1960

Not sure if this picture will show up good or not, but it is one of my favorites.  Probably taken in the Fall of 1960.

Tessie

Last week we got quite the scare from Miss Tessie Bess.  We had gone down in the field to fix the fence and the dogs had gone with us.  Down where we were fixing fence is a culvert that runs under the road.  It's probably about 2 feet around and the dogs have always loved to crawl through it so I wasn't worried when Tessie headed that way.  When we finished the fence and started back to the house I noticed Tessie was no where to be seen so I went over to the culvert to see if she was still there.  She was laying about half way through, breathing kind of hard, but I just thought it was because it was cool in there and she was resting.

Tessie is about 14 years old, her hips are bad and she can't hear hardly anything.

Let me just say that it was late in the afternoon, the sun was starting to set and it was in the 30's so when Tessie didn't come out of the pipe, we got worried, on one side there was ice and quite a bit of water backed up.  On the other side there was a big snow pile that was melting and running into the pipe.  It was useless calling to her, she wasn't moving and couldn't hear.  I was pounding on the pipe, but she was just laying there looking at me.  I figured I should shimmy into the pipe and get her, so I laid down in the cold water and started to shimmy.  It was quickly apparent that with my coat and everything I was barely able to crawl in the pipe on my belly and I am claustrophobic...I got about all my body in and knew I couldn't crawl in there all the way.  I started to panic a little trying to get out and as soon as I was able to get out of the pipe told Bruce to call the fire department, because it was clear that we needed help.

First 2 police officers came, they were pretty useless.  I had to ask to borrow their flashlight to see what was going on.  They just stood around and did nothing.  Bruce finally convinced them to radio the fire chief, who brought out the fire truck and a couple of young guys to help us.  One of the guys, Trevor, suited up and finally climbed in the pipe.  I had been able to see that Tessie had one leg that had broken through the ice and was trapped in the cold water below the ice.  Because it was a hind leg, she just could get it free.  Trevor pushed her out of the hole she was in but she was so scared and her legs were so cold she couldn't move.  The fire chief said "if we don't get her out soon, the water will freeze up around her."  This was about 2 hours into the operation.  The young guy standing next to me on the other end of the pipe, said screw this, I'm going in.  So he took a noose on the end of a long stick and went in the other end where all the ice and backed up water was.  I should mention that I had been bailing water for about an hour and had made progress at emptying the pipe, but there was still a bit of water he had to crawl through.  Between the 2 guys they got the noose around Tessie and with one pushing and one pulling, they got her out.

We had brought towels and blankets to wrap her in.  Her legs were frozen stiff so the guys lifted her into the back of the Gator and I climbed in and laid on top of her and through the tears and everything we thanked the guys as we took Tessie home to warm her up and assess the situation.  After a couple hours of drying her, she perked up enough to eat and then stand and pretty soon she wanted to head to her bead in the garage.  I have never been so relieved in my life!

She is doing fine now, back to her old cranky self, although she clings to me and wants to be hugged and petted a lot more which I am happy to do.

The fire crew got a proper thank you from us and Tessie, chocolate cupcakes and a note with a smiling picture of Miss Tessie.  Thank You Kiowa Fire Department!  You guys ROCK!

Skid Retires

Today is the first full day of retirement for my hubby Bruce, aka, Skid.  I'm not sure how this is all going to go.  I am happy for him, he's worked hard all his life and deserves it, but he is driving me a little nuts.  I had to remind him this morning that he may be retired from work, but he is not retired from life.  There are still horses and dogs and cats to be fed at the crack of dawn.

I also had to set him straight that I am not his secretary nor his personal assistant and that he would need to figure out how to fax things and that he might have to turn his new iPAD3 on once in awhile to get email and stuff like that.

The worst part so far is that I have to find personal insurance, he will be going on Medicare (YIKES!) and I will have to fend for myself.  After spending too many hours applying for insurance, talking to sales guys and underwriters and being totally pissed off at how much it costs and how little it covers, I'm thinking I may have to go get a part time job somewhere just for the freaking insurance!  Any suggestions would be helpful.  Anyway, just hoping he can find something to do to keep him out of the house and active.  I have a list of things for him, but he's moving like a turtle right now and I guess I need to let him for just a little while.

The Kanaio Coast

Or "the Hold on for Dear Life tour...

This was a highlight of the trip for both me and Courtney.  Let me just say that the pictures and description in the brochure were a little misleading.  It looked like calm waters and snorkeling with the dolphins and turtles, wow, couldn't have been more wrong.  Yes there were dolphins

And turtles and fish, but that was only a small part of the story.  Here is how it actually went...

It was early but Court was a trooper, we knew we would be in the water so there was no point to makeup or hair this morning.  We were so innocent and naive at this point.  Then the briefing started...

Here we are after finding out that we would be rafting through one of the roughest channels in the world to get to the Kanaio Coast!

On the way out I took some serene pictures.  This is a whale with the small island reef of Molokini in the background.

And a mom and baby that we encountered on the way out.  The bigger island behind was used for target practice during WWII.  It is uninhabitable as it was shelled and bombed and still to this day is radioactive and they periodically find unexploded bombs and warheads that need to be detonated.  I have flown over it and there is nothing there, what a waste!

Well, I would have gotten pictures of the waves going through the channel, but frankly I was holding on for dear life and screaming like a little girl.  Some of the waves were 15-20 feet high and me and Court were sitting right on the front seats of the boat.  It was a white knuckle ride as the boat captain was hot dogging at break neck speeds through the channel, everyone was screaming and laughing and screaming!

Think of the movie "The Perfect Storm" that's how big the wave felt and looked to us as we rode up one side and got dumped down the other.  There was a lot of wisdom in the warning to "keep your butt on the seat"!

This is the blow coming out of one of the volcanic tubes, the suck the water up in and then blow it out, pretty cool and the captain thought it would be a good idea to get us close enough to get sucked in and you guessed it...blown back out with the pressure!

The formations were very cool, I think this looks like people looking down at the ocean below.  We saw things that looked liked squirrels and pigs heads and even a resemblance of Walther Mathau, but most of the time I was hanging on so I didn't fall out, so only got a few pictures.

 The arches and formations were amazing and beautiful.  This was a very high adrenaline adventure.  If I go back, this is definitely on my list of things to do again.

We did stop going back to snorkel, but it was anticlimactic after the big waves.  We took some underwater pictures that I might post later, the colors weren't very sharp but there are some fun ones and even a turtle and a spotted eel.  Yay for the Kanaio Coast  and Blue Water Rafting!

Full heart

I loved the afternoon and sunset at Makena Beach, we had a fun time taking silly pictures and people watching.  I think out of all the beaches we tested out, this was the favorite and the one we went to for Court's final sunset before she left for home.

Worth a thousand words...