What's Up Wednesday

 

I feel a little like I'm stuck in ground hog day over here... Not because everyday is the same, because I personally thrive on consistency. But because I'm still trying to get the same three things taken care of that I've been trying to get done all summer! Namely: get the pool swimmable, get the cable situation sorted out, and get my vehicles attended to. Unfortunately, everything is taking like seventeen appointments to get finished. 

The pool is nearly ready, it's still slightly green tinted, but the chemicals are all balanced and it's perfectly safe to go in. But it's cold and the heater has decided to not work. I've been keeping the electrician very busy. He rewired the heater, but now the pool guy needs to replace something on it and hopefully then it will do it's thing again. 

The cable situation went similarly. Everything was perfectly fine in my house, but the cable in the apartment stopped working sometime between when my last tenant left and my most recent arrived. I had the tech out to fix it, but it turns out he couldn't because I needed to get a stronger internet connection up there. The new boxes are wireless apparently. So back came the electrician to run ethernet to that building. I had him run to the barn too so I can get my cameras up and running finally. (That's still on the to do list though.) I have another cable tech coming this Sunday, so hopefully that will finish up that particular project. 

As for the vehicles... Ugh. So it all started because my emissions were due for the car. The same day I got my notice the check engine light came on. I went in to have it scanned and see what the issue was. It came back as an air pump and the tech said sometimes if they clear it, it will stay off because it can get clogged, trigger a code, and then be fine. I knew that I wouldn't get so lucky, but I gave it a shot. It came back on later the same day. Bummer. So I went back because a day later two more lights came on. (Of course they did.) Sensor problem, not too bad. Tech said lets see if you can get through with these minimal repairs. I did not pass emissions. So I have to bring it back in and find out what the deal is with that air pump for real. My car has 170,000 miles on it, so I'm not wanting to sink a bunch of money into it. But I have to fix it enough to get through emissions otherwise it's worth about zero dollars as a trade in. So currently, I need to schedule and get it back in. I'm just dragging my feet because I don't feel like spending all this money and the hassle of getting someone to pick me up when I drop the car off is annoying. Once the car is sorted out, I need to get the truck in for an oil change, a couple of recalls, and I think there's a nest or something in there because it smells like pee in the air vents... (Keeping it classy over here.)

Anyway, all that is annoying. But you know what's not been too annoying? My horses! Eros and Shiny are both feeling kind of lazy, but despite that, they've been great. Here is some photo evidence from last week of how cute and wonderful they are:

I'm excited to jump the new course this week with them. Hopefully no one has a nervous breakdown because it looks different... Or because I stuffed flamingos in the flower boxes:

Some of my flowers should be here today, but it looks like my fun flower holders won't be here for a little bit. I forgot to check the ship date when I ordered (rookie mistake). Bummer, but it's just a couple weeks. Maybe sooner! Also thanks all for the dollar store suggestion for flowers! That is normally where I go, but this time I sourced elsewhere out of convenience. I did get these flamingos from the dollar store several years go. I bought them a few days before Jamp foundered and thus never got around to putting them out. They sat in the backseat of the truck and I forgot all about them, until I was cleaning out the truck the other day. Good find!

Caught Pammony having a roll the other day

Pammon is still loving his feral life. Although lately he walks away when I pull out the halter for groomies. I'm not sure why, I don't remove him from his buddy or anything. I just put it on so he doesn't wander off halfway through. And he does enjoy his groomies! Horses are weird. He does always come right over when he sees me though! It has more to do with the cookies I bring I think, than it does to do with me, but I'll take whatever I can get. 

Yes, he had only one fly boot left on in that gif. I finally found my shoo fly ones I bought and never used and put those on him last night. I'll see if they're still on later today... Let's hope! I thought these other ones would be as good as the shoo fly, since they looked to be the same design, but alas they did not hold up so well. They didn't tear or anything, but they did get sort of bent. And they definitely did not stay on, He's not one to take his stuff off, so I'm thinking the boots just weren't quality enough for 24/7 use. Bummer because I loved that I could choose the colors. 

