My Haphazard Journal

Discussion in 'Personal Diaries' started by Allie Seay, Mar 4, 2015.

  1. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    It's a lovely day here. Very springlike, though tomorrow we return to winter for another little while.

    For reasons other than the beautiful weather, I am reminded of a fourth of July morning several years past.
    It was then that Ken (crazy man) first startled me shooting squirrels.

    I know. They're cute little animals. Who couldn't love a squirrel, right? But when their population gets to be too much around your home they can be problematic. They get into things. They mess with (and eat) electrical wires. They chew out the entrance holes in all of your bird houses thus turning them into squirrel houses, which then fall off the trees because the squirrels weigh too much.

    Plus, when the apples come in they will tote away every single one they can sink their little teeth into--nevermind that the apples are twice the size of their little heads. The thieving of the granny smiths is reason enough for Ken to blast all squirrels with dynamite, but he contents himself picking them off with a shotgun.

    The problem is, the squirrels aren't stupid. They quickly learned that Ken is harmless without it, but when the shotgun appears they'd better take cover.

    Ken grew tired of them making a fool of him. Taunting him when he was gunless and completely disappearing when he wasn't. So he decided to try something new.

    I was ducking for cover and looking for bottle rockets to start zinging around me on that fourth of July morning that Ken first started shooting squirrels from inside my kitchen. He doesn't do it every day. And it's been awhile, but there he was this morning BLAMMING away with the door only partially opened.

    It's just a really nice day for this time of the year, so I don't think the season is upon us as yet; but soon I'll wake up to the sound of the gunshots with real regularity. Apples will need protecting, after all.

    The sound of that shotgun unmuffled in my kitchen and the sight of Ken in the doorway will always remind me of that fourth of July. It will always make me feel like some pioneer woman. And it will always make me think that if I were a pioneer woman I'd have a good recipe for squirrel stew.

    But I don't, and I don't think I want one.
     
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  2. Richard Paradon

    Richard Paradon Supreme Member
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    I think that there may not be very much meat left on the squirrel after being blasted with a shotgun! Here in the city I have only seen one squirrel and he was all black in color, and when I am at my jungle place, I have not seen any, but up there we have some scary animals that I avoid.
     
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  3. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    I feed the squirrels here. Since my cats are stuck inside, at least during the winter, I like to keep them entertained. Since our house used to be an apartment building, there is a fire escape on the second floor, so I put bird and squirrel food out there, and our cats sit in the window watching them eat, sometimes slamming against the window so that they can watch the birds scatter. Our one year-old is especially excited about them. She chatters away at them, and can sit there for hours watching them eat. For their part, the squirrels have learned that the window provides protection so they sometimes come right up to the window to look in at the cats. So far, I have only seen three squirrels though, and the other two chase the third one away.
     
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  4. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    I've never seen any black squirrels on our property (You think there's a reason for that?), but I have seen quite a few of them in surrounding areas. Large squirrels, they are. And pretty.
    I've also seen some albino ones close to one of our favorite fishing lakes.
    We don't live in a jungle area here, but our property backs up to a large piece of government property that is a wildlife preserve. There are some pretty scary animals around. Large cats, though not as large as what you might see, and wild hogs, mostly.
    I agree with you that when blasted with a shotgun there shouldn't be much left of a squirrel, but I see them laying there after (from the window) and it appears there is more left than one might think. Of course, I'm not likely to know as Ken tends to get them cleaned up and out of sight before I go out. I don't know what he does with them.
    The gun he uses is not as big as the one he uses for deer hunting. It is a smaller, lighter one that he actually bought for me, thinking he could get me interested in going hunting with him. The little girl down the road from us has been getting deer with one just like it ever since she started hunting with her grandfather a few years ago.
    Anyway, Ken has never managed to get me interested in getting up before daybreak to drive for an hour and walk through the woods in the dark to climb a tree in the cold, only to sit for three or four more hours. I'm perfectly happy preparing his biscuits and setting up his coffee the night before; and, of course, kissing him goodnight and wishing him mighty hunter's luck for the following morning.
    Quite often, too, the times that he's gone hunting are the only times I have in which to do things around the house in precisely the order in which I want to do them. I like that every now and then.
    I get a bit of time like that during fishing season, too. That is, if I'm not the one who goes fishing with him, since that is something we both enjoy.

