Rain, rain, rain . . .

But it could be a lot worse -- did you see those tornadoes over in Dallas?  They hit over in Arlington, too, where I lived while I was in school.  Odd how if you've ever been somewhere it seems way more scary. 

But actually, it barely rained at all here today.  The storm system moved across just above Baton Rouge so it was just a light rain here today.  Of course, it WAS enough to make the paddocks a muddy mess again.  And it didn't do much for Arthur's hair, either!

Arthur with his "rainy day hair"

Since most mules have manes that grow straight up in the air, I will eventually cut his mane down, I think.  Not sure whether I want to roach it completely, or try and cut it something like this Fjord.  Isn't that cute?

Well, not exactly like hers.  Since she has a black dorsal stripe down the middle of her body, she has a SOLID line of black hair inside those two rows of cut/shaved white hair. But if you pretend that black hair isn't there, I think that would look good on Arthur.  I'd just cut Arthur's mane down to 2 or 3 inches high, then shave alternate spaces all the way down his neck.  Cute. 

But first I really need to clip Lizzie.  I keep putting it off because it just seems like such a huge process.  I did clip her forelock yesterday, though, since that hair seemed to keep getting in her eyes and getting stuck there.  It looks a bit odd now, but today when I checked she didn't have those big sticky clumps in the corners of her eyes finally so it must have helped to keep that hair away from her eyes.   

But I still need to clip all that long hair off of her entire body.  Then if THAT goes well, I'll move on to Arthur's mane.

And speaking of Arthur . . .

Back when we boarded our horses over at Al's place, a woman named Lizzie boarded two mammoth jacks over there -- briefly.   ( ;-D . . . long story.)  But anyway, my point is that she is the only person I'm aware of around here who has worked with donkeys and mules and not just horses.  So . . . I got her on the phone this evening and asked if she would come help me train Arthur since he's been behaving a BIT differently here than he did where I bought him.  Ahem. 

When I told her I bought a mule, she told me that not long ago a guy asked her to get him two mules and train them to pull a cart, but when she went to buy them the prices were so good she bought FOUR of them and ended up training two sets of driving mules.  She said one set was very large (draft cross) and one regular sized.  (When I told her how small Arthur is, she seemed very happy to hear it!)

Anyway, her husband is on vacation at the moment so she said she needed to check with him and see what he has in mind for this weekend, but she said she WOULD come help me - either this weekend or next.  Yeaaaa!!   Be great if she makes it this weekend, though.  I DO have a long weekend, what with Good Friday off and all, and it's supposed to be sunny and clear finally, as well.  So - we'll see.   She definitely will come by soon - either this weekend or next.   That's great!

Of course that saddle Jan brought over still isn't set up to ride with.  I hate to admit it, but I already managed to lose those billets I bought last weekend -- THE SAME DAY I BOUGHT THEM!  Good grief!  That tells you two things.  (1) My memory is just AWFUL, and (2) the house is such a mess that it's easy to lose about ANYTHING.  I need a visit from that declutter guy of Oprah's (Peter Walsh?) big time!  Mark and I have talked about getting a dumpster and asking Buddy and Lisa to help us by either a) taking things home with them, or b) throwing them in the dumpster!  I have so many things that I've planned to sell, that have ended up piled all over the place instead.  At this point, I think just getting rid of the stuff would make us feel every bit as good as making money from it! 

As for the missing billets -- if they turn back up, I can always return them since they're still in the bag I bought them in, complete with receipt!

Sigh.