After months of work, work, work, we finally managed to take a day for ourselves, and trailered the horses over the Riverbend for a fantastic two-hour ride. I spent the morning making changes to my new work website, a work in progress, but finally we broke away after noon. What a great ride! The horses were perfect, a bit sluggish at first, not surprising they’ve gotten lazy after such a long layup, but they truly were brilliant today. I even managed to do one of the longest gallops ever! It was great! We can’t wait to get back on the road, but so much work still remains. We only just got the old RV on the market this past week or two, we still have warranty issues on the new RV, but they’ve been waiting for parts, and can’t come out for another two weeks, and we’re still waiting for a shipment of blinds for the bedroom that I ordered back in November, but because the company changed hands, we fell through the cracks, and now they’re trying to catch up. We’re going stir-crazy here, and can’t wait to move on, but it looks like we may just take a short venture out just to get a change of scene, then come back for some of the other essential work. We’ve got more jobs coming up in late Feb/early March, so we’ll likely still be here, though it’s WAY overstaying our welcome here (but as it’s my brother, he can’t complain too much… : -). Can’t wait to get back on the ROAD!!!!

Okay, okay, I’ve been completely neglecting my blog lately.  This is partly because we’ve been so darned busy, and partly because most of what we’ve been doing has been pretty mundane from our perspective, because it hasn’t included much HORSE time!  Here’s a quick recap of what I wrote during this time, at least until I started getting somewhat serious again in mid-February:

Friday, Nov. 16, 2012 – Furniture Hunting, Online and Off

Saturday, Nov. 17, 2012 – Furniture Buying and Another Look at the RV at the Dealer

Sunday, Nov. 18, 2012 – Ride Day in Jupiter – A short ride around the neighborhood with my brother.

Tuesday, Nov. 20, 2012 – Pickup of New Trailer, Didn’t Happen
Wasted most of the day hanging around the dealer trying to get things done.  Workers kept screwing up, the worse being tearing the kitchen floor up while removing the couch we didn’t want.  Never going to look right again, but not much we can do about it.  Several other items still need to be completed, pickup postponed until tomorrow

Wednesday Nov. 21, 2012 – Finally, pickup of New Trailer!! And Brother from Austin Arrives.

Thursday, Nov. 22, 2012 – Thanksgiving-Way too much food, as expected!

Friday, Nov. 23, 2012 – Start Cleanup of the old RV

Saturday, Nov. 24, 2012 – More Cleanup of the old RV

Sunday, Nov. 25, 2012 – Some Rest, Some Online Computer Decor Planning

Monday, Nov. 26, 2012 – Austin Brother Departs, More Cleanup and Transfer of stuff to new RV, including the air mattress that my brother had been sleeping on.  The one in the new RV is hard as a rock, and we haven’t slept well at all.  Can’t wait to sleep on our own bed tonight!

Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2012 – More Cleanup, etc., etc., etc.

　
Saturday, Dec. 8, 2012 – Fly to Vegas from PBI (change of flight due to weather, 2 stops instead of one, aaargh!)

Sunday, Dec. 9, 2012 – Rest Day

Monday-Thurs, Dec. 10-14 – Two Speaker Training Camps (Basic and Advanced)

Friday, Dec. 15 – Rest Day

Saturday, Dec. 16 – Fly Back to PBI, One stop at BWI, so second flight almost as long as first.

Holidays spent doing more cleanup and moving and dealing with storage problems.

Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2013 – Fly to Vegas from Ft. Lauderdale

Thursday, January 17, 2013 – Rest Day

Friday & Sat., January 18-19, 2013 – Private Two-Day Corporate Training Camp

Sunday, January 20, 2013 – Fly Back from Vegas

Monday, January 21, 2013 – Buy new sink and faucet for bathroom

Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2013 – Worked On Computer All Day

Wed., Jan. 21, 2013 – New Corian Counters
Removed Corian from the top of the moveable kitchen island and replaced it with one with an overhang sufficient to put stools up to it, making it a breakfast bar.  We already sold the dining room set, with plans to replace it with more storage and a dog bed on top.  Had the Corian guys cut the old top down to size to fit in the bathroom, to replace the really chintzy plastic sink and laminate counter that was already in there.  I don’t understand why they would put nice Corian in the kitchen, with stainless steel sinks, then put such cheap stuff in the bathroom.  Good job done, though, things are starting to look almost finished in the new RV!

