dec 19 2022

ouch...  

in th process of having a new web.... i have had several comments about not finding the chicken brick donation. 

 clicking on the bottom of my emails  OUGHT to get you there....

Alien tape I bought some ---they sent me three rolls--- I almost used one roll before  the other two roles disappeared entirely---- I am about to order more and I do recommend it ----it's not too bad ---eventually it did  let go on a scrap basket that we had next to my mail call but it hung on there for much longer than anything else I've ever had and the surge strips on the wall are still there that was my best alien taped project.

 

Luckily..... I was invited to let my dogs  run over at Meredith farms and let me tell you they were beautiful the fields are just lovely and those absolutely gorgeous stone walls all over the place I let the two of them out and then I drove around what is about a half a mile   of dirt road while they galloped over the hills and Yonder.. actually it was just gymini and malarkey ---I had left sizzle home I'm not sure why.

Carl who is with Janine a lot of the time has become a regular farm dog ---where he  goes with her while she does chores... he’s  usually within about 20 feet of wherever she is..  but his manners are not 100% when it comes to recalling him to put him either in the barn or in my car.. so he needs some practice there but he is trouble free with other dogs entirely as he and Wanda tag after Janine.. my two came back and slept the rest of the morning..

 

And we have started the struggle of fencing... in the arena--- mostly on camera....  The object is to put a fence between what will be the riding area and things like the oil tank and  huge pile of koranda beds and miscellaneous odd objects that we didn't get out of there------ the steps and the backup channel are all piled in the corner which would be an inconvenient distraction when riding a horse in there which we hope to be doing very soon.. the fencing is proving to be a challenge... it is white plastic and we'll look beautiful eventually but right now the 8 foot panels slip ever so gently into two holes on the post assuming you have the post buried to the right depth in the dirt.... which is my job on the tractor.. the first 8 foot section was a disaster hopefully it gets better -----we will need about 3   8’ panels. on each side and it will look lovely when it's done----- that arena is 60 foot by 80 foot---and when I originally planned it,   riding area would be 60 by 60 and I would have 60 by 20 for a “closet” all the stuff which is now in the G tent...(. or in the dump ) this  “closet” now  is mostly odd bits of service dog projects paraphernalia.

 

It's been a long time since I had to work the backhoe---and let me tell you if I gain another 3 pounds my tummy is not going to fit between the seat and the levers... the only way I could get in the thing is to have one of the stabilizers lift me up hydraulically  ---The typical. ”  jump in” is out of the question.. but this works.

 

That last rainstorm deposited so much water that you'd think it was muddy March... and I'm told we have another rainstorm coming before the end of the week... what I would call a dark green and yellow... because that's what it looks like on the radar.

Whatever happened to the weather prediction of things like “red sky at night is a sailor's delight ---red sky in the morning sailor take warning..”  ??

I don't know when it changed from -----anybody's guess----... to noticing that we were going to get whatever was happening in Ohio the day before.. I don't think that was part of my childhood at all ---you looked up.

Now they're predicting the weather 30 years away when florida  will be just a figment of someone’s imagination. 

'nae man can tether time nor tide "  

good ole robert got that right.

tis the season

to not forget your most important service person..

your trash collector.

those are dollar bills....

 dec 18 2022

wow... that arena. is looking very respectable...  i still have more stone dust in th e  pile to put along the right side. today...  as for  the mud/ manure..... on the outside is totally out of control and will need masterson's.... a  huge contractor business--...with their dump trucks to move it out of where itis...it is all pure shlt whic was not picked up on a daily basis. so.. add rain and it is 8 inches deep....masterson usually likes it. and doesn't charge the usuall huge price for his equipment---- because add a few things and by next spring it will be valuable top soil...   note when i type shlt i have to use a lower cas "L" instead of the i...  same for female dog. bltch. so it "passes"

 note.... if it was picked up on a daily basis we would not have this problem...  between elizabeth and janine, there is no "manure mud"  at meridith  where they have 3 times the number of animals over there.  i would rather hire masterson's than beat up our tractor  ( and my bladder) on the  mess.

 

As cold air moves in....  it’s music to my ears?  ...( actually it is the rock music that I hate. Like noise to my ears).  You want real  problems???  My Snow suit has no trap door.  Time for indoor projects .. and lotsa wood... “comfort food” has taken over already.

