Horse Perception

Sorry about having two posts in one day.  I had an interesting thing happen with Gabbrielle and wanted to mention it while I have time.  She a very affectionate mare, always looking for hugs and kisses.  I went in for a hug, and she startled me by snorting and jumping away from me.  I figured the annoying neighbors were around and did something to spook her, so I tried to hug her again, and she

Stinkage

People have asked why I'm not jumping for joy over moving to a new house.  It's because I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Historically, whenever I make a large purchase, something bad happens and I regret making the purchase, because I end up needing the money for something else, like a big vet bill or hospital bill or repair bill...  Also, I can rarely enjoy blessings before something

Cleansing

We finally got some snow this winter after being promised some for several weeks. I feel sorry for all these pregnant robins who thought it was spring...

Though I can't stand the cold anymore, I do love the way a fresh snowfall seems to quiet everything down and cleanse the neighborhood. There's less traffic on the road, less construction noises, less trash to look at. I've been seeing

A Quick Note

I've been buried in legal paperwork this past week and have had both phones ringing at the same time.  Our real estate agent is worth her weight in gold... or maybe I should say she's worth my weight in gold, since she's a skinny little thing and I'm almost too big for my horse.  We spent several days negotiating a deal on a house in Arizona, and the seller kept coming back with counter offers

One Foot In Front of the Other

I've been trudging ahead.  My apologies for being absent from your blogs.  Never ever ever try to settle an estate, pay taxes, refinance a house, buy a new home, and try to fix up the old home for sale all at the same time.  Even if you had ten clones, there wouldn't be enough of you.  I got both phones ringing at the same time, emails coming through with forms to sign, and people coming to the

Lots of News

House Hunt:  I spent literally all day and night yesterday getting paperwork together for a home loan approval and finally got the pre-qual form late last night.  Now I'm in the phase of investigating this home a little closer and possibly making an offer.  Turquoise Pants is still living on the porch next door sucking on her cigarettes and staring at me all day, so it feels great that I'm one

What I Learned From Watching The Amazing Race

Originally, my plans for Monday, if I didn't find a house were to go letterboxing and geocaching to help me get to know the areas around Phoenix better.  If I did find a house, I planned to meet with a lender either in person or over the phone before leaving for the airport.  However, it got to be nearly 11:00 AM and my real estate agent still hadn't contacted me with a list of lenders.  I was

Sunday's House Hunt

A lot happened on Sunday, and the Internet it really slow in uploading pictures here at the hotel, so I'm only going to share some of the more important pictures.  Otherwise, enjoy the story of our adventures.

The first house we visited had a horse paddock, breezeway and tack room, but it was way up high in the mountains.  There wasn't a whole lot of space in the house, and the distance to

A Day at The World Wildlife Zoo

I promised my husband I would post this last night, but I fell asleep before the pictures finished uploading. I took the kids to The World Wildlife Zoo in Litchfield Park. It gave me a chance to do something with them other than house hunting and eating, and it also allowed me to meet my son's girlfriend. Here is a medley of some of the animals we saw:




Oops!  I don't think we were supposed

Saturday's House Hunt

The real estate agent, my kids and I all met up north of Phoenix to look at a horse property short sale. This was the first one I'd seen where the home owners kept the house and property clean and didn't attempt to destroy it on their way out.

It was a beautiful home, open, airy, light, no funky smells.  The first thing I noticed was that all the horse properties were surrounded by beautiful

Friday's House Hunt

I'm sitting here in my lovely hotel room with the sliding glass door open listening to the sounds of city traffic, honking, crosswalks beeping, and boisterous voices while I try to air out the disgusting smell of perfume that smacked me in the face when I walked into the room.  But it doesn't smell any worse than some of the short sale homes I looked at today.  My olfactory sense hasn't been this

False Impressions

I took Midge back in to see the vet, because my Corgi still seemed anxious and was urinating more than normal... and normal is a lot for her.  The doctor instructed me over the phone to not let her urinate for a few hours before her appointment, so that they could get a decent urine sample.  The poor dog was running around nervously panting because she needed to pee so bad that I took her in a

We Finally Got Something That Was Promised

Yup. The weatherman finally came through for us. He's been promising snow off and on all winter, but I think the last time we got it was October. We've just gotten to the point where we ignore snow forecasts because they always end up being a few gray clouds drifting past.

Our haystack that was already drenched with rain was hanging in there. We lost a few bales to mold, but most of the

No Love Lost

No love lost here in the neighborhood, because there never really was much.  Last night I needed to clean stalls, put the horses away, feed and blanket them, but the annoying neighbors had a ton of people over at their place all hanging out next to my barn.  There's a woman living with them who I call The Chain-Smoker, because she comes out onto their front porch every five minutes to smoke, so

Before the Storm

It seems that our nicest days are always the day before a storm is expected to move in. I took advantage of it by riding Bombay, who was killing me with his boredom. You know how people tease you by trying to block you from getting where you are going? Bombay does that to me while I'm walking around the horse paddock shoveling manure. He anticipates the next pile of poop I'm going to scoop

Pups in the Sun

I woke up yesterday morning trying to decide whether to do a photo shoot at the animal shelter, because it was such a nice day, or whether to work on my novel. The county decided for me by bringing in more heavy equipment to do road construction in front of my house. I started loading my car up with photography equipment and ran out of the house without finishing my make-up, drying my hair or

Earplugs, Please

These pictures pretty much sum up how my week has been going. The truck traffic outside was more obnoxious than usual. I looked out my window to find this truck blocking the end of my driveway...

And this truck blocking our mailboxes...

There were tractors and other machinery parked all up and down my private drive. The county employees who were supposed to working on the road were all

Poor Midge

Over the holidays, Midge was restless and panting, drinking a lot of water, and spending more time outside despite the cold.  I was about to take her in to see the vet, and she instantly got back to being her old self.  We figured she probably got into one of the kids' Christmas chocolates and had some chocolate poisoning from which she recovered.

Then over the past week we've noticed that she's

Please, Somebody Send Me a Good Luck Charm

I'm in a crabby mood.  My junk yard neighbor had a U-Haul truck filled with more junk spew its contents all over his property this weekend.


He's had pickers coming and going at all hours buying junk from him ever since.  I decided to report him to the county again for running an illegal, unlicensed business.  I spent hours phrasing the letter of complaint just right, and then my black ink

Moving Questions

I'm taking a quick break from my semi-productive efforts at preparing the house to be put on the market.  For those of you who have experience moving, I've got a few questions.

We are in a situation where our house is stuffed to the gills with furniture and clutter.  I want to install new flooring and fresh paint, but that means moving all the furniture and stuff someplace else.  I'm not willing

Another Adrenaline Burst

I'm trying keep my Facebook page all business.  Sometimes family or a friend posts something hilarious about sex or burritos or dog poop and I desperately want to respond, but know that my comment will be blasted all over the place, and that would very unprofessional.  Also, being on Facebook means getting invited to events.  I rarely accept social invitations mainly because I can rarely keep my

Off Topic, But...

Is anyone else being driven batty by excessive phone calls containing political messages and surveys?  We have been getting calls at least every half hour throughout the day and night.  I think it is indecent to call private homes after 8:00 PM, yet the calls keep coming long after that.  I find it so ironic that our politicians tried to protect our peace, quiet and privacy by creating the