Hiya Darlin',
Woke up too early, read for a bit before I got moving, but was out on the trail by 10:15. First trail I did was red, and I carefully looked at every marker to see where some folks got confused, and honestly, every ribbon was exactly where it was supposed to be. Yes, a couple of the paper arrows came down, but to my mind, those are secondary confidence marker, it's the ribbons, that tell the story. Nearest I can figure, despite the intersections clearly not indicating turns (i.e. they should carry on straight across the power line), it seems some folks didn't stay straight, they just turned willy nilly. The markers were right, they just didn't follow them correctly. Oh, well, no accounting for that. Anyway, we did the 10 miles of red, stopped at camp for a minute, then went out and did another 10 miles of blue. Once again, the one person that got "lost" on blue was clearly just not paying attention, as there were two signs and five ribbons at the intersection she missed. Sigh... Anyway, we were back in camp by 4:00, made very reasonable time. It was nearly an hour before Linda K. came along, she had volunteered to help so I sent her out to do the white trail, which she had no problem following, and had a good day with her horse Sonny, who is still learning to behave on his own, and did very well today! Very grateful for her help! I spent some time sorting the ribbons, though I didn't get through it by any means, but the pace is thankfully slowing down a little, and I'm feeling a bit more relaxed. All I have left tomorrow is the 15 mile pink, which is a very pretty ride, so I should have plenty of time to run into town for a few errands and to fuel up my tank so I can head straight out Tuesday morning. Enjoyed another pasta dinner with a side salad, a Northern Exposure, and a British geriatric romance, though I'm tired of this genre always ending with someone dying. Why can't geriatrics live "happily ever after," too? May be a short "ever after, but at least it's not a depressing death at the end. Oh, well. Anyway, time for shower and bed! Good night, sweetie! Love you!

Hey Babe,
Well, the day finally arrived, and what a day it was. My first call of the day, before 8:00 am, was from Jo, who said there was a guy out there removing markers again. I called owner Christine, I don't know if she ever got out there, but Jo tried to explained to the guy that the markers would be down in the next day or two, so I guess he quit. Big "it's my property and I don't have to leave these here" crap, but I know for a fact that most of the markers were on WMD property, so that was no argument. Not long after, I got a call from someone who was lost on the white trail, which, to my mind, was the easiest trail to follow. Turns out she missed a marker, but I drove all the way out there to make sure the markers were still in place. With all the rain, there were a few of the signs down, but all the ribbons were still in place. I won't go into what her excuse was, but then I actually watched her pass a turn, and she wasn't even aware of it (despite that there were no markers where she was going), and only turned around when I beeped my horn at her. She continued to get lost throughout the day. I ended up on the phone and putting out fires all morning, mostly on the red trail, which was complicated, but so many people were rushing through it and not reading the markers, it got ridiculous after awhile. Suffice to say it was a very frustrating day for me. I had planned to go out and take down one of trails after they were done with it, but with so many fires to put out, I decided I couldn't afford to do that, which was just as well, because I spent time going out and picking up water troughs instead, as they became available. Fortunately, my friend Linda from Pete's Place is coming back out to help tomorrow, so she's going to pick up the markers from one of the 15's while I get the two 10's, then I'll only have one 15 on Monday to do. I'm booked here until Tuesday morning, so hopefully I'll be able to get packed up and back to Goethe before it gets too late. My trailer and my truck are a mess from all the rushing around, we had terrible rain yesterday which luckily was mostly gone today, so weather-wise it was a good day with just a few sprinkles. I managed to get the local vet from Dunnellon to look at Lola, and she was kind enough to call in a prescription of antibiotics for her and to let me schedule a follow-up session before I leave the area. This is the vet everyone recommends but wasn't taking new patients until June, so I was very fortunate to get her to look at Lola. Hopefully, I'll have more time to soak her foot and let the pills work and she'll get better. Probably a foreign object, remotely possible it's a fungus. We'll know soon, I hope. Anyway, once we got all the troughs in, I ran into town to get the prescription, and I grabbed a salad as well at Publix, and I couldn't help it, stopped at the liquor store for some bourbon, which I've had a craving for, and frankly, really appreciated after all the angst from the day. Fed the horses a treat of some peanut hay, and finally settled down for a slightly more normal evening of salad for dinner and a Northern Exposure. Won't be long out of bed, that's for sure! Tough day!

