Hey Babe!
Well, I’m almost there! I wasn’t sure if I would finish the Teal Trail in one day, since it’s the longest, but I managed to get her done! Amazing, too, since I got a late start. I headed out around the fence line, then remembered I was going to check one of the front tires on the tractor since I had noticed it seemed low, so I came back and checked it, and sure enough, it was down quite a bit, so I pumped it up with my slightly defunct air compressor (it only works now on low psi) and it brought it up in no time, so I was back on the trail by around 10:00. This is the trail that goes along the power line on the west border, so I kind of cheated a little bit and put a spot on the base of every tower, figured it was a public utility with a public right-of-way, so why would they mind a little paint to mark a public trail? Especially since it’s the only way to keep the marks on the correct side of the trail to work with the system. It’s a long, straight line, so it didn’t take me too long, not my favorite section of this trail. By the time I reached the southern end of it, I was really hot, no clouds today so I was broiling in the sun, so I took a side trip down to the group camp and pumped some water all over my head, which felt great! I even took off my T-shirt and soaked it, that felt nice and cool for awhile, too. I got back into camp about 4:30, did a little clean up then sat down in the AC and re-hydrated for awhile before taking a shower. Grilled a sausage, then fed the horses and did my rounds. About ten minutes after getting back from that, it finally started to rain (it had been predicted for 1:00 this afternoon!), but I’m very glad, we need the rain, though I wish it had been cloudier earlier in the day! Anyway, settled down for the evening, will undoubtedly be in bed early again tonight. Love you, sweetie! Goo night!

Hey Sweetie,
A good night sleep, a typical morning of chores, plus a load of laundry, then I headed out onto the lime Green trail to refresh all the paint and markings there. This one is the craziest trail yet. It’s been marked so many times, there’s no way I was going to be able to straighten it out to match the system I want to use. That said, there are so many paint marks out there, it would be tough for anyone to get lost, at least for the short loop. The long spur south along the west side was a different matter, those markings were mostly faded so I was able to fix some of those, though not all. At least I got it done, though I’m not too happy with the color, it’s more yellowish and is often hard to see because it’s the same color as a lot of the foliage out here, and using a roller on a lot of this is crazy. The pine tree bark is so thin it flakes off as I’m painting, and the hard-barked trees have so many gaps it’s hard to make a solid marking, so not my best work, but the best I can do with the tools I have! Anyway, I was out from 9:30 to 3:30, got back, let the horses out on the back section to graze, took my shower and relaxed for the rest of the evening, other than feeding and rounds. Down to my last half tank of fuel, so I need to request another refill tomorrow. Just one trail left, the Teal trail, but that’s the longest and farthest trail out here, so it will take me at least two days to finish, if I get the fuel. Meanwhile, I’m getting to bed early, tired from jumping off and on my tractor all day! Good night, my darling! Love you!

Hi Darlin’,
Well, once again the weather forecast was way off. It was predicting lots of rain and strong winds for most of the day, so I hadn’t planned on getting out on the trails at all, but all we ended up with was a few sprinkles in the morning, clearing up in the afternoon, with no discernable winds at all! So it was kind of a wasted day, though I have to say, I’m feeling much more rested and will definitely be raring to go tomorrow. I figured out about how many posts I’ll need to mark the trails here, and I’ve decided to paint the tops the color of the trails for now, at least until I can get some arrows and numbers for them. It’s a start! Other than that, I pretty much just read and binge-watched the rest of the day. I had cordoned off the horses to they couldn’t get through the barn and let them have the run of the entire back section of paddocks, lots of grass back there, so I’m saving a lot of hay right now. Last weekend, a couple turned in some credit cards they had found by the back fence and when I went to look up who they belonged to, it looked like they might have a guy that was actually killed out in Hungryland back in March. Not sure if it’s the same guy, but I called the Sheriff’s office and had them come pick them up, just in case. Otherwise a quiet day, only two campers left, so not much to do. So, time for shower and bed, as soon as I finish my tea! Good night, baby! Love you!

