The perversity of machinery, part the umpteenth

My shredder quit working. Yes, it was plugged in. Yes, the head was seated properly on the bin. No, it refused to work when I turned it on.

Sigh.... Off to the store for a replacement. I don't need it often, but I do need it. So Wednesday I got a new one, hauled it upstairs to the office, and left it in its box till after Thanksgiving.

Today I decided to move the dead shredder to the basement pending finding out how to properly dispose of it. I took hold of the cord and began to lift the head....

And the furshlugginer "on" light blinked to life.

Oh, come on -- really? Yes, really; it ate the sheets I fed it. I turned it off; turned it back on; it lit up again.

So I guess I have two shredders now; one old but still functional machine, one sitting in its box awaiting its turn.

Oh, and remember the scanner/printer that stopped printing for a while, then magically healed itself? It stopped printing again. Still worked fine as a scanner so I left it by my downstairs workstation. Then it had to get piled in the recliner seat during the window installation. When I put it back and turned it on, it hummed, buzzed, clanked, whined, made other carriage-moving sounds -- then seized a sheet of paper and began its little in-and-out alignment dance, ending with ... a printed page. And it's been printing ever since. I daresay it will eventually quit on me again, but this time I have A Plan.

Ben Enjoys His Thanksgiving Day

Ben is a happy horse today.

He was turned out in his paddock with his lady when I got to the barn, his midweight blanket already off thanks to the warmth of the day. I put him in the indoor ring for some (relatively) wide-open spaces time. As I'd hoped, after puttering around for a while looking for just the right place, he rolled -- in a far corner close to the wall, of course (in the vast expanse of the arena, he always goes to roll there), and he managed to find the one spot, the one sole, solitary spot, in the whole ring with a road apple pile to roll into. I wasn't worried about him getting cast against the wall, since he never, ever, rolls all the way over; no, he folds down onto one side, does his wallowing, heaves himself upright, paws, and drops again to to the other side.

I left him there while I went to pick some of his paddock. There weren't any horses in the stalls that flank the ring, and although he could see some turned-out horses through a window I knew he'd eventually decide he'd been abandoned to the wolves. Sure enough, after several minutes: "NNNNEEEIIIIGGGGHHHH!!!" Pause. "NNNNEEEIIIIGGGGHHHH!!!" I stopped what I was doing in the paddock and walked over to the gate, trying not to laugh (too much) at the long worried face that greeted me. The poor thing was so relieved to get back to his paddock and his tiny herd (Dora his lady, Levi across the fence).

I finished cleaning part of the paddock, then clipped the leadrope onto Ben, led him into the fourstall and put him on the crossties for a long, dusty grooming -- well, dusty over most of him except for the mucky patch on his left shoulder where he'd rolled onto the road apples. He got curried, body-brushed, his forelock and mane brushed out, and a final going over with the soft brush, finishing with his face. Ben adores such pampering; he was totally relaxed and happy by the end. Also very shiny, even in his fuzzy winter coat.

I put him back in his paddock, fed him his last horse cookies, and departed in a miasma of stinky horse dust.

Good Morning!

What a way to start my morning.

So there I was, lying on my side in bed, half-awake as I wait for the alarm buzz. The bedside TV's on and the early news is droning softly but my eyes are shut. Sally's curled into my belly; Pumpkin's doing library-lion on my hip. All is peaceful....

Chaos erupts! Shrieking yowling exploding cats! A frantic hind paw slashes the side of my face as Sally bolts!

I jerk upright. No cats to be seen, not even the sumfabitch (Stan or Schooner, take your pick) who'd made the sudden lunge from the floor that spooked my bedmates into panicked flight.

And I'm bleeding. Oh, not very much, point-source ooze, really, and a quick lurch to the bathroom, cleanup, antibiotic dabs, and Band-Aids take care of it -- even the ding a quarter of an inch from my (shudder) eye.

The alarm goes off while I'm in there working on my face, so I get to listen to its whiny beeps while I repair the damage.

This is not how I'd intended to start my day.

À la recherche du temps perdu

I was visiting a friend living in Paris back a couple of decades ago. It was a time in Europe when some group or other was occasionally carrying out terrorist attacks. We were having lunch outdoors at a cafe somewhere, don't recall where, in the heart of the city, when a sudden BOOM at some small distance jolted us and the diners around us.

People looked around, wondering. There were nervous titters, some neck-craning in the direction of the blast. I exchanged a grimace and shrug with a woman at a nearby table.

Then we all quietly went back to our meals. Because, really, what else was there to do?

Today's Daring Adventure

So what did I do today?

I rode a horse, that's what I did. I rode Finnegan -- Finny to his many friends -- one of Hilly's schoolies. I hadn't thought I'd ever get on another horse after Royal, what with the massive collection of issues I have about riding these days, physical and mental, but Finny has a sterling reputation for safe, safe, SAFE. Plus he's only about 14.1 hands high. In his winter coat. If you don't pick out his hooves first. He's got a red-brown pinto coat complete with long red forelock on a Fjord-style body (but maybe rounder in the barrel, I kid you not). So, not very far to the ground, and he's built round and stumpy-legged and sturdy, well up to my weight, plus my Aussie security-blanket saddle fits him perfectly.

So, firmly tamping down the usual butterflies, I groomed Finny, tacked him up (let Hilly bridle him since he can be a bit of a pill about that), then took him in the ring and got aboard. He stood politely for mounting (well, Hilly was at his head, but he didn't give her an argument about it) and walked off when requested. I liked his walk; it wasn't Ben's spider-legged big but it was larger than Royal's had been. After a bit I tried some trotting.

Now, I'd been warned that Finny has an amazingly big trot for such a tiny tub, a sort of downsized-Warmblood effect, and he certainly had a lot of energy in it. I found it to be more vertical than forward, though Hilly told me he does tend to dog it in the ring and moves out more on the trail, but I could easily post to it, in fact I found it just as easy to sit to it despite its vigor. He was fun!

After ten or fifteen minutes I asked Hilly if we could ride out, and off we went -- down the driveway, along the road, and up a small side street as far as the driveway up to Yellow House field. Walking all the way, since I was getting a bit tired by then and in any case we were on pavement, but Finny was solid and sensible and clearly wanted to stick right by Hilly's shoulder. Well, as we neared the turn-around point he did try two or three times to see if I'd let him turn for home, but submitted without fuss when I legged him back in line. He also gave me one tiny spook -- one quick head-up step to the side a rank beginner could ride through, then back to placid. He's very good off seat and leg and stops Right. Away. when told "Whoa." I like that in a horse.

By the time we got back I'd been aboard for about 25 minutes, and even at mostly a walk my fat old self had had enough -- but what a delightful ride it was! I definitely want to do this again.

Oh, and Hilly took a couple of photos with her phone of me aboard him but hasn't sent them yet. I'm going to take a camera to the barn tomorrow and try to get a shot or two of him. He's really adorable.

So what did I do with my morning?

I’ve got horse stuff. Lots and lots of horse stuff. Years and years of accumulation cluttering up my basement and garage that’s in fine shape but will never be used by me again. So today I wiped down a bunch of tack, dusted off a bunch of other horsey stuff, and drove it all over to Windrush Farm to donate. To wit:

three English saddle pads
one foam pad
five English bridles with snaffle bits
two Western bridles with snaffle bits
two leather English girths
one pair of stirrup leathers
one plastic tote of summer weight breeches (around eight)
one plastic tote of winter weight breeches (around six)
one pair winter insulated overall pants
one barn jacket
one rain jacket
one fleece vest
one heavy winter horse blanket
two rain sheets
one fleece stable blanket
one fleece cooler sheet
two bucket heaters
one hay bale bag

No partridge in a pear tree – wouldn’t fit in the car.

The woman who helped me unload all this from my car was thrilled. She said a lot of the breeches could be used for their clients who didn’t have/couldn’t afford pants for riding, and most everything else would be useful in their program too. What isn’t can go to an auction to raise money.

And I’ve still got enough stuff that another trip isn’t such a bad idea. It was a lovely drive through lovely New England fall color back country, after all....

Windrush Farm: http://www.windrushfarm.org/