My Weekend In A Nutshell

Okay, I know I've been totally slacking off on this whole blogging thing. I swear I want to. Blog, not slack that is. I've just been busy.

As I mentioned in my last post, sometime last week, I was house-sitting for a neighbor of my grandparents. For simplicity's sake, I will call them The H's. Anyhoo, I went out to sheep-sit for a couple nights. Yes, you read that right. I wasn't really doing much actual "house" sitting. I was there for the sheep.

I went out there Wednesday night, just before sundown. The sheep are trained to come up to their pens at night. I got them all locked up, fed the dogs, and the barn  kitties. The H's have a couple guest houses, and I was staying in one of them. I had brought myself  a little dessert (popcorn and M&M's, can't go wrong with that), and a book. I was hoping I'd sleep well since it was a new place - wholly unfamiliar to me. I'm not used to sounds of sheep bleating or their stupid bells on their necks ringing all night. But I did okay.

Until 3 a.m. rolled around. The dogs were barking like crazy. I realized that they weren't barking where the sheep were, so that meant the sheep probably weren't in any real danger. That and the sheep weren't making any more noise (nor any less), and the horses were completely silent. I grabbed a flashlight and stepped outside and couldn't find anything. I called the dogs, Lilly & Buzzy, and they were right there in seconds. I did another sweep with the flashlight, but couldn't find anything. I was hoping it was like a raccoon or a skunk. Meaning they aren't life-threatening to sheep.

I crawled back into bed, and about 15 minutes later the dogs went nuts again. This time closer to the sheep. Arrrgh!

I put my shoes on, grabbed a flashlight and my sweater, and took a walk to the sheep. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, so I told the dogs to lay down and crawled back into bed. And slept until morning. Well, I mean, a couple more hours. When my alarm woke me up, I went out to let the sheep out. I had one of the dogs with me, and good thing, too. On my way to the other gate to let them out into the field, one little guy came running up to me. This one had horns. It stopped about two feet from me and just stared. It had an odd glint in it's eye. I don't trust sheep (or goats). I called Lilly over and she came up to me and the sheep took off. Nice to know they are more scared of a dog than me.

The next morning I was at work at the Sticksville clinic, and then spent the afternoon delivering papers in Town with Papa D. I went back out to The H's ranch to lock up the sheep and feed the little critters again. I took the dogs to herd the last of the sheep through the gate. Back in the guest house, I slept pretty good. A little cooler than the night before, but the dogs were silent.

Friday, Papa D and I delivered papers as far down as Burney and back. By the time I got home, my mom was at my place. I took her out to dinner. One of the cafe's in town does Mexican food every Friday, and boy is it good stuff. YUM! Saturday I was at work in Town at the clinic. Guess it was my lucky day. We had a huge windstorm Friday night. That lovely storm brought down a large limb or a tree down on a fence line near where my grandparents property and The H's property meet. My mom sends me texts saying she's not dressed for ranch work, but still went out in her sandals to help out. Eventually I get one that says, "Cow shit feels great between your toes!" (in case anyone was curious, she was being sarcastic). Apparently one cow got in that one field, and left it's mark. And my mother found it. A few times.

Sunday morning my mom and I got up, got my car loaded with papers, and had breakfast at a cafe in Sticksville. Then she followed me home and stopped when I stopped. Even helped me carry bundles in. Once in Redding, we drove directly to the rehab place my Granny is in. I'm not sure I've even updated everyone on that. Granny had surgery last Monday to take out a defective knee replacement. She's now in rehab so they can get her back home in a couple weeks. The doctors are pumping her full of antibiotics to kill of an infection in the bad knee joint. So hopefully in a couple months, she have her knee replacement replaced. We met my dad there and visited with them for a bit. Then I left to finish delivering in Redding and spent about 3 hours with my mom's parents, Nana & Sonny. We had a good visit, and a few good laughs. Then I ran out to grab a burger and went back to rehab to have dinner with Granny. She'd already been served her food and had what she thought was turkey soup.

Monday I ran my errands in the morning, had lunch with my parents and then took off to finish delivering. I got stuck in construction about three times, which didn't please me. Or my bladder. Traffic in Redding and Red Bluff was pure hell. I wound up getting home around 7:30 last night, which is kinda late.

And thus begins another hectic week. I'll be sheep-sitting again this week while The H's run off to a conference for a couple days. Plus my regular stuff on the ranch, the publication, and the clinic.

Nope. Not busy at all. Not me. Never.

I will be posting a story I wrote for the publication on the town my ancestors helped settle in the late 1800's, in this same county. I wanted to wait for it to be officially published. Now it is, but it would make this post far too long. Along with it, my column for this month, which is a tie in. I also still have the long post about awards, which I need to get out. If I don't get them out this week, it'll be next week!