Hi Babe,
Had a good night sleep plus I slept late this morning, almost to 8:30! I still felt physically tired though, obviously all this activity is wearing on my. So I wasn’t terribly disappointed when it started raining just after I fed the horses, and kept up mostly of the day. It was cool enough to be able to turn off the AC and open some doors and windows, which was a nice change. Did a tad of housework, then read a bit, napped a bit, then spent the rest of the day binge-watching Supernatural on Netflix. Obviously, I needed a day off, and got one! So I’ll be taking my shower and going to bed early, though the forecast is more rain tomorrow, so I may have another lazy day as well! Good night, sweetheart! Love you!

Hey Sweetie,
Had a decent night sleep, up again by 7:30, out on the trail before 9:30. Worked on the red trail today, and got it mostly done, but then I broke the handle of the roller so I couldn’t quite finish. That makes two areas now that I’ll have to finish off later, but my plan is to do as much as I can with what paint I have, then go back and do the final touchup. That way I can get only the paint I need rather than a lot of extra. Got back around 3:30 or so, cleaned up the tractor and chilled for the rest of the evening. We’ve got a tropical storm watch going, but the forecast still looks like I should be able to get more done tomorrow, though if it’s raining, frankly I wouldn’t mind taking a day off. Gets kind of tiring climbing off and on the tractor for 6 or 7 hours every day, I’m certainly getting a workout! There were thunderstorms all around me today, but I only got a couple of minutes of a sunshower, so no big deal. Supposed to be worse tomorrow, but I’ve given up trusting the weatherman. We’ll see how it looks in the morning. Had my shower early, so now it’s just a Spanish lesson and bed! Good night, my darlin’! Love you!

Hi Darlin’,
Had another good night sleep, and was up bright and early. Was out on the trail a little later, around 9:30, and got the entire white trail done. Or should I say “re-done” since I had done this with spray paint on Flash, but that turned out not to work very well. The off-white color was too much like the color of the tree, and it was absorbed and faded so it was practically invisible already, even though I just did it a couple of weeks ago. Got it done with canned paint now, a much better job. But really, painting on pine trees that have a bark so thin that it comes off with the roller doesn’t seem like the best solution to me! They should really just do metal diamonds or something, make it permanent, but I doubt that’s in the budget. Anyway, I’ll keep going, if I do one color trail a day I’ll be done in another three days. Once I got back and cleaned up both the tractor and myself, I ran into town to get a couple more paint rollers (as usual, I don’t have the patience to wait for James to bring me some, though I expect he will later in the week, but I don’t want to miss a day) and I went to the IGA to return a carton of ice cream I bought last week. When I opened it, it was all crystallized, and it tasted really grainy, so I checked the expiration day, which was November of last year!! They let me exchange it for another one, plus I got some Gatorade, I’ve been drinking a lot of that to beat the heat lately, though it wasn’t too bad today. I’m either acclimating, or things haven’t gotten too bad yet. There’s a small tropical storm headed this way, suppose to get here on Saturday, but we’ll see. Once I got back I fed the horses and did my rounds then settled down for the evening. Will be in bed soon! Good night, babe! Love you!

Hey Babe,
Happy to report that I had a much better sleep last night, and was feeling rested when I woke up early, so I got up and got the day started. After chores and breakfast, I gathered all of my painting supplies and headed out to work on mostly the yellow trail, though I also did some sections of red and a little white. Working with this kind of paint works a whole lot better than the spray paint, and I also did a lot of clearing and pulling down some vines. I was out there from about 8:30 until past 4:00, then I was close to running out of bottled water so I headed back to camp. Got back by 4:30 exhausted and dehydrated. Drank lots of Gatorade, tea and nectar mix and sat in the air conditioning until I was re-hydrated, then went out to clean up the tractor. It’s impossible to work with bucket paint without getting it all over everything, and unfortunately, on the way back down the grade, my yellow bucket bounced out of the loader and I crushed it before I had time to stop, so no more yellow! Left a nice puddle in the road, though. There wasn’t a huge amount left, but I’ll have to get some more before I can finish the job. No worries, though, I have a lot more painting to do before I need to worry about coming back to yellow. Once I finished cleaning up the tractor I took a shower, since “everything” also meant me, and I had to use a fingernail brush to get it all off me. Had dinner, fed the horses, did my rounds, then settled down for the evening. Since I’ve already had my shower, I’ll be going to bed early. I’m reading a Dean Koontz book now and it’s keeping me intrigued, so I’ll be reading for awhile before I get to sleep. I’m liking this early to bed, early to rise schedule, I just need to do more of it! Good night, sweetheart! Love you!

