Just when you thought it was safe to go outside...

This is what you find. A thrashed barn. The day before this, Trent decided the grass was greener on the other side of the fence.....LITERALLY....and broke thru the gate to get to the other side.

He pulled up concrete and all! I awoke yesterday to "R, Trent is outside in the back yard with no halter on". OK....that is NEVER good. Especially since there was panic in the delivery. As I jumped out of bed (on my one lame leg and other recovering knee) and ran downstairs, I was feverishly trying to get the cobwebs out of my eyes and head. I could hardly believe my ears. And if that wasn't enuf, I find out as I get downstairs that they caught him, but that I am NOT going to be happy when I see what the barn looked like. This picture is but a smidge of the damage that he did. Somehow he got out. I am convinced there is a horsey burglar and once they saw how beautiful Trent was they came by to steal him. But once they saw him in action, they left him for me. He managed to get into EVERY bag of feed...even the ones we CAN'T open. He managed to get them ALL open. He thrashed the barn...turned over everything. So, we cannot put them in the ring cuz the ring is broken....remember, Trent did that yesterday. So Terri and I start (early) on the hunt for all the stuff we need to fix the barn. Wheelbarrow (bigger than the one we had)....ANOTHER 32 gallon gigundo garbage pail with lid to put all the opened bags of food. And of course Trenton couldn't do this BEFORE I get a huge shipment of food and bedding....NNNNNOOOOOO.....He waits until AFTER the shipment comes. We needed pitchforks, bags, pails, bell boots (cuz Buddy threw a shoe and took a hunk out of his hoof), rope halters with knots for control of Trent....whew. After that, we came home. Just in time to do all the work while it was 98 degrees and humid as all get out. I had to transfer horse from stall to stall to muck the stalls. Then, bathe both cuz both were covered in muck from being in stalls all day. Then the real work began. It took four of us well over three hours to clean up all the mess he made.

This coming the day after he killed the ring....gate and all. (see above). OK, so "Hey R, Trent is out" should no longer be a surprise to me. In fact, I almost expect to come home these days to NO horses in the ring. My Buddy....well what can I say except that when I went out to the barn yesterday and you would not believe what I saw. Buddy had a glowing halo hanging over his head. He becomes more angelic each day that passes. So, I'm up, sore and heading back to horseman's outlet for yet more horse stuff. If Trenton wasn't so darn handsome I think I'd give him the boot. However, with that said....

Until next time...

May 15...

I know, it is only Wednesday, May 12, but there is something about that date...May 15...that carries with it a cloud. Almost literally. We here in NJ are supposed to wait until May 15 to do any planting. I assumed I just jumped the gun this year out of boredom waiting for my shoulder to heal. But, having looked back in my gardening journal, I found out that, well suffice it to say that there MAY be a pattern with me here.

My sister says for sure. And she has only participated in this one growing season, but in her humble opinion, she thinks there is most definitely a pattern of early planting. OK, so I had my surgery Mar 15. Totally out of commission for a week, then slowly recouping. So let's say I made it to mid April before getting the itch. So Mid April, given the weather pattern thus far, seemed completely appropriate to put a FEW things around here. We had summerlike weather the entire month of April til this point. So I planted a few things here and there...oh....that's not completely true at all. In fact, I planted very little. It was my poor sister Terri who planted nearly everything the first time around. (Did that just pop out of my mouth like that! The FIRST time around...yes, there was a second time around). OK, so with that said, it got cold. Now, if I could have, I would have pulled all those plants in myself but because of my shoulder, I couldn't...so I got Terri. And she pulled them all in. Then in the beginning of May it got beautiful again and Terri put them all back outside.

And then I decided it was time to plant more things. So we went...that is...Terri and I. She says that I do the driving, she just pushes the petals and steers the wheel...But we came home and we planted more. This time petunias, herbs, tomatoes, lettuce...the hearty stuff. Then if you can even believe it, a frost came last week AGAIN.

What did I do? No, I didn't panic...I called Terri...and Terri brought all the plants that she planted the second time around in the house along with the plants that never had a chance to make it to a pot before the frost. This is where I started...

