Worth Repeating

SEVENTEEN. Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; and Responsibility for all your actions

Good Thoughts to Remember

After hearing about all the bad things that have been going on lately around the world a friend sent me this in an email. We all need to try to remember to do more of it.
Except I do have a problem with number two, as when you get older your hearing gets worse. And for number six - it would be smart to be engaged for at least six months but Lee and I had only known each other for four months and had been engaged for only two months when we got married - and that was 38 years ago. And I do believe in number Seven

Mental Feng Shui
ONE. Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.
TWO. Marry a man/woman you love to talk to. As you get older, their conversational skills will be as important as any other.
THREE. Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have or sleep all you want.
FOUR. When you say, 'I love you,' mean it.
FIVE. When you say, 'I'm sorry,' look the person in the eye.
SIX. Be engaged at least six months before you get married.
SEVEN. Believe in love at first sight.
EIGHT. Never laugh at anyone's dreams. People who don't have dreams don't have much. NINE. Love deeply and passionately. You might get hurt but it's the only way to live life completely.
TEN.. In disagreements, fight fairly. No name calling.
ELEVEN. Don't judge people by their relatives.
TWELVE. Talk slowly but think quickly.
THIRTEEN! .. When someone asks you a question you don't want to answer, smile and ask, 'Why do you want to know?'
FOURTEEN. Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
FIFTEEN. Say 'bless you' when you hear someone sneeze.
SIXTEEN. When you lose, don't lose the lesson.
SEVENTEEN. Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; and Responsibility for all your actions.
EIGHTEEN. Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.
NINETEEN. W hen you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it. TWENTY. Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice.
TWENTY- ONE. Spend some time alone.

A true friend is someone who reaches for your hand and touches your heart.
-- Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened. Dr.Seuss ____________________________________________________________

Sane People-Or Insane

Cactus Jack Splash says that the only sane place is on their ranch. I think that the only sane And maybe cats and dogs. All I can say is the rest of the world doesn't know what they are missing. I am staying as far away from stores as I can probably for the rest of my life. I detest it when I have to go to the store to buy food or new clothes when the old ones wear out completely. I go hide in the horse pens as much as I can when the rest of the world becomes to much for me to handle. And this time of the year seems to bring out the worst in the human race.
It is hard to believe that a gang of people trying to be the first into a Walmart would trample and kill the person unlocking the door for them, and injury others.
And that other people would fight and kill over who gets to buy an item in a store.
No, I am not one of those that is a goody two shoes, got to go to church everyday, and say 'God Bless', to everyone I see. I just believe that the human race should take a good look at what they have become, and maybe opt for a little change for the better instead of believing that the only good life is to spend money as fast as possible on junk. How, or how, did people get so materialistic.
All I want for Christmas is more peace for the world, a load of hay for the horses and a load of dog and cat food as well as some for me, and all the homeless, starving animals and people in the world.

Thanksgiving Rain Storm

We had a drizzle of rain when we got up to feed the ponies yesterday morning which was Thanksgiving day. We hadn't planned anything special as we couldn't afford to go visit any of our family for the day. Nor could any of our family afford to come here. So we called and talked and wished everyone a good day.
I kept watching the sky. I had a feeling that there was more rain to come. And there was. About noon it started raining harder than it had earlier that day. Then the wind came. And with it a huge whirlwind or maybe it was another of those little tornados. I watched from the front door as the horses ran around their pens in fear and I couldn't do anything for them. It looked as if the roof of one of the shelters came up off the walls a few inches and then came back down. The wind hit the tree near the door and I saw the leaves picked off the tree, whirled into the air, and dropped back down onto the ground right around the tree.
In minutes the wind was gone, the rain had stopped and the sun was shining. Thankfully there was no damage.

Really Black Friday

I can not believe that people will stand in line that long and get up that early to go to stores and trample the people in front of them on the off chance that they will get to buy something that they don't just have to have. There is no way I would get up that early to go to a store to buy gifts or even stuff I can use even if it is on sale.
And why do stores do this? Why do they have to open so early? And why do they put things on sale for only a few hours? Is it really worth it to make people fight and kill to get into the store so that the business can make a couple of extra dollars?
Is this what the people of the United States have come down to?

