. Sometimes they mow hay at night - never here until now. I can hear and smell it as I type this - mmmmm another crop going into the local economy, and more free hay for us this Winter, woo! That tractor is loud for this time of night, but the neighbors are used to it. The pony is not - he neighed a few times and snorted at me when I tried to console him. Apparently he isn't used to hay being mowed right next to him. Baasha has never shown fear of vehicles of any kind (now piles of dirt/rocks, those are worth running from!).

The field doesn't look long enough to mow, does it? But mowing now is way better than not, cuz last year we had no second cutting, and our field grew and grew until even the 280 sheep couldn't make a dent in it, and then it all fell over dead in winter, and then after 3 months of snow, it looked like crap. I have our shepherd on the line waiting for access. His sheep will have better grazing this winter, I hope. (I also hope they do not rub so much on our Tposts....)

Mercer

She was NQR today. I don't know what it was, she acted sleepy at the wrong times, and squinty, and she slept in a hiding place that took me forever to find. I was so worried I called the vet right away (and I could tell my husband was scared too, from the tone of his voice when he said "Take her to the vet"). The vet told me to just watch her and bring her in tomorrow if she's not better. Her appetite is good, she's begging for food, and she's actually purring and wanting affection, which is odd for her. Since when does lovey mean sick?

I ran to my man's office and said, "She could be pregnant." He said, "Well then I guess that means she's not neutered." "No, I guess that would confirm that.": ) She kept squinting at me and I said, "Look, I don't want a husband, a horse, AND a cat with eye issues!" (My husband ran into a branch in Munich and went through months of pain from a scratched cornea. My horse, well, you all know about his horrible eye thing.) Believe it or not, in this photo she was perfectly fine, it was just really hot out that day and she felt the best place to cool down was my flower bed. Covering her eyes with her paws just seemed to fit with this blog entry. I did not like finding her there, it was too similar to finding Lander dead - it was the first time I'd ever seen her lie down outside, and I freaked out for a moment.

In this photo, you can see that my cat has claimed my chair. I have to stand now. As I type this, she's on the window sill looking out for the terrier lady's tomcat. I know there is something going on, which is why Mercer has a curfew now. She gets dinner and house arrest til morning. This is because they fight, and I'm not sure it's flirting, it sounds serious. Scared of when she finally gets her driver's license...

3 days and counting

I have my first guests from America arriving. I sure hope they don't mind fire ants and wasps. But they're horse ladies so I think they are used to stuff like that. This photo has nothing to do with this topic, I just wanted to show you how my man is training Baasha for a halter class with carrots.