That May 15th date. I met a man recently. His name is Joe. He must be late seventies. I was grazing Buddy on what I thought was public property but apparently it wasn't. It is Joe's property. This very kind old man came over to me and said, "Oh, I thought you were my daughter Jill with her horse.". I said, "No, I'm just grazing my boy trying to beef him up and thought this was part of the high school". "Nah" Joe answered, "it's my property and I want you to bring him here ANY time to graze him. I'm going in to prepare the garden". "Oh, you garden?" I asked. "Are you planting anything fun?". "No," Joe answered, "I'm just going to weed and prepare the soil".

What a multitude of lessons there. I wasn't Jill (made me sad) but I did remind him of her and apparently that made him happy - which made me happy. Also, Joe was old and wise enough to know that he should only prepare the garden, not plant the garden, before May 15.

So, that is what the pictures are...the round of frost survivors...and some are questionable at that...

Next year, will I wait? I hope so, but given that I seemed to do the same thing in 2007 and 2008 (2009 is missing altogether) and 2010, I might....I just might not make the deadline (or early line) next year, either...

Until next time...

Ouch!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

All right. I have done some bizzarre things in my life...for real. I have darn near run myself over (I'll save that one for another time), I have been hit by a car, I have jumped out my window and nearly broke my ankle, I have walked around on a broken ankle for 9 days...I could go on and on. However, I do believe yesterday tops the list (lately anyway) of all time stupid things to do...even for me!

I went out to the barn to check things out. Make sure there are no critters (mice), check the traps, and of course check the plants I planted outside the barn (clematis) which were near dead by the time I got them IN the ground. I was sure they were totally dead by now, but much to my surprise, they were alive and well. Actually greening up and looking to climb something. When I prepared the garden outside the barn for planting (cleared away about three years of leaves, junk and decayed mulch) I found the mother of all cactus plants growing. AMAZING. A cactus (large I might add) growing in NJ...surviving winters. The thing is HUGE. Well, I decided to leave it at that time because I was just amazed. Well yesterday when I saw my two little plants struggling to survive the massive cactus, I decided to pull it...bare handed. Heck...there were NO visible prickers on it. NONE. So I grabbed all the way down near the root (apparently where the prickers are razor sharp and the size of hair) to pull and within seconds I was on my knees in pain with a hand full of razor sharp prickers that you literally could NOT see.

Now I know what you ALL are thinking because I thought the very same thing....IDIOT GIRL! What kind of an idiot grabs a cactus (visible or invisible prickers) by the base and pulls! Who on earth does that! IDIOT GIRL! So I stood there, staring at the deeply evil purpetrator who left me wounded and scarred...the damn cactus. I cannot even describe in words what was going through my head...it would be banned from Facebook for all the expletives! OK, now I needed to devise a plan to get these things out of my hand...which needed to be clever because I can not even see the damn (oops, darn) prickers, but boy oh boy could I feel them.

So I began feeling around with my other hand to find them. Man, as soon as I rubbed over one it was like a chard of glass pounding in my hand. HHHHHMMMMMM......OK, so I decided, since I can't see them but could feel them with my other hand (barely) but could not pull them out because they were like 1/8" long - AT BEST! So, in my infinite wisdom, I decided to feel around with my tongue till I felt them and then use my teeth to pull them out. OK, plan seems reasonable. So I started feeling around....BINGO! Got one. Success. BINGO - got another. OH! WAIT! What is that! NO WAY! That pricker made its way from the tip of my tongue to my gums. ALL OF THEM! So now I am trying to pull prickers out of my tongue and gums AND the hand that is still loaded with hair like prickers.

To make a longer story short....I had no success with my nails so I went upstairs to get a tweezer to pull them out. Suffice it to say that if you cannot see them in your hand you surely cannot see them in your mouth on the roof of your mouth none the less. So after about 45 minutes of unsuccessful attempts, I decided to just let them take up residence there and hope for the best. This was yesterday...

Today my mouth is sore, but my ego is more sore. This definitely ranks up there with running myself over with my own car!

Until next time...