hqueen's collection of Far From the Usual stuff.

[lcertuche]

You never see that many horses with coats here in Arkansas. It gets cold but it usually doesn't last long. When the sun comes up it warms up most days.

 

[hqueen13]

Actually, it's funny that you say that. My trainer lives in FL and she found through a funny situation that the horses did better when she puts sheets on them at 50 degrees. They drank more water, which to her is important for preventing colic. Me, I wouldn't blanket if I didn't have to. It's currently raining, and when I got up it was only 33 degrees, and my horse was without his sheet. But it's also supposed to be raining and go up to almost 50 degrees. I didn't want him to get too warm, either. It's a double edged sword, and you're constantly worrying about them no matter what you do!

Well. I'm such a dork that I spent most of yesterday getting my budget back on track. I'm proud to say that I was able to pay about $750.00 towards my debt yesterday once I got things organized again. I'll be able to make another payment again when I get paid. I'm set up to be able to manage my debt and get it back under control again. The business, well, it's still struggling, but I can see a little light right now. Since I've got 4 horses that gives me some breathing room to be able to pay some of the debt off. I'm also pretty well stocked up on feed for a while. I need to buy hay, but I should be able to manage and get that debt paid down. I'm tired of seeing big numbers when I go look at my credit cards. I want to see lots of zeros!!

The other good news is that the BF is giving me permission to set up his budget. With the money he has in his account right now, we were able to make a $2000.00 payment on his credit card. Plus he also remembered part of the reason it was so high is that he had to put some medical bills on the card while waiting for reimbursement from his Flex account. So that will be another $700ish that will be knocked off the card as soon as the checks come in.


I can't say just how excited I am to be really getting a handle on things. I had to really get serious in the most gentle way possible (he freaks out and shuts down otherwise) with him that I wasn't sticking around if he didn't change his spending habits.

We also set him up so that he has $200.00 he can spend any way he wants per pay check. I won't say anything if he spends the entire $200 drinking coke (well, I'll grumble under my breath, but still...). If he has a surplus, then it will just accrue, and he can buy himself something bigger with the funds if he wants, or we can readjust his numbers and give him a little more money towards his bills, it will be entirely up to him. And as of right now, he has all of this month's bills covered. I'm so excited to be moving forward with this. As soon as the tax return comes in it will get dumped on the credit card as well. Git'er done!!!

So I took my christmas money from his mom (I should have made him chip in some too!) and bought a dutch oven so that we could cook venison stew. The recipe had rutabaga in it, which was very interesting. I wasn't able to get all the ingredients anyway (who has Juniper berries and dried green peppercorns anyway!?), and I ended up putting too much lemon rind in it, but it turned out great. The meat just fell apart, and the flavor was nice even if it did have too much lemon in it. Next time I think I might try turnips instead of rutabaga, partly out of curiosity (can't tell if it's too much lemon or if the rutabaga does taste strange), and partly because my grocery store only had GIANT rutabagas, and one fo the videos I watched said that the larger ones don't taste as good. I'm proud to say that over this holiday we've only eaten out once. I think it was once, maybe twice, but once that I remember off the top of my head. And by this holiday I mean new years... LOL. It's a start, now if we can just figure out how to keep cooking. We do have quite a bit of leftovers in the fridge right now, so hopefully we can keep using those, and freeze some, and then keep cooking in bigger batches. I'm sure that will be the key for us, but it's a matter of planning on doing it that makes the difference.

Did I mention that I took my pictures to be framed? I can't WAIT to see them... the suspense is killing me! I think they'll be ready next week. Of course this week will go by fast enough.

I'm currently sitting in the office while the office is closed waiting on the IT guy so that we can do some computer work while nobody is around. He's a half hour late, so I'm sitting here wasting time doing whatever. I owe myself a half hour, anyway, so we'll call it even from here LOL

Hope yall had a good new years and that this year is looking up for everyone!