    Ken, I often feed the squirrels here, too. Though unintentionally. I feed the birds and the squirrels benefit. I enjoy them. It's just that there are so many that it's sometimes unreal around here. Even with Ken thinning them out, they are everywhere.
    People come to visit and make remarks about the number of squirrels we have.
    I also remember putting bird feeders close to the windows in apartments and other homes I have lived in during the past as much for my cat's enjoyment as my own. Many times I remember standing in a window in winter with my little friend on a table beside me, actively engaged in a cat to human conversation about the birds.
     
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  5. Richard Paradon

    Richard Paradon Supreme Member
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    Hi Allie! Yeah, it does not have to be a big animal to be scary! The biggest threat to me (great fearless one) are wasps. I one have been stung one time and that was enough. It was beautiful as it was half black and half yellow and I tried to get closer to look at it. Well, beautiful or not, it sure was not sociable as it stung my ear! OUCH, I still get chills just thinking about it!
     
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  6. Pat Baker

    Pat Baker Supreme Member
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    I throw the old bread and cereal out for the birds and squirrals, when I have not provided any food for a few days the squirrals will sit on the deck and look into the house, like the are saying "Hey Feed Me". We are just going to throw the bread out anyway so why not help the birds and squirrals and ants get some food, they are God's creatures too.
     
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  7. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    During the summer and fall, when I am working on our camp up north, I often bring food for the squirrels. One of them in particular, the one that lives right around our camp, will follow me through the woods, going from tree to tree, scolding me if I didn't bring him anything. While I was laying a ceramic floor in the camp, I had left the door open. He came inside the camp, and stood at the door chattering at me.
     
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  8. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    I hadn't even considered wasps and such. No! I'm not fond of stinging insects either. I find that most times they leave you alone as long as you leave them alone, but you can end up right in the midst of a nest of them before you know it.

    I know when Ken and I go riding we've always got our eyes open for yellow jacket and hornet nests. In fact, as much as I sometimes like it when we get together with other people and have long strings of riders on the trails, I still tend to prefer it when it's just the two of us. Yellow jackets are common and, particularly in the fall, they are just plain mean. When you have a string of riders come through and disturb a nest, the first couple of horses seem to get by before the yellow jackets get too stirred up. And the last two or three horses are ok because they and their riders have had a heads up about what's coming and can find a way around. It's the horses and riders in the middle of the string that get eaten up.

    Plus, often the riders hit the ground and end up hurt in a bad way when their horses get stung.

    Needless to say, I tend to like being the caboose when their are a lot of riders.
     
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  9. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    I've noticed in the last few days that the grass is greening up here and, thankfully, the horses are not eating quite as much hay as they have been.

    It was such a lovely day that Ken and I were going to go on a quick horse ride and check out our campsite this afternoon (after church), but we decided to get our bikes out instead. We rode to Madison, which is about a thirty minute country ride southeast of here. They have a new Steak 'n Shake and neither of us has been to one in years. Well, decades, more like.

    Anyway, it was a pleasant ride and a good meal.

    We popped into the Madison Goodwill while we were there, but we didn't find any goodies today. It was fun anyway. You can't get lucky all of the time. Right?

    Tomorrow we plan to go with our original plan of today and go to our horse camp for an afternoon ride. That is, if Ken feels up to it. He seems to be a bit off tonight. It could be the time change, I suppose.

    After that, it's back to working on the kitchen floor again. The tile is coming along nicely, but we have to do it a little at a time so we don't completely isolate the important things while we're waiting for tiles to set. That would be things like the refrigerator. The stove. The sink. Stuff like that.

    I've been feeling like a mountain goat. Hopping from one place to another to avoid the spots I can't step on.:)



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  10. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    So we took a break from the two things we are almost finished doing anyway--wood cutting and tiling the floor. Well, tiling the floor will be ongoing next fall, but the part that we intend to finish before summer is nearly done.

    Anyway, the break.

    We took two horses out to our camp for an overnight trip. Much of the first day was spent just cleaning up the camper, though we did still have plenty of time for a two hour ride before dark. Our longest ride, though, was the next day (Monday), when we rode for five hours.

    This is such a lovely time of the year, as it is warm here and everything is just starting to green up a bit, but there still aren't many leaves on the trees. Which means you can still see far out into the woods when you're riding. A little later on and the greenery will prevent that, but will provide it's own kind of beauty.

    Ken made a couple of short videos. The first one was on the first ride and the second one the second. Easy enough. Not very good videos. It's hard to take them from the back of a trotting horse, but I'd reckon they're ok enough for here. I'm not really sure I can get them on here correctly, though.

    We'll see.