 

My forerunner says it is getting 11 miles per gallon—maybe—I spend almost asd much time going backwards as forwards and I don’t know if that affects mileage.

 That last storm was 99 % rain... so judy squirted diluted dawn all over my car and I went out to drive 80 mph  on route 95 to rinse it off.. did a pretty good job.

That  experiment worked better than the drier vent on the wood stove vent... in an effort to put heat on the floor....  I was told  by a science type that it is nearly impossible to push heat down.... I agree at the moment.

For a while our scissors seemed to be reproducing on their own... but i find that  they have migrated to Meridith farm and were bussed to  the 5 diffrerent barns-- where they have melted  into the meridith society and are  now gone to their  own version of the rainbow bridge...GONE----

you would think.......

this is my kind of race...

no one cares about first... just finish !

 dec 17 2022

thank heavens for cookies ( dog kind). my 3 dogs appear at my elbow at 4:35 am for their morning cookie so they don't have an empty tummy that gets very upset and tries to be more emptier...,,.,.

I am told there will be on the arena camera today As a few of the ERN=-- people are scheduled come do something especially open the gates for me so that I can start putting that stone dust back in the arena--- from a heated tractor cab--- shouldn't be too difficult it's all power steering so I sit in an air conditioned chair and wiggle my fingers not too tough....looks good tho.

 

I watched the two donkeys be transferred through the arena out the back door with great enthusiasm... those two donkeys look pretty well socialized already... I just need about 8 more like that to try and pull together the pack burro race. by next summer.

I had hoped to have it been down memorial drive in Cambridge--- I may get there yet.. but the other option would be through the historical the estates of Ipswich and Hamilton like the Appleton farm and the Winthrop farm that would be an interesting way to go also.... Apparently the people who ran the one in Colorado will travel the countryside putting on these I wish they weren't called a race because that hardly describes wandering around the woods with a donkey.

 

donkeys are the most underrated animals I know of ------so I'm hoping we might start some educational process here... and granted I can't do it but then there's Karen currently with a broken? arm who loves the donkeys.. very enthusiastic and agile so if I sit and make suggestions maybe we can get six or eight of these donkeys usable... which basically means they will trot along with you quite willingly...  and peppermint candy almost exceeds sliced carrots----- problem with peppermint candy too much as they begin to look for it and pinch.. which is why I try and promote frying pans instead of hands.. but for this pack burro race concept every donkey is supposed to carry a frying pan and a pick and a shovel.. so we're all set---

 it does google,,,, looks like the donkeys enjoy it too.. in the photo most donkeys are actually leading their joggers.. but they do need preparation..it is not a race... but a n

.episode.. or happening,,,

 DEC 16 2022

by 1/16th of an inch... it looks like we are all rain--- i think it ustabee... called  torrential rain... as in liquid blizzard???? i think all equines under my care have access to shelter of some kind... so if we put some hay in that shelter i can call them fed-- for the storm... out in the wild.... they will back up to a big tree as a windbreaker.....we have some juggling-- there was the usual concern for our lady mini donkey and the 2 new. temp visitors ... i hope she remembered the broadway song about." remember it is he who has the fun ... and thee the baby"- these apparently belong to someone further up ht line of "rescue" and the just needed a few nights place to park them... i know that two of the "truckers" are veterans with the great business of schlepping things and animals around the country...with a sequoia typoe vehicle- that willing ly pulls trailers... they have the van set up for their "living/sleeping"  one guy.. ? john? brought the 2 pups from florida very nicely... slept here for a few hours and was gone across country... great business... i know ERN is really a network of like souls.... at the moment there is a mule at somebody's farm where this ERN paid for the farm to put up a "run-in. shed". for their uas and anyone else in the Network.. there is another person... who watches the auctions and is pretty good at spotting a horse/mule/donkey who would fit in a specific program. and is trusted to buy it... on ocassion... it is for that reason i must today get the tire fixed on the horse trailer. because it is needed for this network of schlepping somethng somewhere... i do not know how they keep it straight. -----another unknown... there has been ocasion where they buy a horse or pony, that is in such terrible shape with broken things that they immediately euthanize it to spare it falling in those terrible trucks to mexico...  now that is a rescue in my book.... a "softer landing"  on tv overnight was the map of the states that do not allow "state computers??? to run tiktok,,, i may not have that quite right- concept is vaLID.. N.H WAS ONE OF THEM--- COME ON MASSACHUSETTS...   full masking seems to be sneaking back on the population around massachusetts----