Hiya Darlin',
Let myself sleep in a bit this morning, having had to put in earplugs because of the hard rain that came down all night long, woke up a bit before 8:30 and was luxuriating for a couple of minutes until Ride Manager Mya knocked on the door. I got up to show her around, then got my day started. I'm sure Flash was relieved I didn't come looking for him after breakfast! I had filled my water tank on the truck yesterday, so I went over to Mya's trailer and picked up enough troughs to cover the first water stop down on the White trail and headed out, even before Jo got here. I've wisely made all the water stops so that I can reach them in about 10-12 minutes from camp, so it didn't take me long to get the first troughs done. Back to camp, grabbed a few more troughs, filled my tank again and headed up the stop on the Red trail, then back to camp, finally picked up Jo's extra 40 gallon tank, filled them both up, grabbed some more troughs and buckets, and managed to do the last two stops in one run, as they're only about a quarter mile apart on the same road. All told, it took until about 3:00 to get all that done, just about when registration began. Unfortunately, I had noticed that a bunch of my signs had been torn down, especially the ones getting the riders into the trailhead at Mattair that is hard to find without markings, and not for the first time. In fact, on one tree, I had put a sign up one day, then two signs (to replace the first sign) the next day, then put three signs to replace the first two and to add the last sign, only to see that they had all been deliberately torn down, as well as all my carefully placed in and out signs on the posts leading into Mattair. No clue why anyone would do that, or why they didn't get the hint after the signs kept getting replaced, but there's no fixing stupid, I guess. Jo had made some signs saying "Horse Event, don't remove temporary markers," which I didn't think I would need, but evidently, I did, so I put those up as well. Christine, the owner of the facility, arranged for one of her Canadian renters to take me out in a UTV to fix a couple of signs on the Blue trail, and we fixed the entry signs as well, so hopefully they'll be there in the morning. It rained off and on all day, so I'm hoping most of the signs on the trails will still be relatively intact. Got back from that around 5:00, finally relaxed for a few minutes, tried to fix my staple gun, which has been nearly worthless this whole week. I need to replace it, for sure. I was given a hammer type stapler, but I can't for the life of me find it, so I'll just have to get a new one, seeing as this is becoming an essential tool for my lifestyle at the moment. Finally made it to dinner, which was a fabulous smoked brisket that melted in your mouth, and smoked chicken, with green beans and potato salad and dessert (I picked chocolate chip cookies), and was grateful for such a fabulous meal that I didn't have to cook or clean up after. 🙂 Then we held the ride meeting, where I got to describe all the trails, and saw an awful lot of familiar faces. I'm certainly getting to be known in this community! After that, I went out in my truck again, to do a last minute check on the markers on the way to the trailhead, replaced the ribbons that had gone missing, figuring they should last until morning, hopefully, then got back to camp and finally met owner Christine, who I had only spoken to on the phone. She was very gracious and was telling me all about her new 1600 acre property in Vermont which she said she would love for me to visit, even spend the summer there! My plan for summer so far has been NY, but I wasn't sure I wanted to spend it in all the same places I've been before, so this could be just the alternative I was looking for. She says there are miles of old logging roads from the 60's, so I imagine it would be quite a fascinating place to explore. Looks like my summer plans are shaping up! Finally headed home around 9:00, settling down to wine, then tea, then Spanish, then shower, then bed! Good night, my sweet! Love you!