 

[hqueen13]

Well it rained almost all of Monday and Tuesday. It's just been gross. Everything is sopping wet and the mud is knee deep depending on where you are. It's slowly bringing our reservoirs back up, which is a good thing. I've missed seeing water over the dam.
I managed to dodge most of the rain drops yesterday to get feedings done, so it wasn't horrible. I also had to stop by the frame shop and pic a different mat out for one of my pictures because the color that we picked was discontinued. I'm a bit bummed even though I know it's still going to look good. I can't wait to see them. The other two pieces might be ready by Friday, but that piece won't be ready until next week since she has to reorder the mat for it.
I'm only working in the office a short day today and then I'm going to go over to the barn and help SB clean everything since the horses were in for almost 24 hours due to the rain (no shed in her pastures, which is crazy, but whatever...). So we're going to clean everything up good, and even do a bit in the house since we've been tracking in mud, too, and then we're going to soak in the hot tub. My neck is killing me today along with the general soreness in my back, so that is a very very good thing! I can't wait! The day is going so slowly, and I wish it would hurry up!
I currently have a headache, which is rare for me. Not sure what brought it on, but it is probably tension related (and likely the same reason my neck hurts so bad today). So it goes.
I need to make sure that I crank out my last tracking for my financial stuff because I have my meeting with my accountant on Tuesday. Looking forward to finding out how fat our tax return is! I'm claiming close to $10,000 in mileage this year. I've driven an INSANE amount, mostly due to farm sitting.
So putzing along... not much else to share right now.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Hope you feel better! You are on the ball with getting your tax stuff done. I'm sure I'll put it off until the last minute - as usual. I have about 600 feed receipts (give or take, lol) in the console of my truck that I need to get entered on a spread sheet....procrastination is something that I'm very good at.

 

[hqueen13]

FEM thanks, I hope I feel better, too! I'm sure I will!
LOL, yeah, I was there back in November. I was about 3 months behind on my financials, and I decided that I didn't want to have to sort it all out in January. Since we almost always get a return, I like to get it done so that the return can help us pay off debt. The flip side is that if we owe, we'll have about 4 months to figure out how to come up with the money, or ask for an extension. A lot of my other friends delay it as well, but I love getting it done as quickly as possible. Plus the accountant isn't as busy, which means she is going to be more focused on processing everything than if I waited until April! It's also a LOT easier for me to sort out the mileage when it's still fresh in my memory! I drive so much that it is hard to remember two months later. I think I'm going to tally some of that today while I'm in the office. Might as well be productive for something

 

[hqueen13]

Hot tub last night was GREAT. All day headache, not so great.
Finally went away once I got home last night and the BF made me lay down on the couch after I took some ibuprofen and I took a nap while he made the mashed potatoes for dinner. That was super yummy. And I did feel better later.
Finally getting my shipment of hay. I really need to pay him $200 per month to have it paid off by the time I use it up. I really don't like dragging it out any further than that. I can probably pretty easily do that, so long as the barn stays full. We'll see what happens on that front.
I also realized I have 5 bricks of small bales (21 bales per brick) so I don't need small bales at all this year! WAHOO! I'll hardly use them up with the horses I currently have. I could even stick some of them in the feeder instead of the big bales if I get desperate. It also makes me feel a bit better about all the small bales I used up that were DB's since I was worried about owing them back to her. Now that I know I have so many I don't have a problem giving her a whole brick's worth!
They're calling for a little snow tonight, that will be nice to see some pretty snow. It's also crazy cold. Which means no mud, which is helpful after all the rain we've had.
Looks like it will be clear for my jaunt to NYC this weekend though. That makes me happy. Traveling in bad weather to a place I don't know is not on the to do list.
I've only got one more day at ES's farm feeding. I can't wait to be done. She's been gone for SO long. I guess I'll have to make arrangements to stop by on Sunday or Monday to pick up what she owes me. Which is a lot. I hope nobody goes out of town for a while after this!!
I have a call tomorrow with a gal that might end up being my next business mentor. I'm very excited about it, so we'll see how that goes. I also have to do a check in for CM's mom's mule that was left alone after they lost his companion last night to colic. Thankfully they aren't planning to move Toppers back up to her mom's, but I'm not sure how they'll handle the mule as he's grieving hard right now. Hopefully a communication session with him will help. He's a sweet boy, but also older, too.
That's about all that's happening around here... just chipping away at things!

