Red Headed Stepchild

A certain pointer is the rock star around here. 
But, in truth two dogs own my heart:  Cole and Jinx.  The most diametrically opposed personalities, one's idea of adventure is the other's definition of abuse.

 

Jinx, aka Roo, aka Roodley, is a rat terrier.  Roodleys are easily perturbed, shy and reclusive.  Their preferred habitat is a warm bed.

 

 

 

 

 

Once removed from native habitat, Roodleys can become timid and elusive.

 

This withdrawn species finds it difficult to make new friends. With coaxing, it can be accepting of camaraderie. A new boarder is with us for a few days.

 

 

 

This dog and I are on the same page, every day is a bad hair day for me.

 

 

The similarities to Don King had Jinx worried.

 

 

Combing it over didn't help.

 

 

Guess that doesn't work well in general.

 

 

One pink bow and Miss Christie Brinkley is ready for date night.

 

 

Va va va voom!

 

Not all creatures great and small are welcome in the house. 

 

 

At dusk, a young rat snake intercepted Cole and I as we made our way up the porch steps.  I barged in on my neighbors to show their granddaughter my catch.  I was given chicken pot pie to go, I suspect, in order to get me and the snake to get out of their house.  I think I'm onto something.  I wonder what else I can catch around suppertime tomorrow night! 

The snake was released unharmed, but much admired. 





















One Thing Leads to Another

Tuesday, my friend, my client, my favorite artist announced she was having a studio sale.  Nan Cunningham has given me some of my most cherished possessions:

A portrait of Angus, Bella and Axel.

You know who.

I tried to resist, I really did.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

When I saw this landscaped painting,

 I was taken back to my run with Cole in Abiquiu, New Mexico.  The land of impossible colors.



OK, Ansel Adams I am not, but the Abiquiu landscape was unearthly, no wonder Georgia O'Keefe established herself here. 
(Nor am I a good art photographer either, sorry!)
My new painting got me dreaming about running with Cole again.  The physiotherapist is confident that he'll be ready for a road trip in Sept/Oct.  I've put off this trip so often, that I'd almost given up hope. 
Time to drag out all the travel guides again. Rather than attempt to run 9 Northeastern states at a whirlwind pace, I'm focusing on heading directly back home to Canada.  Familiar forests are calling me.

Algonquin Park, Ontario.  'Tamaracks' by Tom Thomson.  Before his untimely death in 1917, Thomson helped lay the ground work down for Canada's most influential artistic movement embodied by the Group of Seven artists.

Nan's landscape painting brought this all back to me.

As a girl, my Dad introduced me to the beauty of Algonquin Park during a two week canoe trip.  30 years have elapsed.  Too long.  Homesick.
Unexplainable how art can stir the soul.  bring back memories. smells. feelings. joy.

Appetite, let's not forget appetite.

Pears, by Nan, now hang in my kitchen, inspiring me to spend a few hours creating supper.
Homegrown onions, garlic, my canned tomatoes, my venison and Rancho Gordo heirloom beans.  Cumin and chili powder and I'm off in epicurean bliss tonight. 

I grow some of my own dried beans, but lack the garden space to be totally self-reliant in that department.  Enter my latest book on heirloom beans, which connected me to Rancho Gordo, in California, my new online source of the best, I mean best, tasting beans.

Books will be my ruin, or the only reason a tornado won't be able to lift my house up off the ground!

Ageing Gracefully

I'd always hoped to confront age with dignity.  Apparently not the case.  I prefer to vacillate between feistiness, denial and sulking.

