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I may seriously have to consider therapy - mental therapy.  I helped horse show mom move out of the whine country estate last Friday, Sunday and Monday.  I am damaged, probably beyond repair.  No snarky comments please, it's unbecoming.  Anyway, the real tragedy of the thing, besides that unfortunate incident of the Jeroboam of whine in the garage and the impact of same on the concrete floor, RIP, was the fact that Monday was Halloween and horse show mom and I had to fight off the hoards of beggers.  Now granted the little ones were pretty cute and it was kinda fun to see the parents dress up as well as they chaperoned their little hoarders around the hood.  However, there were the teenagers (one group of which I addressed as the Sonoma High School Senior Class...), slackers who didn't even bother to dress up and sadly, a homeless freak, thank God Muffie got that one. 

I may have mentioned that Steve and I wisely turn off all outside lights and all lights inside that are visible outside and huddle in the murky darkness with the tee vee and refuse to answer the door.  We put shock collars on the demon dogs so they don't warn the miscreants of hiding humans within.  It's a lot of work avoiding Halloween.  On the upside, Steve bought mini candy bars on the off chance that someone would manage to break through security and demand a treat.  Happily all was secure in Vacaville and we have a nice supply of fat food to nosh on through the cold, cold winter. :-)

So I was talking about the horse show mom and the moving out of the whine country estate.  Sadness, mostly because now I am out of a valuable money making scheme, but also because the horse show mom will need to have a new name applied to her new status as a townie dweller.  Heaviosity.  Will there be no limits on the creativity that is expected?   Sadly, for you, no.  Any way do you remember that adage of round holes and square pegs?  Well use that sort of logic for moving a ton of stuff from a 5000 square foot house to a 1700 square foot house and just for fun add in an eight stall barn full of horse stuff (read heavy, awkward stuff) and you have an idea of what the move was like.  There were even professional movers who fried out and fizzled not to mention horse show moms mom.  Yes Penny, we should have had cocktails all day.  It would not have made the move even slightly easier, but it would have made it more entertaining.  We tried to get Horse Show Moms dad to come help, but he didn't answer the phone.  Not sure what that meant at all.

I have a pretty good eye for product placement in one's home.  But to be honest when I left, rather hurriedly, on Tuesday a.m., you could not even negotiate a clear pathway through the dining/living room and there were boxes and bags and all kinds of catchalls everywhere.  Gross.  Horse Show mom called this very morning and asked how I was holding up and I mentioned that I went home on Tuesday and slept all day.  Yesterday I went to the gym, but other than that didn't even leave the house.  She said she hadn't had a good sleep yet and she couldn't find anything, like her clothes and that she was still wearing the same dirty jeans from a couple days ago.  I said that was nasty and went back to bed.  Age does have its privileges.

So yesterday I decided that the dogs needed to have their nails trimmed.  This is cause for much angst in our canines world, not because I'm a bad clipper, but I may have a little bit of a short fuse when the malcontents resist the mani/pedi's.  Ungrateful  little snipes.  Anyway, as I was still recovering from my help in moving gig, I was a little more short tempered than usual.  I managed to trap snare bag hold the first one lovingly and began the ritual snip snip of the nails being careful to only get the white part, sadly, this one has a lot of black nails.  It's kind of hard to tell where the nail quick begins so you kind of blindly try to just cut the same length of nail on those as the white one...more sadly, this doesn't always work out so well.    By time I was done with the first dog, our bed looked like a war zone with blood all over the sheets, thankfully only on Steves side and the dog is still resentful and runs for it every time I come near, and hauls buns to the haven under the deck when I call her.  Tragically, the blind dog was next, and he just bled and growled and pulled back and generally just was pitiful through the whole exercise and then left huge bloody toe prints all over the formerly white rug.  I didn't even see where I'd cut him too short, so I guess he just bleeds randomly because he can.  I didn't even bother with the third one, mainly because I was afraid to and she's the cutest and most deadly.  Don't tell me I can't learn a thing or two.  Perhaps I will just give up on dog grooming and take them to the pet store where they will be pathetic and Carlos will pee on the floor, the table, on the groomer and anywhere else he chooses and I won't have to clean it up.  Sounds good to me.

Last Thursday I gave up my valuable nap to assist the middle daughter in assessing all the junk in her basement for she was holding a garage sale that weekend.  Now the house she and her beloved live in belonged to the beloveds grandmother many years ago.  And as is the case when one gets to live in granny's house, you also get to live with granny's stuff.  All the important stuff like antique furniture is long gone, but those 3000 canning jars, the chest freezer, and all the kitchen gadgets are still there.  I have to tell you that I was positively itching to start ditching (catchy eh?) all that old stuff.  But oh no, we would have had to get papal dispensation to off load any of that stuff  those valuable heirlooms from the beloved, who was sadly unavailable due to rice harvest.  One does not bother the beloved during harvest, planting, fertilizing, watering and all the other stuff farmers do to their crops.  So we could have had a bonanza of stuff to sell, but were severely limited to my old stuff which I assure you I have no great love for. 

On the day I didn't go to the former whine country estate, I did go to the garage sale.  It was not rewarding to see all my stuff go on the block for a fraction of it's true value.  It was, how ever, rewarding to go to lunch, post sale, and have many, many, many Cosmopolitans with a gigundo burger to assuage the misery.  Let me just say right here and now that I do not like garage sales.  Steve and I had one once and it is a lot of work for not a lot of gain.  Marking, sorting, moving, haggling, and disposing of all the junk you've accumulated just is not my cup of tea.  The middle daughter has the mutant gene that makes her like this sort of activity.  I just turn a blind eye. 

We also visited the youngest child up in the backwoods of No. CA to watch the little ones play soccer.  These are the same little ones of the money grubbing and tadpole killing.  So the two oldest ones play soccer and the baby runs amok.  Well actually the oldest one plays soccer and the middle one twirls her hair and looks around whilst on the field and runs off at the first opportunity to go have a snack...and a rest.  They don't keep score officially at these little tyke games.  But I can assure you that the parents do, and they know who made what goal and who should be benched for life and you get the drift.  Because there are no winners OR losers the kids just run willy nilly and the parents swell or deflate depending on the skill of their offspring.  My grandson is the best player of all of the other kids combined.  He is the Pele of kid soccer in the backwoods.  Full Stop.  My granddaughter on the other hand would be much happier with a hand mirror and a tutu.  Just sayin'.  I'll get some grief for that bit o honesty.

The newest grandchild in New Mexico appears to be thriving.  The "other" grandparents went for a brief visit last weekend and have proclaimed that I know what I'm talking about when I talk about cute babies.  The new mummy and daddy have not had a good nights sleep yet.  When your children have children, and that is a very scary thought to be sure, then you get your revenge for all the sleeplessness you endured when they were self entitled infants.  And that is pretty much all I'm going to say about it.  Except, new daddy's?  Probably the very worst thing you can say to a new mother in the morning is "did he/she sleep all night?"  I'm pretty sure there is no man slaughter penalty in that case.  I believe it is the same statute which applies to what ever answer you give to "does this (fill in the blanks) make me look fat?"  Just don't go there.  Ever.

Alas dear reader, once again I have hit the proverbial writers wall.  Just be grateful you aren't me.
Cheers,
Squidgy