Hiya Sweetie,
Finally had a good night sleep, and was busy all day packing up. I've learned to pace myself on the day before moving, so I'd do one big job, like taking down the screen room, then take a short break, then do another big job, and so on, so I didn't wear myself out. Managed to get everything done, even got the truck lined up so all I have to do is drop it down and plug in the electrics. Lola was still limping badly, so I put some ice on it during every break I took. Late in the afternoon, Meg came by to give me some leftover food (a HUGE tray I had to break into smaller pieces to freeze and refrigerate, the tray was WAY too big to fit in my fridge!) and also to reimburse me for the porta-potty I had to order at the last minute. She saw Lola hobbling and, being a vet, was nice enough to take a look. She said she thought it was an abscess and that I should treat it by soaking her foot in epsom salts until I could get some antibiotics for her. I'm not sure when I'll have time, but at the latest, I'll work something out with the vets at the ride next weekend. Lola's been much happier with a warm washcloth wrapped around her foot than she was with a bag of ice, so hopefully, it will do the trick. Settled down with a dinner of leftover pasta casserole and some chunks of lovely bread, now for my usual evening! Good night, my darlin'! Love you!

Hey Darlin!
Well, today was the day! All that hard work the last few weeks paid off, as it turned out to be a resounding success! We didn't quite make it to 150 attendees, but considering there were at least six other major events, not to mention St. Patty's Day weekend, we thought it was a good turnout. I was up before dawn, got my chores done early, and was on the road by 7:30. The sun wasn't even up yet! I HATE Daylight Savings Time!!! I met Chelle at the shop to get more ice, and was surprised that there were already several guys there. Finally arrived at Tidewater just before 8:30, and the rest of the day raced by! I set up a nice couple of tables with all kinds of forest giveaway stuff, an accordian board with some great educational stuff on it, and I even got out a giant mural-like display that had never even been out of the box before. I thought it made for a pretty impressive display. Lots of food, lots of folks, lots of fun! We even had a guy providing live entertainment between presentations. Logan's nature hike got delayed a bit because a tree had come down on the blue trail and he ran out to clear it, as the buggies couldn't get around it, and Mark's fire suppression talk was well attended. It was a great day! I was so busy I hardly had any time to eat! Which was probably a good thing, as there was so much food. One of the local TV stations even made it out there, so evidently my Press Release worked. I got so busy talking to the forestry guys that everything was packed up by 3:00 except my stuff, but several folks pitched in to help me get everything loaded up, and Mark and Jo both helped me put stuff away at HQ, so I made it back to camp by 5:00, exhausted, but content. Connie agreed to pick up the markers I put up, since tomorrow I'll be busy packing up everything to get ready to move to Suwannee on Monday. I'm definitely going to be testing my stamina this week! That's okay, though, because if you don't use it, you lose it, right? And I've spent too many days not doing anything constructive lately anyway. Was worried about Lola when I got back, though, I discovered one of the toes on her rear left leg was swollen to the size of a golf ball, so I put some ice on it and gave her an aspirin, which seemed to help. Not sure what's causing it, but it almost looks like one of her toenails was close to being ripped out, there is an abrasion right under it, but I don't know. Still upset that the vet I took her to didn't seem to have a clue about what was wrong. I just hope it's better tomorrow, not sure where I could take her on a Sunday anyway. Fingers crossed it's better. Had cereal for dinner, since I had so little to eat and I wasn't in the mood for a heavy dinner, watched a short rom-com, and will soon be on my way to shower and bed. Love you, babe! Good night!