Feistiness:

I'm addicted to my sessions with my personal trainer...I've asked him to start doubling the length of the workouts. Ike has a closet full of torture equipment, I get positively giddy when he starts to rummage through it.  6:30 AM Friday morning, he pulled out boxing gloves.  By about Round 5, I was dizzy and ready to puke, but I didn't want to relinquish my gloves.  It's always a good workout, but it's a great one if I can push myself to the brink of upchucking. 
By 7 AM, out on the sidewalk, we were strapped together with bungees.  And no, it doesn't help to remind myself that I've paid to be cinched up in a harness and made a spectacle for traffic on University Drive.  His job:  keep me from moving forward.  My job:  drag +200 pound man, at a run.  Sometimes I ran in place, sometimes backwards.
An athletic young black man being forcibly dragged around by a middle aged white woman.  No telling what misinterpretations the passing commuters conjured!
If he put all his clients together, he'd have a team capable of plowing.  I do not jest.  I remember my Canadian history very well.  The Doukhobors were a Russian religious sect exiled to Western Canada.  They did not believe in using their 'brethren' (animals) as beasts of burden.  Their women were at the bottom of the totem pole.

 

 

 

Denial: 

 

A 1970's body can heal as quickly as a 1990's model.  Friday morning, I had pulled with all of my little Clydesdale heart, so much so that I had water blisters on my heels and my left calf was tight like a grapefruit had been inserted under my skin.  I hobbled through my jobs that day because Saturday would be better.  It was worse. 

I had a list a mile long of things to do around the farm over the weekend. 

The horses hooves were trimmed, odd jobs were done and I cut some firewood.

 

 

Big whoop.  Hardly the Warrior Weekend I had envisioned.  Enter the next phase.

 

Sulking:

 

I made yogurt, breads, salads, quiches and grazed from my perch on the couch or in bed.  A book in one hand and an ice pack for my calf in the other (unless one hand needed to be operating a spoon, then the ice pack was ditched). Pity party.

 

It's tough to sulk too much around here... with all the daylilies beginning to put on a show.

 

 

 

The hostas and I are wondering if our voracious slugs forgot to come out of hibernation.  Unblemished leaves this year!

 

 

Tough to sulk when my in-house comedians put on a show.

 

 

For weeks, my 20 pound Kung Fu master has been demonstrating his skills to Cole.

 

 

The Karate Kid is getting whipped by the new girl.

 

 

Sadie demonstrating the proper way to apply the choke hold.

 

 

Utter humiliation.

 

Sunday morning, I figured my calf couldn't possibly hurt any worse, so why not go for a short run.  See Part 2:  Denial.

 

 

It quickly dawned on me that taking a Lab for a run around the old Fisheries Unit may not have been wise.  Why run when you can swim? Alligator population in these ponds is unknown, therefore I said she couldn't swim.

 

 

She said she would.  Kind of hard to disagree when you've been dragged down onto your knees and you're grabbing reeds to keep from going all the way in.

 

 

"I'm leading."

"No, I am."

"You don't even know where you're going."

Chaperoning an old married couple for 4 miles.



Just Bragging

New gadgets and vegetables to brag about:

Tommy sizes up the competition.

A friend gave me a long term lease on her electric mower.  A new toy!  The ever expanding flower beds around here have turned a straight forward mowing job for Dr P into the obstacle course from Hell.  Isn't all that much grass left to cut, my wee wittle mower is fun to use!

The sauerkraut making process is messing with my sense of order.  To keep the 20 L crock at 65'F, I had to Jerry rig a cooler on its side with ice packs around the crock.  Only 6 more weeks of this to go.  The compost pile may get it, should my patience run out.

Onion harvest.

Potato harvest being coveted by lover of spherical flying objects.

Photo art by Kim

Cole has been hired by the vet school therapeutic clinic to help with an Open House demonstration next week.  Get his autograph now before the fame goes to his head!

Unplugged

Last week, the manufacturing division of Smith Enterprises attempted to depose its administrative director.  As it is a one man operation, such a coup is unfortunately impossible.  After rounds of schizophrenic negotiations, we've/I've agreed to moderate the work schedules.  Last four weeks of work has left me a little burned out -- like extra crispy. 

The support staff at home has been providing comic relief.

More than 6 months have passed since Cole's first surgery and we've never left the farm. Time to head to my refuge in Appalachia before I blow a gasket.
I have this great gig where I clean a vacation home in the mountains of North Carolina.  It's a four hour drive, but a world away. Another client kindly offered the same arrangement for the care of their beach condo, but I passed.  I'm not exaggerating when I say that you can't pay me to go to the beach. Leave me to my forests.

