Ok, today the wind is gone. Not even a light breeze. But still cold as hell. You cant win. Yesterday I got fooled by the early morning light breeze and thought the blowing was done. And then it kicked up later and blew hard. I hate the wind.
I may have never mentioned how out here in the country there are lots of animals. Ground dwelling birds of every kind – pheasant, quail, grouse. And wild turkeys, of which we have 40 or 50, in a herd, that summer on our land. They roost in our trees and make quite the racket, you know, gobble gobble. Its quite the sight watching them, at sundown, fly up one by one into the tall trees for the night. I dont hunt them though sometimes I give it thought. The Toms tend to be very large and would probably taste quite good. Not like chicken.
In addition to the wild animals there are a million feral cats. Plus domesticated cats that are dumped out here. We have two cats, both former ferals that we tamed. It can be difficult to resist. Over the years we have found, or been adopted by, stray dogs. One a Paparanian, half pom half Papillon. We kept him awhile then found a good home for him. My favorite was Petey, an American Bulldog. Named for the dog in Little Rascals whom he looked like. One hell of a dog. We found him down the road a mile, he was limping and panting and we thought he was not long for the world. We put him in the car lr and took him home. Miracles do happen, by the time we got home his limp was cured and he no longer was overheated. Smart dog. He was big, about 140lbs, and strong as hell. Very friendly and well mannered. He loved to go for long walks. He would take off across the fields at full blast, very impressive speed, turn around a half mile out and tear back to where we stood. Was always scary because it looked like he wasnt going to stop. Last second he would veer off. I watched him on several occasions leap the drainage ditches, about 20 ft, on a dead run. A sight to see. He liked to run straight down the middle of the full irrigation ditch blowing water out each side and over the top of him and at the end blast out and take off. We found him a nice home.
I mention all this, not because of the feral cats Trisha recently grabbed, but because we have a new dog sorta hanging out. It appears to be a cattle dog. Black and white and is a male. Cant say whether its intact or not. The dog is very afraid of people. It can be sitting 100ft from the house and I open the door and the dog runs away. Far away. I have been feeding him and he has moved into the hog barn. I should say, I leave food for him. He is never around when I put the dish down. I do not know how long this will take. We would like to get him calm and people friendly. Once we get that far we can get him to a rescue and get him adopted or to a nice family. Not mine. I dont want more pets.
So what did I do today? Plenty to do. I went to buddy Jims sho. Had to drop off his wife’s Christmas gift. He asked me to pick it out for him. Jim knew I would be better at it than him. He’s right. After Jims I went to see my personal stylist Rachel. I made her a coffee too. Rachel is the gal who lived over our garage for a few years prior to Trisha. She is now pregnant as well. Which is not important here but I thought I would mention it. Afte Rachels I went to the drug store. I needed a gift box. I dropped in on my workout coach. I had an 830am meet up with her yesterday only she did not show up. She claimed it was for today. I think she misses alot of appointments. We rescheduled for Friday am. Hope she is there. I dropped off a package at the UPS store next. That time of year. Friends need gifts shipped to them. I drop big $$ doing so. Merry Christmas. Vacaville beckoned, and I responded. Pictures were ready at Sams Club for Emily. Of course I picked them up for her. I am such a nice guy. One last thing, a trip to the grocers then home. Finally. Put all the crap away and I went upstairs. To do actual work. I pulled copies I needed from the file. I called the IRS for a client, long hold, two transfers, but got what I needed. Which is a true surprise. By this time it was close to five o’clock.
Emily called around five on her way to yoga. But I had most everything handled for dinner. She also had to go to the store. We cant get through the day without hitting some store. Sadly.
I made a roasted pork salad for dinner. Its really nothing more than a green salad topped with a twice cooked pork loin. We baked loin steaks yesterday. Today i chopped them up and fried them and added some spicy habanero jelly to them while they cooked. The pork then goes on top of the salad. Very good and strangley healthy as well. Also diet conscious. Win win baby! For a beverage I made mai tais. Perfect combo. Bad for diet. Lose lose baby!
Not much else to the day. Dishes and put away crap. Emily already went to bed cuz she is a bum. I will head up there soon. Have to water the dogs first.