Hiya Babe,
What a busy day! It started off really rough. When I got back last night, I was in the mood for something sweet, and made the mistake of having a couple of Dr. Pepper Cream Sodas, which I suddenly realized (after having drank them both) that they were loaded with caffeine. The unfortunate result was that I didn't get to sleep until after 3:00 and a double dose of melatonin. So when I got up at 9:00, I still felt tired, but I had so much to do that I spent the day running on mostly adrenaline. After chores and breakfast, I collected most of the stuff around the trailer that were on my list from the meeting last night, then went down to the HQ to get what I needed out of the volunteer closet. There was a lot more and heavy stuff than I remembered, so it took me awhile, and a lot of muscle, to get it all in the back of the truck. Fortunately, Rick went down to Tidewater with me and help me unload it. We just managed to get it all in the closet behind the bathrooms, now all I have to do is wrestle it out of there tomorrow. Got back home and dozed a little in my chair before heading out to pick up some stuff from Val's, and Chelle's and Meg's before meeting Jo at HQ to fill up a truckload of coolers and water stations. It was nearly 6:00 by the time that was done. Bev and her crew arrived while I was gone, chatted with her for just a minute before coming back for dinner, a quick Northern Exposure, a shower and EARLY bed, since I've already made plans to meet Chelle at 7:45 in the morning at HQ, so it's going to be a very long and tiring but exciting day tomorrow! Good night, my sweet! Love you!

Hey Babe,
Finally had a decent night sleep last night, thank goodness! Started the day by running over to EV Hay and picking up five bales, which is all I needed to get me through to my trip on Monday. Did some work on the trail planning for the upcoming Taste of Goethe, including a short trip down to Connie's to discuss the options, a little bit more on my tax prep, and started to do a couple of things in preparation for my week away next week, including dumping my black water, and starting up my generator. Thought I was having a problem with it, it kept starting but then cutting out immediately, but then I remembered how it does that when the propane pressure is low (and oil pressure, but that was fine), so I opened another propane tank and that solved the problem, thank goodness. Once I shut the generator off, I turned the propane tank off again, no need to run that until I need to. I still have two full tanks, so I'll refill the other two once they're completely empty. When I have electricity, it seems like a tank of propane lasts forever! I also checked the fluids in the truck, everything was good except the power steering fluid, which needed topping off. I'm hoping that's just from normal use after the last repair, and not another leak somewhere. It wasn't empty, just low, so hopefully it's all good, I'll just have to keep an eye on it. Did some more trail work on the Suwannee trails as well, and chatted with some new campers for a bit. Finally settled down for the evening, with a Northern Exposure and a fun adult rom-com, something about A Grand Romantic Gesture. Good work in that one. Now it's time for my usual, tea, Spanish (Day 654!), shower and bed! Love you, Sweetie! Good night!

Hiya Sweetie,
Had a terrible night sleep, still trying to get used to DST, yuck! Didn't get to sleep until after 2:00, was up around 9:00, Did my chores, then even before breakfast I decided to get a couple of small jobs done. I put a new handle on the gray water tank valve, it broke off a couple of weeks ago. I had one handy that I had bought for the black water tank, but could never get it to fit, but it worked fine on the gray water tank. Then I finally tackled cleaning the battery terminals, and boy, did they need it! I used a wire brush and sandpaper, and one cable end needed tightening, and all of the electrical tape needed replacing, and I put a little vaseline on everything to hopefully keep it from doing that again! A good job done, though, albeit long overdue. Finally came in for breakfast, or should I say brunch since it was close to 11:00, then decided the task for the day would be to get my bookkeeping ready to do my taxes. I downloaded this year's TurboTax, which took a couple of hours with my slow connection and all the updates, but while it was doing that, I went through all my accounts and got them straightened out so the actual doing of taxes will be fairly straight-forward. I was going to do them tomorrow, but I realized I don't have enough hay, so I'll have to pick some up tomorrow, and if I'm going out, I might as well get all my shopping done while I'm out. Not that I have to get that much, but I need enough to get me through next week since I'll be swamped with work starting on Thursday or Friday. That took me until about 5:30, so I fed the horses and then had dinner and a Northern Exposure, followed by an old black and white movie with Anne Baxter and Raymond Burr from 1953, The Blue Gardenia. I love watching old films that have great story lines, without all the overt violence, language and soft porn that most modern movies seem to have. Amazon Prime keeps presenting me with rom-coms and kids movies, which are about the only modern movies that fit that description, but I'm not into kid movies, and rom-coms all have pretty much the same plot, so they get boring. Oh, well, maybe I'll watch more old black and whites! Anyway, tea's made, ready for shower and bed. Good night, darlin'! Love you!