 

[hqueen13]

Had a good weekend all in all.
Friday evening we had dinner with TW and VO, which was fun, as always. We were really late, though, after I'd asked her to do dinner earlier.
And we were late because I forgot the key to the farm where I was farm sitting. So my friend TM was going to come over and go down to soak in the hot tub with me. She was recovering from a cold, and I just wanted to get in one more time. We both showered and put on suits at our houses, and when she came to my house, she said she could drive since her truck was all warmed up. Great, so I hop in and we ride down to my friend's farm. We arrive and I remember, gee, the key to the house is in *my* truck. We both have our suits already on, so we change in the barn into bath robes and get towels, and head into the hot tub anyway. I text my BF and let him know that I need the key and if he can come down that would be great, and I tell him he should get in with us. We sit in the tub, and the jets go off twice before we finally decide to get out, and still no sign of the BF. I dry off enough to check my phone and see a text from him that he'll be down in a while. I text him back and ask what he's doing and he says he was doing some stuff, and says "oh, I'll get in the shower and then come down." Mind you, it's now after 4:30, and we're supposed to be at TW's at 6:30 for dinner, and it's 20 minutes down to the farm where we are without too much traffic and it's rush hour on a friday night. I'm like, um, NO, you need to come NOW, like you should have come over an hour ago when I texted you the first time!!
So we change out of our wet suits and into dry clothes IN THE FREEZING COLD BARN, and finally he gets there when we're standing there waiting on him when he finally pulls up. I couldn't finish feeding until he got there because the feed for the old men was in the house soaking so that it doesn't freeze. So I start busting my butt to get chores done, and he futzes with my truck and waits on me so that TM can go home and get things done that she wanted to get done.
So yeah, that's the saga of why we were late to TW's house for dinner. I felt really bad after I had asked her to have dinner a bit earlier. We had a great time though, as usual, and really enjoyed the food. TW is an amazing cook with an equally amazing kitchen.

Saturday morning it started snowing again, and so I got up and got things organized and fed the horses before we headed down to get me to the bus. It was an easy ride up to NYC despite the snow. I met my friend at a cafe across from the bus drop point, and that worked out really well. Then we had a bit of a walk/ride on the subway to get to the meeting location. It was great to meet a lot of business people and do some networking and chatting. After our meetings were over we hung out and played pool and enjoyed everything. When everybody left, I went and crashed with JA in his apartment, and we finally went to bed after 12:30. I slept until I couldn't sleep anymore, and got up about 7 and relaxed and read until I needed to catch an uber to get to the bus stop. Only downer was standing in the FREEZING cold waiting for the bus to arrive, which took 30 minutes (I wanted to be sure I had plenty of time, and so I caught the uber pretty early). It took me half of the 3 hour ride home to thaw out again!!

Easy ride home, and the BF picked me and up and we went and got food because I was starving by then (2 granola bars really doesn't equate to breakfast). We headed home and I crashed for a nap, and then we got up and did chores. Finishing chores we were walking back down the driveway to the house, and I slipped on ice and wrenched my knee. I felt it do the thing it does that's not good when I went down, and so I spent most of the rest of the evening on the couch relaxing a bit.

We finally went down to the chicken coop to take care of the girls late in the evening. The BF had forgotten to open them up that morning, and he didn't collect the eggs the night before because I guess he forgot the bucket when he went to close them up. Well, guess what, eggs freeze. And that makes the shells crack. And that means they're not sellable. I guess he learned his lesson in caring for animals though.... Princess chicken's water was completely frozen and she was out of food, and obviously had been for a while. He was complaining because the dog peed and pooped in the house, which I am also pretty certain was because he didn't let him out at the right time. Oh well, he'll learn one way or another.

Today my knee hurts, and I tried to stop by the PT office to talk to KM, but the desk gatekeeper didn't want to let me through. So I left my number and I hope she calls me. I just need to chat with her and have her poke and prod a little bit to make sure that I don't need to go see my doc. I'm not happy with the way it feels and I can't afford time down right now. Too many things that I have to take care of.

The energy has been a little strange today, so hopefully that settles down again soon, and hopefully it doesn't bother the horses! Who knows when things get wonky.

After all it was 8 degrees this morning...

 

[lcertuche]

I just read the disclaimer about typos due to your smart phone. It reminds me last year when I was texting my son-in-law condolences on his favorite uncle passing. It went some like this "Rob I am so...no be quiet get out of here oh no its typing what I'm saying stop stop" and then somehow the post was sent in the excitement so of course I kept calling until he answered the phone. He just laughed because he knows what a crazy, loud Wildbunch my children are. Moral of story don't text condolences.

 

[hqueen13]

LOL. That's hilarious, @lcertuche My phone has done that a time or two, and sometimes it comes up with the most absurd words when I spoke/typed something completely different! I don't even know how it knows some of these words! Thankfully, I have interwebs back, so most of my typing is now on a computer, but sometimes it's still true!

