102.3 in the shade

The horses lined up when I got the hose going around 4. What a week.

heavy heat

The temps have gone up again here and we're expecting high nineties all week with 101 on Wednesday.

Our weekend has been quiet, mostly getting outside chores done before the heat sets in, getting horses comfortable in the shadowy barn with their fans for the heat of the day, and offering cool showers with the hose around dinner time, when it seems to be the worst.

Yesterday I did my Saturday morning feed store run (two kinds of horse feed, black oil sunflower seeds, a new natural oil fly spray concentrate) and then stopped by the library. While looking for something they didn't have, I found Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres and decided to read it again.

Later in the afternoon, my daughter and I went out to lunch and then to the food co-op for Dr. Bronner's Peppermint soap (great for cleaning bits) and eclairs (great for us). On to the drug store for a new stash of hair bands and stain remover for the chocolate I managed to get all over me from the eclairs.

In between, my husband got two loads of hay, 76 bales, which cleaned our wonderful hay grower out of his first cutting of square bales. The feed room is packed now and we're all hoping for more good rain so his second cutting can get safely baled and in the barn. His hay is the best I've seen, and when he runs out my stress level rises. His wife sent us homemade grape jam along with the hay.

After the horses ate dinner and went out for the night, we settled in for the first season finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. After watching Firefly in the spring and becoming a huge Joss Whedon fan, I'd held off on Buffy. It's not Firefly, but Whedon's sense of humor is very much there and I am getting fond of the series.

This week is going to be all about managing the heat. Thank goodness for cold water!

getting down to the bones

Today was my day to read in writing group, and I was eager to move on to the next chunk of the novel I'm editing right now.

I've been reworking the structure and now my focus is the voice of the main male character, a CIA agent who is struggling with the ungrieved death of his wife 26 years ago and his 26-year old daughter who has run off, south and west, in response to a marriage proposal.

I'm shifting the Scott sections from first person present to close third past, trying to find a more distinctive voice. What I have captures his sensibility but the expression is too lyrical. Too similar to the voice of his daughter.

Today's advice is to dig right down to the bone of the matter. The rhythm of the sentences and the actual sentence structure itself.

I have an undergraduate degree in English but if someone asked me to parse a sentence I'd be about as horrified as I was taking the GRE math section.

But as we talked about how to tackle this task, a group member read some of my sentences out loud and suddenly I could hear the voice differently. I madly jotted down notes and some very concrete things to try with those sentences.

I might have jumped right in upon arriving home, but made the mistake of opening my cell phone bill and discovered $600 worth of TEXT MESSAGING charges that are NOT MINE - I don't do test messaging!

I'm officially on a tear and have clients tonight so all this will have to wait.

But I have the notes. Will get to the bones. I read again in two weeks and I'd love to knock some socks off. :)

Keil Bay comes for a visit

I was sitting on the sofa just now finishing Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns when I looked up to see Keil Bay watching me. I think if he could figure out how to get up on the deck, he'd come right in.

Hosseini's newest book is brilliant and heartbreaking. I think everyone should read it.

the mysterious muscadine caper and the very loyal sidekicks

Monday morning Keil Bay ate breakfast as usual. From his bright blue feed tub, he munched two spare scoops of Vintage Senior, one cup of black oil sunflower seeds, licked his Glanzen and DE and Source, crunched his carrots, and did the grand panther walk back out to the field.

Within five minutes he was back, hanging his handsome head over the stall door, just looking at me.

I knew something was wrong.

He'd torn his hind leg up, not hideously, but inside and out, and the bright red of the blood was most alarming.

I washed it with chlorhexadine, gave him Bute, cold hosed for twenty minutes, and applied triple antibiotic ointment. Walked the back field and discovered he had tangled with a wild muscadine vine. The evidence was laid out perfectly. One pile of horse manure, a number of very hard green grapes scattered on the ground, and a vine, just behind the manure pile, broken.

Tuesday morning his fetlock was swelling. I called the vet. She arrived within the hour and assured me I'd done all the right things. She taught me to put on a standing wrap and remarked how amazing the Big Bay is - how smart and kind and good. I heartily agreed.

So twice each day since, he gets all of the above and fresh wrapping. By Wednesday the swelling had decreased significantly and he was whinnying and cantering through the field to claim the apple offered by my daughter.

Apache Moon has stuck like glue to Keil Bay since Monday.



I think he likes wearing the wrap. He does look quite regal with it on. And he seems almost eager to get his special attention. Walk out to the field to take a picture and... here he comes.



This morning I was so caught up in re-wrapping his leg before leaving for my writing group, I forgot to bring Chase in with me. He was found shortly thereafter, waiting loyally by the barn door.



Dickens E. Wickens was keeping him company.

It's been a notable week. Time to go cold hose.