Wednesdays Wonderings and Potpouri for $1000, Alex

What a wonderous world it is that we live in, isn't it?? On so many levels. I laid awake last night, thanks to two cans of pop I had earlier in the day (smacking self on hand because I KNOW what happens when I drink pop after noon), thinking of just a bunch of miscellaneous things that are just weird. Do you think I could remember any of them at this point?? Of course not. So let me tell you about my irks right now instead. I'm going to vent. I know, that came out of left field, didn't it? But those were some of the thoughts going through this mind of mine last night on our way to the barn to have my first ride in over two weeks. The ride by the way went excellante. I was freaking thinking we were going to have a bonifide rodeo going, but I was pleasantly surprised. Grandpa watched the boys, so hubby and I got some quality alone time, hehe. Anyhow, my mare has not been rode in over two weeks and in fact has only been turned out to run in the indoor arena once in that time. She was jumping at everything on our way to and from the arena, so I had low expectations. But when I went out to ride, she didn't even move when I got on her. Normally she will try to start walking off and I have to keep stopping her until she lets me tell her to go. But she didn't last night. So that was a plus. AND, I think she has figured out that when she spooks, she doesn't need to dart around the arena. She spooked twice last night and she is starting to spook verticle and then freeze until I make her walk off. yay!! It's kind of funny actually and makes me laugh. So last night was a good night. I am a little worried about our little paint mare friend though. Since the cold weather started, she quit eating hay and started dropping weight. Fast. So she's down at Ohio State University and has been for over a week now and we haven't heard a word about what's going on with her. I hope she's ok. :( She's a little doll.

Here are my irks, these are all horse related right now. We are the only borders in our barn that have more than one horse. We are not difficult borders and we do not ask for special treatment. Board for two horses is not cheap. Here are my irks.
- We are out of sawdust. Irk one. So if we go buy our own, do we get that off board? No. "Things happen and the mill hasn't been open" the past couple times the b.o. has been out to get it. Ok, so if we are paying this board, which is supposed to include bedding, shouldn't the b.o. find an alternative supply?? I really don't mind getting out own as TSC is on the way, but 4 bales of sawdust is about $25. And we are paying board so that we don't have to worry about these little costs that add up. It sucks and we can't take it off board. Which takes me to my second irk.
- The b.o. put a note up on the board that he wants ALL board paid in cash from now on. ???? Do you know how hard it is to get $500 in cash?? Our atm has a daily limit. Our checks are direct deposited. We have a budget, which includes paying board by check, so that we don't have to visit the atm 3 days in a row for board alone. We have other things that need to be paid that we need cash for as well. I think it's a crock of shit. Why cash all of a sudden a year and 1/2 after we started there?? We've never bounced a check, and we've NEVER paid late. Not once on either of those. I have a feeling other people have though. So we are going to have to talk to the b.o. and let him know what an inconvenience it is. Is that bad? Should we just not care and I'm just making a big deal out of nothing?? I don't know what else to do though. There just aren't very many boarding barns around here with an indoor AND outdoor arena and lots of space to ride (since we don't have a trailer, yet) and it's really not a BAD place. If he's trying to make it so that he doesn't have to claim it as income for his business to pay taxes, wtf, it's not like we give him 1099's or something. I could care less what he does with our money once it leaves our hands as long as we are getting what we pay our board for!! grrr. Ok, that irk was part of this next one.
- The notes on the board. We are seeing the b.o. less and less it seems, and there are more and more notes on the board. He's not a shy man by any means, so why the notes? Why not try to make face to face contact with the boarders on decisions like these? That way, if there are questions, no one is stewing, (or gossiping as the case usually is) but they can be addressed right then and there. I just don't know.

Ok this irk has nothing to do with the barn, but my hubby. I love him, I really do. But he makes comments sometimes that make me want to smack him upside the head as hard as I can to try to knock some sense into him to see if he knows what he's saying. He said this to me last night. "You know, if we weren't paying $500 a month in board for these horses, we could afford a house sooner." Like what, we are supposed to sell our horses (or give the one back to the rescue) just temporarily so we can do "things"???? How about you find a better paying job??? How about you quick frequenting 7-11?? How about we give up these gps units that are mislabeled as cell phonoes??? How about we cut out cable??? He makes me so mad when he makes comments about that because it's like he just doesn't care and they are "things" you can just throw away and who cares. He makes comments about our dogs like that too. He doesn't like our blue heeler because she barks too much. He likes her other than that, but he just wants to "get rid of her" because she's annoying and barks too much. I'm like, I'm sorry, but when I take on an animal, ANY animals, it's till one of us dies. I'm a pet lifer. Now I will say that we did have to give back our gelding Chip to the rescue we got him from and the reasons were two fold. We could just not afford board for three horses because our circumstances had drastically changed from when we had adopted him to when we had to give him back. The choice was NOT easy. We chose him as the one to not keep because he was dangerous. He was very unpredictable and would be fine one day and buck my sorry butt off the next. And when he bucked, it wasn't just a little "I-don't-feel-like-working-today" buck, it was more of a "you-are-NOT-riding-me-today-and-there-will-be-no-if-ands-or-buts-about-it" type buck. It had meaning. Now if we had known the joys of chiropractors back then and could have afforded it, maybe things would be different. But that boy had issues. And the other reason we chose him instead of my mare (who at that point was still crazy and wildly unbroke) was that he was going back to the rescue. We didn't have to worry if he would be at the next auction slaughter bound or if he would be starving in some field or being abused. We felt horrible and I cried forever because he really was super sweet. Except for that, I refuse to just "get rid" of an animal just because someone's tired of it, or whatever. So his comments are just really irritating. They usually follow with "and then we can get" another horse, dog, whatever. Uh no. I've told him if we get rid of something, it will be a looooooooong time before we make the decision to get another one. If one dies, that's different. And no, we don't go around just offing our animals. lol Much to my husband's chagrin, they usually live long. Like our goldfish. lol

So those are my gripes for the day. And maybe tonight, as I'm laying awake looking at shadows, waiting for some mystical figure to appear to me, I will write down what crazy things cross my mind so that I can share then with you tomorrow. :)) Have a nice night all. We got about 6 inches of snow overnight so we are staying home and being cozy :))