    If you hear me fussing in the background of the second one it's because I hate when people leave piles of trash on the trails, and this is a spot where it happens often because it's a favorite place for many to camp.





     
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  11. Richard Paradon

    Richard Paradon Supreme Member
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    WOW is all I can say! I loved the vids although I wish they had been longer. I understand your grief about the trash leavers. Used to be "Pack it in and Pack it out" but some people are too important to clean up after themselves.
     
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  12. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    We have a ball on our horses.

    It's still "pack it in and pack it out" for most. I don't know what's wrong with the rest. Just plain inconsiderate, maybe? And, judging from what we see, I'd have to say that sometimes it could be people who really don't have anywhere to live at the moment who leave the most junk behind. Those I kind of feel for without really knowing their circumstance. They don't make up the larger part of it, though.

    The bad thing is that there are people in our local government who really don't like the horse people on the trails and so it is inevitably the horse people who get the blame, no matter that logic says differently. It's always been the horse people who were willing to go in and clean up the trails in the places where they get trashed, and those places are always in the sections of the trail that are accessible by car. Where other people camp, in other words.

    The horse people have their own places to camp; and, needless to say, those places do not get trashed. Or, if they do they get cleaned up right quick by some of the horse people because Ken and I have been riding those trails for almost twenty years and the places the horse people camp are always well kept.
     
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  13. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    Well, now I know for sure that spring has sprung. Yesterday I got my first tick of the season and this morning Ken found the second on my belly. He's more squeamish than I thought, I guess. Especially for a hunter. He wanted me to go right away and get that thing off. I was busy cooking breakfast, though, so I told him the tick would have to wait. Besides it wasn't itching so I told him I thought maybe it deserved a last meal.

    Like flies, they don't eat much.

    Ken turned a nice shade of green.

    And speaking of green, it looks like the neighbors on our left have decided to clear the back part of their land for pasture. They're doing a neat job of it and I like seeing their horses almost as much as seeing mine, but I'm going to miss the feeling of seclusion those trees provided in our back two pastures. I guess you could say that heaven is taking on a new look.:)
     
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  14. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    A lovely rainy Sunday. Ken and I did almost nothing that we didn't have to do as we stayed inside all day. We did smoke a nice pork loin on the back porch and we enjoyed that.

    And this morning before church I got a good laugh out of Ken. I had bathed and shaved one of our little poodles last night before I went to bed. I usually do that outside in the sunlight where I can see very well, but I'd put it off for too long and didn't think I'd get a better chance for quite awhile.

    That poor dog. I'd snap a picture, but he looks so pitiful that I just can't. I scalped him all over the place, I'm afraid. I did the worst job I've ever done on him including the first time I ever tried and I advise no one to ever shave their poodle in a room that's not well lit.

    Anyway, Ken called me into the bathroom, asked me to shave his neck and put a razor in my hand. I said, "You haven't seen the dog yet, have you?"

    I think he seriously did rethink his request, and while I was shaving he was saying, "Aren't you going a little high? I just want it evened up."

    "Hey! You know what I'm capable of (or not). It's your own mistake.":)
     
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  15. Allie Seay

    Allie Seay Veteran Member
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    Wow. So busy this past week that I haven't even made it here once. I had a farm sitting job all week, which is something I used to do quite a bit of but not so much in the last few years. The woman I was sitting for is someone I used to sit for and so I knew all of her horses quite well. Even so, I was unprepared for how a couple of them had aged since I'd seen them last.

    That's the way it usually is when you see an old friend you haven't seen in a long time, though.

    Anyway, there was that and then Ken and I were spending just about every spare minute getting a car ready for our granddaughter, Audrey. We'd bought it before Christmas and intended to give it to her then, but decided that it needed a paint job first. Ken and a friend of his spent hours painting that car and getting it right in weather that was really too cold for painting.

    On top of the cold, it seemed like that paint job was just cursed. Everything that could go wrong with the equipment did and they ended up redoing (and redoing) things so many times. This week, though, Ken and I spent time working on the interior and the exterior, just getting it all waxed and cleaned up very nicely.

    Poor Ken was so sick of looking at that car that I also had encouragement detail. I was really pleased with the way the car came out, too; and Audrey was thrilled when she picked it up yesterday. I don't think I've ever seen her so emotional.

    So today, Ken and I both woke up tired and feeling washed out. Needless to say, we did as little as we could get away with, not even making it outside the gate to go to church.

    Hopefully tomorrow we will both be back to our normal active selves.

    Audrey and her daughter, Gracie-bug, beside her new car.


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