Another productive weekend

After Duke broke through the 5-wire fence around his paddock I got really concerned because that same sort of 5-wire fence is what we have around the entire back pasture.  So despite the fact that he's been sick as a dog ever since he got home this time, Mark got busy and installed the solar fence charger on that back fence.  Now Duke will NOT break through it and wonder off down the road, nor will the neighborhood stray dogs get into the pasture to harass our horses.  (I never worried about that when Bug was alive, but Duke and Lizzie are waaaaay too friendly with dogs to be entirely safe.)

And while Mark was electrifying the fences, Lisa and Buddy cleaned up both horses.  Now Duke -- no problem.  Grooming him is never a problem - it's actually fun.  Lizzie? . . . NOT so much. 

Duke and Lizzie AFTER getting cleaned up Saturday.

Duke always looks wonderful.  Lizzie always looks . . . well, LESS than wonderful.  But over the last few days she looked and felt like a horse statue instead of a horse.  She had rolled in so much mud that it felt like she was made of clay, with no actual hair. 

But although she still doesn't LOOK as good as Duke, at least you can tell she actually has hair now.  They got most of the heavy dirt off of her -- although if you pat her a dust cloud DOES still rise!  But Lisa and I talked and decided that if it gets warm one weekend we'll give her a bath.  (Of course then we'll have to lock her in her stall for the day until she dries out completely or she'll be right back to rolling in the dirt!  Sigh.)

Oh - when Mark was installing that fence charger, the door to the storage building got left open, so I walked over to close it because the LAST time a door was open to that building, Duke walked in there, then couldn't figure out how to get back out.  When I figured out where he had gone, he was looking out the front window!  I was afraid he was going to rear up and put his legs through the glass!  So when I saw the building open on Saturday, I hurried over there to close that door.  Well, it's been YEARS since I even looked inside the place.  Check this out!  I couldn't BELIEVE what it's like in there!  We probably need to just hire one of those companies that come out and haul things off for you.  I'm sure there's all kinds of stuff in there that Mark might need -- but how the heck could he possibly FIND it if it IS in there!!!



No WONDER Duke couldn't figure out how to get back out!  I don't think I could either!



Oh well -- that's up to Mark, I guess.  But he wants to clear out the other half of the garage so he can park the Expedition in there.  In order to do that, he's going to have to clear out the storage building to make room for all the stuff that's in the garage.  You know, I don't think either of us has it in us to do a project of that magnitude anymore.  Time to get more help, I think.  We'll probably need a giant dumpster among other things from the looks of it.  Well, Mark will be heading back to work on Tuesday, so nothing is going to happen for at least another couple weeks.  (I hope he's well again when he comes home next time!)  But it's time to stop worrying about it for now, I guess.

Oh - and once Buddy and Lisa finished with the horses, Buddy came in and moved that queen sized bed down from the upstairs guest room to my sleeping porch for me (and took the twin bed that was on the porch before upstairs -- I'm going to turn that into a daybed.).  But wow, am I ever happy about having that queen bed out there!  It is SO great to be able to sleep outside on a "real" bed!

That table on the right is just there to keep the dogs from getting to the plugs for the electric mattress pad (on the right side of the bed) when they're out there during the day.  I move it back over at night when I'm out there so there's actually more room along the sides than there appears to be.

There's just a little more than a foot of space on each side, now, but that's plenty for me.  I'm thinking, though, that I might need to add a pipe along the top of that screen wall so that if there is a horrendous rain storm with high winds I'll be able to pull some waterproof curtains closed to protect that bed now that it sits so close to that screened wall.  Or on second thought, maybe I should just get a giant plastic tablecloth and put THAT on top of the bed if it storms.  That's probably way simpler, come to think of it. 

Well, it's almost 11 -- time to go out and put that bed to use!