That's about it from here this week! How are things with all of you? 

What's Up Wednesday

Still waiting over here! I don't have much news as to how Jampy is doing. Seems to be holding steady. I have had a few people asking what might have caused the bout of laminitis, so I thought maybe I'd touch on that today. We will have a better idea if our hypothesis is correct after we get the blood work back.
We think that over the past year Jampy has developed some metabolic issues. I had even commented on here about his dad bod. Unfortunately, neither myself nor my vets really thought much of his weight gain. We attributed it to the long winter. He really was looking great otherwise. So as normal we did his hocks last week to get him all ready for the summer. And that's where we think things went wrong. If you have a horse that's teetering on the edge of being diabetic (or some other metabolic condition) adding a steroid will spell disaster. So that is what we're waiting to learn from the blood work. Those results will help to manage his health and diet moving forward. And obviously no more joint maintenance. What it won't do is help right now. We really just have to wait for his body to calm down.

naps help!

I'm very lucky in that my office is letting me work from home. I can do almost everything from here that I can do in the office, so hopefully my physical absence isn't causing too much extra work for anyone. I don't really need to sit here and stare at him all day, but I do need to swap out his ice boots every couple of hours. My job is 30 minutes away so I'm more productive staying here than trying to drive back and forth.

Jamp's kind of reversed rolls with my nosy neighbor...

I wonder if neighbor feels like he's being watched?

Now that we've covered Jampy, I might as well tell you about everything else going on around here. Last Wednesday I had my birthday dinner with my dad and stepmom. They got me the BEST gift!

Unfortunately, I didn't get to test it out. Also a waste was having a memory card sent second day air to have for Saturday. Bummer. Maybe I'll strap it to a pug? We'll have to wait and see! 

Rio is doing well. His tendon is looking smaller, so hopefully he'll be on the mend soon. He's been enjoying hand walks, grazing, and lots of groomies. 

In other annoying adulting news.... Tuesday when I was cold hosing Jamp's hocks I discovered that this puddle appeared in my ring afterwards:

Yeah. That's where the septic is for the barn. So that's not good. I had a guy out Saturday. He was pretty sure it was just a filter problem, but obviously that would be too easy. 

He'll be back later in the week or early next week to hunt down the bad pipe. Good times here at the farm!

This is also the week that my roofer had my house on the schedule. That's nice and quiet while I'm working from home. Especially since Artie feels the need to bark at every hammer stroke. Sigh. 

P on the other hand could not care less.

Pretty sure my company hand book says sleeping on the job is a fireable offense... But she's not actually on the payroll so I guess we won't report her.

I was super bummed to miss the Derby de Mayo party I had been invited to on Saturday. I probably could have gone, it wasn't far away, but I just wasn't in the party mood. I had a fantastic little sombrero fascinator I was going to wear though. Guess I'll just have to wait seven years for the next time the holidays collide.

One of the nice things about my family living close by is that I didn't have to miss my nieces' birthday dinner on Sunday. My brother lives just 5 miles from me, so I popped over after swapping Jamp's ice boots. The girls' birthdays are just one day apart, so while they're little at least, we can combine b-day dinners. Ellie, the younger one, turned 2 on Sunday. Keira, the big sister, turned 5 on Monday. My step mom shares her birthday, but I'm sure she doesn't want me broadcasting her age!

I didn't stay too long, but got to watch them open gifts and have a hot dog. It was the first thing I'd eaten that wasn't a bagel with cream cheese or potato chips for three days. So that was nice!

A couple of weeks ago I was approached to make some bracelets for awards at an upcoming horse show. Since I'm pretty property bound, I managed to get those all made up this weekend.

They came out cute! These are my favorites:

That's where we're at so far this week. This duffle bag pretty much sums up life right now: