Monday, June 15, 2009

Another Rambly Monday Morning

It's been an eventful but yet uneventful week (read that to say I've been busy but haven't done anything stupid enough to require rescuing). I finished cutting down those trees (the ones I could) without getting the chainsaw stuck any more, and blah blah blah. I didn't have much work for the dogs this past weekend - Linc turned up inexplicably lame on a rear leg Thursday morning, so I'm going to rest him some for good measure. That's one more bouncy dog, I'll say that.

Saturday I went over to Julie's, and she, Kelly and I spent a good bit of the day tromping around in the woods and brush looking for Maia. Maia unfortunately went missing during the storms last week, so we thought to make some passes out in the woods looking for her. Still no sign of her - but I managed to get a tick in my shoulder, a sunburn, sore feet and legs, and what may be poison ivy on my ankles. That's productive, right?

Speaking of sore feet and legs... did you know that when your behind gets too big for your feet they hurt? Your feet that is. That is the conclusion I came to this weekend. So today I signed back up to my WW online account - I can't have this. I can't stand being in pain for doing the things I want to do - particularly when it's completely avoidable. I don't really have the $$ for it right now - but I also don't have the $$ to deal with my fat behind either, and all of the health issues that come with being overweight. So there.

Yesterday I went over to help Chuck Reloaded with shearing his sheep. Tony & Mary came over, and we got them done. It wasn't all that pretty - and I have definately learned that being a shearer is not my lifetime calling. Well, at least not a shearer of hair sheep that refuse to shed (and act crazy as heck). They should feel better now though!

One of the things that I was attempting to do with my sheep (before I had to sell them) was to increase their ability to shed. I bred my ewes that first year to a 3/4 Katahdin ram - who was an excellent shedder, and his lambs shed better than their mothers (but still not very well). This year Chuck bred them to Darci's St. Croix ram - and we're hoping this year's lamb crop will do a decent job of shedding (the third generation lambs should). Time will tell - but I'd prefer to have either REALLY good shedding hair sheep, or nice wool sheep - one or the other. Not that it's my problem anymore, but still. I have opinions.

Two weeks ago I started working on fixing Nick's approach into a pasture or to the handler's post - and it's been amazing to me what a difference it's made in him. It fixed the shape of his outrun, and fixed his attitude also. I'm re-evaluating how I feel about that particular issue, because I've really learned something from this. Yeah, OK, so Robin's told me a million times, but now I SEE it since I've been working at fixing the mess I allowed to happen. See, Nick has opinions too. When he was younger he didn't have enough opinions - and he's making up for it now. Interesting how just now I'm really starting to see the holes in my training - what I need to be asking of my dogs, and things I need to be doing differently.

So it's going to be another hot and busy week, and I hope at the end of it my feet will hurt just a little bit less, because hopefully there will be less behind weighing them down.

4 comments:

Robin French said...

Man i hear you on the WW stuff. I'm giving it another week, maybe two, and if things aren't going better i'm rejoining too. Had a good, AP-filled weekend and the 2-3 pounds that were threatening to permanently joined all their friends on my scale are gone though.

Good on ya with Nickman! I'm fighting the same devil with Billy. He's insisting on leaving my feet square on outruns.

Dancing shepherdess said...

Laura
That was a great post!!! So, your caboose is weighing down the rest of the train eh? Me too. Wish we could disconnect them.

As to the leaving on the outrun- I found if I don't set Lucy up right, she won't start right either. You would think they would do it automatically... Pshaw.

Kelly said...

I didn't find anymore ticks on me after the 1 I found in the house, but boy was I tired when I finally got home. I wish we could have found Maia though....

Laura Carson said...

That's what happened Robin - I was just not able to get it done without WW - maybe you'll be able to tho!

Shoot, the caboose is threatening to overthrow the train if I'm not careful.

Kelly, luckily that was the only one I found. Whew.