The trick to making the trek in 4 hours is to bisect Atlanta after 11 PM, when traffic has abated.  I hit the road Friday night and we were unpacked and asleep by 2 AM.  Up again at 5:30 because one must hit the popular trails early to avoid throngs of slow hikers.

 

The parking lot at Whiteside Mountain trailhead after we'd descended.  We were the third party here when we'd arrived.  Early bird gets the peace and quiet.
I'd chosen this trail to test Sadie's hiking skills.  Short three miles and plenty of fencing at edge of the precipices.

A+ on her report card.

Cole's first hike since our last run in Arizona in November. 

Afterwards, the dogs and I indulged in the best BBQ pork, bar none.  This little joint in Cashiers, NC is always a required stop for me.  Cole was awaiting his next piece.
Next mandatory stop is at Woof Gang Dog Bakery. 

The treat table was under siege.

Cole scored big:  new raincoat, bags of treats and a new food dish, one intended to perplex and bewilder.  Back on Mother's Day, I'd taken the dogs out for ice cream.  In the drive thru queue, Cole couldn't contain his excitement and he barfed all over the dash and stick shift.  Rather than being aghast about the chunks, which are still stuck down between the seats, the 6 hour old digesta with intact kibbles is what upset me.  My dog isn't chewing any of his food, which causes mal absorption of nutrients and possibly life threatening bloat. 
But now, problem solved.

Saturday afternoon, I found some of the most beautiful trails on land owned by a country club.  The front desk staff politely told me that only members are permitted to enjoy the miles and miles of trails.  Ruffians, such as ourselves, must go elsewhere.  My elsewhere was down to the maintenance shop where I inquired about the trails with the Mexican laborers.  Problem circumnavigated and Chimney Top Mountain ascended.  5 more miles under our belt. Gracias, amigos!

Tag teaming it up the mountain.

Yes, Sadie, it is breath taking.

Yes, Sadie, the car is way down there.
I can never get enough of the mountains, I hate to come out of the woods.  I had to remind myself that Cole isn't 100 % back in shape yet.

He loves the mountain air too.
And we had work to do at the house anyway.

With the vistas of Shortoff Mountain to one side, the stable and arena off to the front and lovely rhododendrons blooming everywhere, work here is very pleasant.  Add to that the marvelous silence:  no TV, no radio, no computer, no news, no neighbors...it's restoration for the soul.  I spent three glorious days in a  peaceful world where hearing your own voice is startling.

On Sunday, we wandered North to Pisgah National Forest.  I found heaven.  Almost didn't take the hike:  my map was outdated, the trailhead parking lot was closed due to construction, trail signs were absent (problem I've discovered in all national parks due to budget cuts leading to lack of maintenance).  We plowed forward to ascend Tennant Mountain, a 7 mile round trip hike.

"Are you sure this is the way?"

Well, actually it wasn't.
We stumbled upon a map to the entrance of Shining Rock Wilderness to discover that I had missed Tennant Mountain way back there and we were between Cold Mountain and Shining Rock Mountain. 

 As it was imperative to bag a peak, we headed to Shining Rock 6040 feet elevation. 

Sadie: "I'm gonna tell my Daddy on you!"
Cole: "I'm telling my physiotherapist!"

"Ma, I don't see the car." Oops, we ended up doing a 14 mile hike.
But, isn't it worth it?  Plus, the pack mule, moi, had toted up a big picnic.
Mother Nature helped cool us off on the descent with a long, lovely, at times heavy, rain shower.  Nothing like being pulled over slick rocks by a pair of sled dogs.

Finally back on the trail with my kid, I'll never take another day in the woods with him for granted.

On Sunday, I worked around the house and took the crew out for a short hike to Sunset Rocks.  Yes, Jinx was relieved of his house guarding duties to be dragged along what he considered to be a death march.  We got to the outcropping and Jinx rushed over to other hikers and tried to jump in their arms.  Yes, I abuse him.  Fresh air and exercise are torture for this couch potato.

Well, we're back in Alabama now, my fuel tank has been refilled, I'm good to go for a while until the mountains call me back.