.www.crazyacresfarm.org https://www.memsaic.com/servicedogwall FROM SANDY'S LADY RIPPLE.... Well they are saying that all that stuff that makes people really sick is back and has two more bad things with it! I think we need to tell them to start wearing their mask and keep their hands and feet clean just like me!

 dec 15 2022

i am delighted to report... no ice in 9 and 10-- turns out 100 years ago a shut off was installed at kennel 8 because 9 and 10 ustabe my shop- the whole ice theory was correct according to all you camera people.. until we found some one had shut off that valve we did not know existed.

so the  intellectual  information  of "water expands as it cools from.  from 4 to 0 centigrade so ice floats should be stored for future use.

bud has yellow duct taped 2 other known shut offs...  he really should. make an underground  map of this place...

cellebrating the ipswich news 3 year  party last night-- judy was my external memory device-- since--- in that crowd i could not understand a word anyone  said..  i did hear my name mentioned by the editor and it must have been positive or i would not have been invited... betsy was there and offered to help with  the new equine page/// ipswich is very horsy so the editor was all for trying that  too...  so that means another 400 words  of ERN nature..  there will be ice covering Hades before the ERN project can't come up with 400 words to talk about. 

just sitting here....  thinking. HAY.... and the fact that  drought has affected the supply.....nation wide !!

Not sure if I have told you all...  but.... at one point in my life I was in the hay storage barn of wayne cashman’s parents in Canada..

It was easily 3 times the size of our arena--  this is the kind of place truckers are now transporting from... which then land locally and we run around and see who has the best--   things like source and supply are WORDS  really coming into play as many of these Canadian hay growers did not get second or third cut hay and there will be a shortage.. so it behooves us to stay as well ahead of it as we can with probably a weekly load of hay between Meredith farm and crazy acres... I don't think there is any substitute for hay. not that I know of—I did hear a veterinarian say there was an increase in the cases of colic.. which he attributed to people trying to cut back on hay...20 pounds for a 1000 pound horse... per day

 

and other story regarding  hay and the. Cashmans.....--- when I lived in Lynnfield ,  Andre was my hay supplier. and he would bring I think it was 30 tons at a time maybe----  there was a day when Wayne and his brothers we're at our farm in Lynnfield and they looked at the hayloft and how the hay had been stacked and they didn't like it so they took the 30 tons and threw it out the window and very nonchalantly threw it back in the window and stacked it differently---- never batted an eye I think it took them about 12 minutes.. it was a flabbergasting performance... Wayne's wife is a quarter horse owner and that's how I know her.

 

There are a huge number of horses in. florida—with all it’s weather problems—there is

wolgemuth auction  web. and it has a hay testing video..... someone goes  around and tests the load with a long test  probe.. and people bid on it.

 I found the hay resting video fascinting.

..who knew????

 dec 14 2022

moving on to   the weekly hay delivery.... thankfully a nephew showed up to help unload yesterdays "load" of hay-- i am told the owner of meridith farm helped unload it too...   that whole operation at meridith is amazing-- and efficient !! all except that marvelous husband of el.izabeth  who is "A" cheerful.  and "B" very helpful  ( remember he offered. to go back in the  grocery stoire for me !!)  ... he broke a leg-- not in one.. but at least

3 places... including his heel?????  so i had to loan him my walker so he can put his knee  and cast on it and keep going ( his armpits are already sore.....) eliz immediately wondered if we could put a bale of hay on the walker with  this broken leg...

the nephew that showed up... from wash/dc is the  one who struggled to put delores together in a wonderful; mail call with he and  his  twin brother running around with a woman's arms and legs...-- he has also done  tipi overtime.. very helpful...no longer a teen.

grants--- it sounds so simple-- write an explination of why you are doing whatever and someone sends you money.. how wonderful..