Wild Horses Situation

Here is a link to an article about the wild horses that the goverment wants to destroy. A fair article but it doesn't mention any way to adopt a wild horse or to write or contact a congressman about them. Nor is there a way to contact the woman that wants to take care of them until they can be adopted out.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/17/AR2008111703680.html

Wild Birds

As I mentioned in my last posting the roadrunner is the state bird of New Mexico. Did you know that each of the 50 states has named a bird to be their state bird? And each state also has a state flower, state mammal, state fish, state reptile, and maybe other state things similar that I know nothing about. It is interesting to find out about these things.
Here at the Tumbleweed Crossing we get a lot of wild birds coming in to either find water, food, or nesting places. Most of the time they are welcome to come and stay as long as they want. I have always been some what of an amiture bird watcher. Roadrunners are one of the rarer birds that come through. Most of the time they are as welcome as the other birds. Roadrunners are members of the cuckoo family and can only be found in the lower elevations of the southwestern United States and Mexico. They are a fairly large bird that looks to be about 18 to 24 inches tall depending on if you count just the head or include that long tail that is usually sticking straight up behind him except when he is running and it is stuck out behind him. I like roadrunners as they eat snakes. Yes, you read that right they eat snakes and that includes rattlesnakes. It can be quite a sight to see a roadrunner killing a highly poisonous snake so it can eat it.
Roadrunners also dine on lots of mice and small rats which is a plus any way you look at it. But on the down side they will eat the baby quail that I dearly love to see, as well as young doves, sparrows, wrens, finches and other birds. Roadrunners are in the carnivore category. Last winter we had one that found that we had water in the heated water buckets for the horses. Each day it would come in and get a drink out of one of the heated buckets and then leave.
I have mentioned the quail. We have what is called 'Scaled Quail' which are similar to the top knot quail of Arizona, only they don't have as large a top knot. In the spring you can see the large winter flocks breaking up into pairs and a few weeks later the pairs will have tiny puff balls following them. By fall the puff balls are almost as big as their parents and the winter flocks form again. I have seen as many as 20 at a time coming in to water in our yard. We keep solid hubcaps for the quail to drink out of. They want water on the ground as they don't fly unless forced into it. They seem to prefer the shallow hubcaps to deeper containers. Hubcaps work well as they can be scrubbed out when they get lots of algae in them, and don't cost anything at the junk yards. I have used the deeper black hamburger trays that are about 4 inches deep but in the spring the baby quail drown in something this deep. I found it out the hard way and don't use them any more in the spring but do in the fall and winter.
I can't afford to feed all the birds that come in so all I put out is the water. We have other birds that come in every morning and evening to drink. Lots of sparrows, red headed house finches, starlings, and doves that are the year round residents, but during migrations we get hummingbirds, gold finches, fly catchers, swallows, and ravens. We are lucky that we get a few redtailed hawks, sparrow hawks or kestrels, coopers hawks, and on rare occasions a golden or bald eagle. We used to see several vultures around but not in a long time. Although not pretty they are good birds as they eat a lot of the road killed rabbits. And we have lots of rabbits. Mostly the desert cottontails but also jackrabbits. They seem to know that they are safe inside of our wire fenced yard where the coyotes can't get to them.
And yes we have coyotes. We see them at times and hear them yipping and howling almost every evening. I am not overly fond of them but know we need them to keep down the rodents and rabbits. And they did live here before people did.

Roadrunner

The Roadrunner is New Mexico's state bird and we have a few that pass through here occasionally. Usually if I see one before I can think about getting the camera it is gone or so far off I can't get a decent photo. A roadrunner was the fartherest thing from my mind the other night when I went to feed the horses. It was the last feeding of the day at 9 pm which meant it was dark and all good little roadrunners should have been in bed. And this one was but in an unusual place.

Lee was trying to get a bale of hay down off the top of the stack, about 7 feet up and was having trouble getting ahold of the string that keeps the bale together. So I turned around to get the hay hook that we have hanging near the hay shed door. Surprise! I found myself being stared at by two shiny, glaring, black roadrunner eyes. Roasting on a 2 x 4 above the door was one of the birds. I stepped back in surprise. And especially at the size of the sharp beak that was pointed at me. You can see him in the photo with his tail up unsure of weather he should stay or leave and knowing that he can't see in the dark he decides to stay put even though there are two humans getting hay for the horses in the shed, as well as a dog with them. You can see the handle of the antique hay hook that I was reaching for next to the hammer and the top of the door in the lower right hand corner.

As quickly and quietly as we could, we got the hay, which did include getting the hay hook and dropping a 50 pound bale of hay onto the floor, and then I decided to get the camera and take his photo hoping that the flash wouldn't destrub him even worse that we had. It didn't seem to bother him at all.

The roadrunner had got into the hay shed because we leave the door open a lot, so we left it open for the night as we figured he would be gone at first light the next morning which would be earlier than when we feed the horses. But surprise again. He was still there at 7 am the next morning. We decided enough was enough. We didn't want such a big bird living in the shed. lee got the broom and shoo-ed him out the door. He ran like a flash down the driveway, under the gate, and disappeared down the road.

I think it might have been a young bird that was confussed. He certainly wasn't as big as some I have seen so it could have been one that had recently left it's parents.

Offended

And if I have offended you by giving my opion about junky emails - you don't have to read my blog.