Once again set the alarm early. Rain came in during the night, so everything was wet when we started getting up. Easy send-off though, with the horses in a corral and no satellite dish. Grabbed breakfast at Dunkin Donuts (after two miles of washboard road again), a quick stop at Royal Battery in Palm Bay to pick up two Trojan batteries for the new RV, arriving at Brother Jeff’s by 12:30. There was a bulldozer blocking the driveway, he was in the process of putting up a large sign over the entrance to his abode, and the bulldozer was, in essence, his means of reaching heights capable of putting in the sign. He moved it so we could come in, and we quickly got the horses settled into one of his paddocks, and set the RV in a place that would make it easy to make the transition to the new RV. We left shortly thereafter, setting bug bombs off in order to take care of a bunch of ladybugs that had been with us since South Carolina, as well as anything we might have picked up along the way, and drove to the RV dealer to finally see our new unit in person. It was almost everything we had hoped for, with just a few difficulties we’ll have to figure out how to overcome. Spent several hours there going over what modifications would need to be made, then headed back home to find a short but strong rainstorm had stopped work on the sign. We soon got in, though, aired out the RV and relaxed the rest of the evening, content we would all get a good night’s sleep tonight, knowing we had a plan for the next few weeks!

Got up with a very early alarm this morning, as we had a long drive today. Got delayed by my truck not starting again, though I couldn’t find anything that would account for the battery draining. Could just be The only problem with Mill Creek is that their dump (though it’s nice they have one) is under a full-blown sewer lid, and needs a crowbar and a lot of muscle to lift off enough to use. That done, though, we headed out with empty tanks shortly after 8:00, picked up breakfast at a Wendy’s in a truck stop a few miles down I-95 (love their pannini and breakfast potatoes!), took a diversion to Rincon, GA for the Walmart and Tractor Supply, one more stop for fuel before crossing the Florida border, where we had to stop at the Ag stop, as always. Our papers were in order, but another older gentleman was having to work around a problem with the paperwork on one of his horses, or rather, a friend’s horse whom he had agreed to transport. He left about when we did, but I got the impression he’s been there quite a while. On their way to Pompano with several trotters. Anyway, we arrived by 3:00, it took us no time at all to set up as this is a usual stopping place for us these days, got everyone fed and got to bed early, which we all needed after such an early morning start!

We were so worn out from yesterday, we actually decided to do nothing today, something I haven’t enforced on myself in a long time. Though I did get a few computer things done in the morning, by mid-day I was pulling out my lounge chair with my Kindle and finishing off a book I started almost two weeks ago (and whose loan period was just about to run out, thus the rush to finish it). Sitting in the sun seemed like a luxury I haven’t enjoyed for ages, and it was most welcome. Felt much more relaxed by the end of the day. Met some of the neighbors, an ever-fluctuating group of very nice ladies who live locally and were most intrigued by Hubby’s and my adventures. Really enjoyed the day, a nice change from the hectic pace we’ve been keeping lately, and the one we’re destined to undertake once we get to Florida and the new RV!

A chilly morning with lots of frost around when we pulled out around 9:00, but it’s a fairly short trip so we weren’t too worried about getting out early. A quick stop to pick up breakfast at BK, then on to Mill Creek Horse Camp, which sits at the edge of the Manchester State Forest. We’ve been here before, so it was easy to find a spot and get set up. Though it’s a pretty wide open field, there wasn’t much grass, so even though we put them on their anchors, they were looking for hay pretty quick. We got the highline set up and got them on there, then proceeded with the rest of the setup, which was pretty quick, too. Spent the rest of the day doing office work and bookkeeping, with barely a good enough cell phone signal to occasionally check my email, before settling down for the evening.

Woke up to rain and drizzle and cold this morning. I had hoped the weather might be nice enough to take a quick ride today, but not so. It had gotten cold during the night, and we were glad the we had put the winter blankets on the horses last night, and we put them out on the grass again this morning. The rest of the day was mostly working on the computer, setting up a long overdue mailing list with Constant Contact, among other things, before spending the evening split between watching a quirky Australian movie and getting caught up on my long overdue blog.