Well. The knee is not improving. I put a call into my doc on Tuesday, and have an appointment for Monday. I'm anxious to get there so I can get this figured out. I don't like babying it trying not to do anything stupid (or normal) that will injure it further. I've got a lovely bruise showing up on the front of the knee, and some swelling in the inside back of my knee, and I can sort of make it up stairs and can't make it down stairs at all if I'm not wearing my brace. That's NOT good.

And on top of that, I went rear over elbows again yesterday morning. Thankfully WHILE wearing my brace, so my knee didn't get hurt, just my pride and frustration. Yesterday morning was NUTS with black ice. It was really really really bad. It had been super cold, but was warmer overnight. We got rain early in the morning, and since the temp was hovering around freezing, but the ground was colder, all of it froze. I took the dog out, and that was fine, but then I tried to cross the driveway to get into the truck to go open up the chickens, and the driveway was NOT fine. Driving down to ES's house to pick up the money from her I passed a fence that had 2 completely separate breaks in it from people sliding off the road. The BF said he was white knuckling all the way to work. And of course it was the kind of thing where no one knew just how bad it was until you were out in it and couldn't really turn around. Very scary, I'm so glad the BF was safe.

After my fall again, I cancelled my phone appointments for yesterday. I probably could have done the second one, but I'm glad I cancelled it, when I finally got on the road to run my errands (and pick up my $$!) it was late, so I would have not made it back in time anyway. It all worked out for the best. So I picked up the money, went to the bank and put it in the bank, and then headed over to pick up some lamp oil someone was giving away on Freecycle. Freecycle is so handy! 2 unopened bottles of lamp oil!

Got home, ate lunch, organized the budget since I put the money in the bank, and then got on my class call for my animal communication stuff. That was interrupted by my doc's office calling to get my insurance info and then discovering that the new insurance I have requires a referral, and that when I signed up for the insurance they assigned me a PCP who I don't even know... Thankfully when I called my insurance the guy switched it right over, and then I called my PCP and they sent the referral right away. Let's just pray that everything that they said actually happens and I don't have any more glitches to seeing my Doc because I seriously can't delay this at all.

Got in to work this morning and was checking my accounts and discovered that the whopper credit card payment is coming out of my personal account instead of the business account. Entirely my fault, because I forgot to switch the little drop down on the credit card payment screen, but NOT a good thing. I barely have enough in that account to cover it, so I moved some money around in the hope that it will help. I don't have enough collectively in the account to manage it, so we'll see what happens. Hopefully my pay check drops in before the payment comes out and I'll be fine. We'll see anyway. I immediately jumped on the chat thing with the credit card company to get the payment reversed, but of course that can take up to 8 days. Seriously. I don't understand how in the world of instant interwebs it can take 8 days for something to clear. Buttons should be clicked and money should move. It makes no sense to me why the banking industry is still so behind with the instant stuff.

So yeah, fun times....
So after all that freezing that we had, today's high is 60. This weather is crazy! Since it rained I didn't go out into the pasture to pull the sheets off the horses this morning or check the hay. Mud walking is not something I'm keen to do right now with my knee not being stable. The BF said he's going to be in the area today, so he'll do it. Of course, if he does it, he's probably going to attempt to get out a big bale with the bobcat, and I have a sneaking suspicion that the mud is going to be a bit worse than he thinks, and he'll have a hard time doing that (read: probably get close to being stuck, and take WAY more time than he should to get the job done, AND the ponies will be romping around him hungry the whole time). I TOLD him to throw a small bale instead, but we'll see if he listens. I'm almost hopeful he can't get there and I'll just text a friend to swing over instead, and TM can do things the smart way. We'll see.

This afternoon he's meeting me at work and we're going to drive up and get his glasses, and grab the things I forgot at the store, and then eat dinner together. That should be nice. I'm glad he's got his glasses, too. That will help him, I think he'll wear them since they'll make him a lot more comfortable at night driving.

Not sure what it also says that I'm just now getting my Christmas thank yous and our "holiday letter" mailed... better late than never, ehh?

 

[frustratedearthmother]

So sorry about your knee! Really hope you can get it figured out quickly and resolved even quickly-er, lol!

That ice ya'll have is so scary. Not something this southerner could deal with. Be safe!