Loading Loading

Neither am I going to take the time to stare at a screen that continues to say "Loading-Loading" while I wait for some dumb video to download that some one else thought was cute, cool, outstanding, funny, ect. And I don't have high speed, only dial-up, which means that it can take as much as an hour or more for a 1 minute video to load to where I can see it. If I can. And normally I can't. So don't send them.

Junky Emails

Ok, I've had it with the junky emails. Emails that are from my friends that I correspond with frequently. They get them from other friends and think they should be sent on to me, and everyone they know. Emails about "friends/love/god/support/cute/care-for/political/awaaa-for-the-day/bad-luck/good-luck/send-to-so-many-in-such-and-such-a-length-of-time/". Even though the election is over I am still getting political emails. What gives????? Don't you think I have anything better to do that go through your crumby "Be-my-friend/support-my-cause/I-care-for-you/vote-for-so-and-so/you-HAVE-TO-pass-this-on/Do-Not-Delete-This/" emails.
I'll let you in on a little secret. Every time I see a subject line that has one of the above words in it-I delete it-unopened. If it was really important-oh well-it's gone. And I haven't read your important email.
I can handle a few of these but it seems to be going to extremes any more. I can handle the cute pet photos a few times but aren't there any new ones out there in cyberland? The same ones over and over get old.
And as for as the ones that say "you'll have bad luck or good luck if you don't send it on to 3/5/10/ or however many email friends in a certain amount of time. Well, I just can't believe that you, my friends, believe that sh---.
So from now on think before you pass it on. Is it really important? is it the first time you have seen that cute photo? (or the tenth), is it a joke that's been around for 20 years and everyone has heard? (or is it a new one, that made you laugh).
THINK! Don't just forward everything to everyone.

Gourds

I raised some gourds this year. They did better than I expected as I have never got that many gourds off the vines. In fact I got 35 of them. Four are still hanging in the redbud tree where the vine grew up in it and I didn't notice the gourds until they were almost full size. 2 of them managed to wedge theirselves in a wire fence the vine was growing on and we had to pull the fence apart to get them out. They were fun and easy to grew and very interesting watching the gourds grow. Some are fairly good sized and others are just average and a couple are even on the small size. I cut them off the vines when the vines died after the first freeze and put them on the back patio to dry only to find that they were developing spots of black mold which I had never had happen before. After reading about gourds on the web I found that this is common. I wiped them down with the 10 percent of bleach water as recommended and put them in the shed to finish drying as they are still very green.

I also found out that they can be used for a number of crafts. Bowls, vases, cute animals, lights, jack-o-lanterns, bird houses, trinket boxes, Halloween and Christmas decorations, and lots of other things, including just using them to paint designs on. When mine dry I might try some. But I found out that the mold on them and the stuff inside, and dust from cutting them open can cause flu like symptoms and allergies, itching and other problems so you have to be very careful when doing the crafts. but it does sound like an interesting project for when they dry. I differently plan to grow more of them next spring and hope to find some different kinds of seeds as there are 1000's of kinds of gourds.

Over

Well it's finally over. the Election that is. I just hope that our new president will be able to pull this country back together and make it the wonderful place it used to be. And if he could do something about all the political phone calls it would be a big help. At least for the time being they seem to have stopped. No political calls, no survey calls, no bashing of each other on dumb political advertizements on TV. What a relief.

PBR Fans

I guess I am not the only PBR fan. Callie let a message that she is one too. I hope there are lots more out there in cyberspace.

PBR Finals.

I am in bull riding heaven this week. The PBR (Profisional Bull Riding) is having their finals this week. We normally get bull riding on Versis TV channel on Saturday and Sunday. This week we had it on Friday Saturday and Sunday will have a couple during the week and again next weekend. A full 8 days of bucking bulls and flying riders during 11 days. Maybe I will get my fill for a minute or so. Would dearly love to go to Las Veges, Nevada for the finals some time. But it takes more money than I can afford. So I will be content with watching it on TV. As some people say you can actually see more on tv than at the event. But you have a chance to actually meet some of the bull riders, anouncers, ect and to see the bulls.
Of course I like anything that has to do with rodeos and horses.
But many years ago I said I would never get involved in watching a sport on TV the way so many watch the football, basketball, and baseball games. But I did. And it was bull riding that won out.

Time Change

Well the politicians are at it again. No one that I know of wants to do this time change bull every six months like the politicians want us to do. Maybe for them and big business it isn't that much of a problem. But for those of us who have to take medications at a certain time every day it can be a pain in the but. I even forgot this time. Got up at regular time turned on TV and was wondering what the h---- when the TV seemed to be off until I remembered. Then I realized that my meds would be off and I would either have to feed horses at a different time or start training them for a different time. All because some idiot politicain says I have to change the time. Funny the sun doesn't know about this time change.