It's getting longer and longer between blog updates and that's because we're just kind of cruising right now. If this blog were a cross-country airline flight, we'd be about Nevada. There's some turbulence coming up as we cross the Sierras and then we'll be landing in L.A to finish the journey. Well, something like that, anyway. In the meantime, we're getting ready to ship cattle on Saturday and the cattle season will be drawing to a close. Yessir... the cruise part is over, we're about to hit some turbulence, but hopefully we'll get this thing landed and get back on terra firma.
To get ready for cattle shipping, I've been spending a lot of time feeding and counting cattle. “Feeding” involves driving around towing a cake feeder. I honk my horn to signal the cattle and they come running for the sweet, high-protein cake. This serves several purposes; it puts weight on the cattle and it also trains them to the feeder which makes gathering easier. Cottonseed cake is expensive stuff and a lot of cattle owners don't like to feed it, but it really is good stuff from my perspective. Feeding takes a lot of time, a lot of wear on the ranch truck, and gasoline costs money. But it's also a great way to count cattle and it gets me out in the pasture.
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| Trusty Ranch truck and cake feeder |
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| The wheel turns the gear which turns the chain which turns the belt... |
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| ...and the belt pulls cake out into the hopper, which an arm opens and dumps. |
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| Cattle at sunrise |
Deer season opened on Saturday and we've been out looking for a buck. This is the first season in a long time that I've had trouble finding deer and I attribute it to the dry conditions. The cattle are foraging in areas where they don't usually go and I think this pushes the deer out. But, we found 14 deer yesterday and I'll be heading back to that canyon this afternoon to see if I can waylay a buck when they come out again. [Edit: the wind came up and I never made it. Oh, well....]
On the falconry front, both birds are flying fairly well and reliably. They're both going up decently. Neither has taken a duck although the peregrine knocked a teal down a few weeks ago. I'm taking a short break from flying right now while I get ready for shipping and while I deer hunt. Will probably start flying again on Wednesday, though. Just a short break.
On the Davidic front, 2 weeks ago the doctors decided to give him 2 units of blood instead of the usual 1 unit. For some undetermined reason (there are a lot of those in this game) he didn't do well and inside 2 weeks had actually dropped to nearly his worst level. The hospital wanted us to come to ABQ that evening, but the reality of a 4.5 hr drive, arriving at 10 pm, and then etc, resulted in Mom and David going to Santa Fe and doing another transfusion on Saturday. Then they stayed over on Sunday to meet with the doctors on Monday. Come Monday, the docs decided not to meet after all, and so they came home. If it weren't for my mother's house in Santa Fe, this would a LOT more stressful, but, thank God, she has a very comfortable little place there that's a great home away from home.
I'm finally getting some solid guitar work done and getting my savings account built up again. That's nice and I really enjoy working on guitars. It's relaxing and satisfying work.
That's the update from here.
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| Sunday lunch in the local cafe. Mom and David were in ABQ. |
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| First snow. You might be able to see the sandhill cranes on the right. |
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