Hey Darlin',
I truly hate Daylight Savings Time. I wish it had never been invented, and I can't understand why we still have it. It serves no purpose. Well, despite "losing" an hour of sleep, which I made up by sleeping an hour later anyway, I woke up energized and decided to get some odd jobs done. Laundry, of course, my usual Sunday chore, and I also reseal the base of the toilet again. I used that supposed impermeable stuff one of my brothers recommended, so naturally, it didn't last, so I peeled it off and redid it with some silicon, using my new generic Dremel to clean it properly. Did some planning on the Taste of Goethe Trails for next weekend, considered changing out the panel on my inverter but had a few questions about some things, so I spoke to Jo's electrically-minded husband Jeff about it. Figure I'll clean the terminals before I put in the new control panel, and I'll have to reconfigure it a bit differently, but I didn't want to get into all of that today. Finally saddle up Apollo for a 5 1/2 mile ride, and today, decided to let Lola come along. I've been trying hard to keep her from overexerting herself, but I'm getting worried that she's going to be worse off without any exercise. She seemed to be a bit better today, not perfect, but she kept up fine and didn't seem to limp very much, though she's still not quite walking in a completely normally, but that might just be the arthritis in her hocks. It's better for her to run in a straight line that jumping and leaping when she's fetching, so hopefully she'll be okay in the morning. I'm almost out of pills, but Jo is going to try to arrange an acupuncture appointment for her next week, which would be great! Apollo did really well, we jogged a lot, and he didn't have any pig scares, so it was uneventful, but fun. It was a gorgeous day! Nice to just get out there and ride! I gave Apollo a good rinse and combed out some of his winter coat before hanging him back on the highline. Then a couple drove in for a day ride, Mary and Ed, and we had a nice chat. They'd never been here before, so I suggested a good trail. Turned out, she didn't get back until after dark, went out on a bunch of other trails, but finally made it back okay. She might be coming back with friends tomorrow, and I offered to ride with them. It's either that or start to do my taxes... Hmmm, ride or taxes? No-brainer there! Finally settled in for the evening, later than usual (did I mention I HATE DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME!!), be in bed soon, but later than usual at the rate I'm going. Good night, babe! Love you!

Hi Babe,
I was so wound up last night that I couldn't sleep. I read for hours, then was worried about my phone going dead, looked up what might be the cause of the problem and learned that sometimes dirt just gets into the port, so I tried cleaning it, but I'm sure the port has been pushed back inside and that's why my cords aren't working properly. It was after 2:00 before I finally slept, so I spent the day feeling tired. After morning chores and breakfast, I read some more, even crawling back up into bed and nodding off occasionally. Finally mustered enough energy to drive over the Jo's to pick up the ribbons for marking the trails at the upcoming Taste of Goethe. We visited for awhile, and Lola had a little play date, though we tried hard to not let her run around too much so that she wouldn't reinjure her leg. Before I left, she offered to let me borrow her extra wireless charger, so that I would worry less about my phone going dead. That may be the answer, if no one steps up to replace my phone, though I have to remove it from it's case to make it work, which is kind of a pain. Finally got back, fed the horses and settled down for the evening, with a Northern Exposure and an interesting movie with Robert Redford (who also wrote it), Meryl Streep and Tom Cruise about the War on Terror. I've been having wine in the evening the last few nights and haven't been sleeping well, so it's back to Sleepytime tea tonight. It's been warm enough to need to use the air conditionng the last few nights, to cool it down before going to bed. Rain coming in tonight, though, that's supposed to make it better by tomorrow. Winter is gone, daylight savings begins tonight (boo, hiss, hate daylight savings time!!), and things are getting positively toasty here these days. Hoping for a better night sleep tonight! Love you, sweetie! Good night!