 Except if not quite that easy----what they don't tell you  in  the fine print, Is that there are 5000 other people competing for each dollar that they have to spend.. I feel sorry for the people who have to read all these applications for money because there are so many deserving charities...  I have to give special whatever for the guy on the TV contest who started urban farming with some available land of five acres he managed to produce all the vegetables for about 2000 people I may have forgotten some of the details but it was an extremely impressive charity

i remember ----here we go---when I was delivering magazines in Chelsea MA I got talking to a homeowner there who had a tiny little garden and how many tomatoes he was getting out of that garden and how he wished his ability was much better etc so I told him to meet me next week same time same place that I'd have a surprise for him... so I went out in my back 40 and filled the trash can with honest to goodness  aged horse manure.   And the guy was absolutely thrilled.. and called it a farmer's gold... which is true and boy have we got a lot of it right now...

 

my chore of the day is to scrape outside the stalls and try and get it into many many trailer loads and take it over  to brick ends farm . which is another shlting story  ----it is in ----I believe---- Hamilton MA which is a very wealthy community for money and land ---I am told it's the highest concentration of horse trailers per square mile than any place in the United States -----Someone passed a law about composting horse manure and everybody in Hamilton began to have a problem with what he would do with it..  so a guy opened his farm for a horse manure processing farm..--- when you can’t lick ‘em , join  ‘em.----.... and to start with it was a bit of a  joke----- I just went over there two days ago with the soggy black trailer full and drove past his little sign that said ----(-manure dump to the right  no cans .. no string...... no trash) so I went there and I backed up to a pile of horse manure that has to have been 30 feet tall and 100 foot Diameter ----- I'm allowed to go in there with this trailer full because my  pile of manure is approved .. I am allowed to dump there and I am also allowed to go back and spend $125 to buy back the processed  stuff I just gave him..

.

 dec 13 2022

goldie has a weird way abou t her.....

Apparently---- the water  to kennels 9 and 10 is not working..... lynn told me... and without giving it  too much thought, i suggested...it was probably ice... because that pipe is slightly. Tipped – higher at kennel 10 so we could drain it in the feed room,

Here is where it gets scientific and realllllly boring to some....

 

In the entire world as far as I know everything expands as it gets warmer and contracts as it gets colder with one possible exception..  thankfully ------as water approaches being frozen ice it actually expands contrary to the rest of the world.. which is very fortunate because ice floats and if ice didn't float this would be a very different world ----all the ice would collect at the bottom of the Scotch glass that would be a bad thing..

so with ice floating and that pipe slightly tipped.. I concluded that it was beginning to freeze and rose to the higher point by kennel 10 where it froze blocking the pipe..  this would follow the law of physics exactly..

 

now if that is not what happened---- then I don't know what the hell did.. and I'm willing to address any other suggestions people might have.. in this case I think the ice is like the Canary in the coal mine,

 

all right---- So what if the thing freezes we just thaw it  out drain it out and let it go of that... except.. This pipe runs the back of the sleeping lofts of all these dogs.. and though the kennles have been and usually are heated to at least 55 degrees... somehow that 55 degrees and frozen just plain don't match... that water pipe used to be just above the pipe that heated those kennels  But it's been so long since I've looked it over I don't know what's happening now -----what I do know is if those sleeping kennles are 55 degrees the water should not freeze.  But it may have- unless someone can come up with another reason....

 

Now we have a brand new and tremendously efficient thermostat sort of deal.. which send a message to Lynns cell phone if the temperature should drop below 55 degrees Or above 90 or whatever..  actually lynns cell phone and marks well because  he  lives  closest.

I was thrilled with this concept it looked absolutely beautiful---   Lynn could keep track of the whole barn from way up there in New Hampshire and mark could come fix anything that was wrong and all was good..

and then that damn pipe /blocked???//frose.???

 

Great danes cannot live in 30 degrees---- they can run for a few minutes... but they have no hair.

 

today.. SDP has to figure that out somehow.. I can not crawl up and around those lofts... besides my assignment has been moved to manure management because behind the stalls has not been cleaned  for ? a year?  I didn’t check—and then Janine did...

those pasture  over at meridith, have  no manure.. she runs around with a wheelbarrow and picks up the  piles  daily...--- so that place is clean.

This was to have been done here – but I am now... with the tractor ---scraping up about 8 inches of pure manure,,,, not even an ounce of bedding...

 

For the SDP crew....  this  frozen water pipe concept must take precedents over all others  ---mommy nature knows darn well water does not freeze at 55 degeres. Something is screwy... God bless Lynn for noticing....  Have at it !!