Hi Sweetie,
Had a terrible night sleep. I couldn’t fall asleep for anything! I kept reading, then putting my book down and then not being able to sleep then reading again, over and over again. I had put Lola out on her leash and left the door open because she was restless, then she got tangled up and started barking to I had to get up and put her back in the house. It was past 2:30 by the time I finally went to sleep and was up again before 7:00, feeling understandably exhausted. About all I did today was three loads of laundry, the rest of the day was reading or TV. I rotated the horses to the south side of the barn where there was more grass in the paddock, and they enjoyed that. Tonight, I’m having a cup of Sleepytime tea, which I haven’t had in awhile, so I’m hoping that will help. Just need to take my shower, hope it doesn’t wake me up too much, then I’ll be heading to bed. Good night, my darlin’! Love you!

Hey Darlin’,
Had a better night sleep, Lola was a lot quieter tonight, thank goodness! A few more people showed up to day ride, but few stayed around for the “picnic,” though Jamie and Dave did, so we had some hotdogs and some of her saucy chicken before they left in mid-afternoon. Once again the dire predictions of rain didn’t happen until nearly 7:00, and I managed to get all my evening chores and rounds done just before the rain. I rained fairly steady for a couple of hours, which we needed, and it cooled things off nicely. I was supposed to ride with Petra but she never showed up, so I didn’t ride or really do much of anything today, so a quiet day. Finally settled down and listened to the rain on the roof, finished a sappy book, and watched a couple of Supernaturals, so now I’m ready for shower and bed. Good night, baby! Love you!

Hi Sweetie,
Had a weird night sleep, had trouble for some reason, but finally managed to sleep through to 7:30, which seems to be becoming my normal time to wake up these days. I went around to move and feed the horses, but discovered the next paddock had two gates that were both bad, one was completely off the hook, so I had to take the time to repair those before I did anything else. It was a good learning experience, though, and once I figured out how to do it, it only took a few minutes to take care of it. Once that was done, I finished feeding the horses (though I tightened a few more gates while they were eating), pulled some more weeds, which I’ve learned are ragweed, and they’re apparently annuals, so I’m trying to pull out as many as I can so it doesn’t get worst next year. Finally got back and had breakfast, then got busy with a bunch of other little chores. I went out to put some arrows up on a few intersections of the trails nearest camp, but since I only have a few I didn’t get very far. On the way back in, I noticed the gate out to the trails had a loose clamp on it, which explains why the thing drags so much, so I decided to fix that too. I had to get some tools, then I was trying to raise the gate with the bucket on the tractor, and finally managed to get that done, so now it works much better. Unfortunately, as I was backing away from the gate, I ran into a water spigot, and that started a geyser of water. Fortunately, since I had mapped all the water valves a week or so ago, I knew exactly where the shutoff was, so I only had to turn off a few spigots along that stretch of paddocks, which no one is using now anyway, and there was a coffee can full of spare spigot parts in the shed, so it didn’t take me long to get it all fixed back up and turned back on again. Not long after that I was heading out to go shopping in town, picking up hot dogs and buns and drinks and chips and ice for the gathering tomorrow. Don’t know how many people are coming, but we’ll have plenty of food. Plus I’m planning on riding in the morning with one of the campers here, a woman who I met on the OTL. She was on her way to an event at Doe Lake, but was having some tire issues and decided not to press her luck, so she stopped here. Had a couple of non-equestrian campers come in, too, so I had to check them in. Finally was able to settle in for the evening, be soon in the shower and up to bed, so good night, my darlin’! Love you!