Rigging Up For A Cure

Rig #4, otherwise known as "The Pink Rig" went to work this week. It has taken so long for this to come together. My Honey...whose identity is no longer secret if you watch the news clip-LOL...has put a huge amount of effort and money into this project. Two years and nearly two million dollars. But it is something that he has believed in all along.

Channel 11


Williams Production has always been a strong supporter of the Pink Rig, it just so happened that the very week MH took delivery of this unit in '09, the oil/gass fields nearly ceased production. While the unit could have picked up a job here and there, the whole point was to put it to work and keep it working to make as much money as possible for The Breast Cancer Research Foundation. Irregardless of whether the unit ever worked a day, the foundation was going to collect $10,000. MH was just hoping to have that figure closer to $40,000.



**On a personal note...I'm doing a happy dance. I hired a fabulous lady for the office. She will be taking that over on March 8th. I'll probably spend a couple of days helping her get oriented, but she has so much experience, I don't think she is going to need me hanging around after that. I'll just pop in once and awhile to say Hi! I've enjoyed working in the office, but man oh man, am I ready to get back to the horses. Ironically, this gal has a horse she needs started. Hmmm...might be I'll be getting back into taking in outside horses.

One Margarita..

Two Margaritas...

Three Margaritas...


FLOOR!


Friday was the first time in a very long time any of us at the office have felt like going out for a couple of after-work toddies.

Everyone used to do that a lot in My Honey's group.

Ya know, just a couple of beers to take the edge off and get relaxed for the week-end.

Since there were a couple of business associates in from out of town, we all stopped at Boston's.

When I ordered my 3rd margarita, I told MH he was going to be driving me home.

I don't drink much anymore and even having eaten appetizers, I sure don't take chances with drinking and driving. The others only had to walk across the street to their hotel and MH only had two beers.

So we were good right?

Oh No!

We decided to order one more round and then everyone was going to head for home.

But the snot-nosed waiter refused to serve us our last round. He told us he wasn't comfortable serving us any more alcohol and closed out our tab.

Needless to say, we were all pretty surprised.

There wasn't a single one of us that were even close to being "drunk", although I'm sure the only one who would have passed a breathilizer was MH...and he was the only one driving.

So we told the kid that.

But no dice, he sent the manager over to tell us that once a server said they would not serve a customer, they could not give us another server or let us sit at the bar.

Apparently, I laugh too loud.

No...I am not kidding. The manager told us that everyone seemed to be okay, but that my laughter was a bit loud and it make the server uncomfortable.

Have you ever heard of such a thing??

Needless to say, that waiter screwed himself out of a big, fat tip. Our Canadian friend picked up the tab and left the dumb-ass waiter a $2 tip.

Of course, the last thing you ever want to tell a bunch of rough-neck, oil-field trash is that they CAN'T drink anymore. So the party was on.

We walked over to another bar and closed the place down.

Six margaritas and 4 shots of god-knows-what later...

We all ended up in a taxi headed for home. They have a fabulous driver service here where the taxi comes to get you and they bring a driver that brings your vehicle home as well.

All I can say is that thank goodness is was snowy and drizzly here all day, cause at least I don't feel bad about doing absolutely nothing except for holding the couch down all day.

I don't know what those shots were...a couple of them were Pink...in celebration of the Pink Rig kicking off this coming week, one of the shots was 2-tone brown and another was a very pretty blue. They were all very good.

As both MH and I eased around very carefully today, we came to the conclusion...

Either we need to train for such events harder...as in drink more regularly...

Or remember we are not hard-core, youngsters anymore and not overdo it.

I think the both of us are leaning toward the not overdoing it...

LOL-Yea, that will never hold up. Give it a few months and we will forget how badly our heads hurt the day after and do it again.

We never claimed to be very smart, now did we...LMAO.

Oh well, you can take the red-neck out of the trailer park, but you can never take the trailer park out of the red-neck.

At least we all got to blow off some steam. We needed that desperately. The last few weeks have been absolute hell. If it hasn't been one thing, it's been another. Just when we think we have made a step forward, we get yanked back two. Hopefully when this is all over, I can share with you all the details. It's quite a story.

Needless to say, none of us will ever spend another dollar in Boston's. That was just stupid how they handled that. Hell, I've been in bars that have a drink minimum...never been to one that had a drink maximum...or where you had to be careful not to laugh too loud. Sheez!

Limited Knowledge

So Laura @ Littlekeebler asked for advice on conditioning...

I'm afraid it's a field I have relatively limited knowledge on. To be honest, I haven't thought much on or practiced much in the way of a genuine conditioning program.

The last couple of years, it has become something that I have tried to learn more about and last fall it was definitely something I felt I needed to work on with Moon.

For the first time in a long time, I have a solidly broke, no issues, competitive horse.

The first thing that came to my mind, when I finally got that good run on Moon was...

Now what?

I have spent the majority of my equestrian years starting colts and training or retraining horses for competition. When they got to a certain level, they were usually off to their own home or to a new home. The thrill of horses for me has always been bringing horses from nothing to something. When they got good or as good as they were going to get, it was time to move them on.

Now, I find myself as one of those people who is going to go on with one, so I have to learn what it takes to keep a competitive horse competitive and maybe even help them improve even more.

However, I'm a couple of months away from having to really focus on a competitive conditioning program. Right now, like everyone else who is coming out of winter months, I simply have soft, out-of-condition horses that I need to work slowly back into a semblance of shape.

Thankfully, Frosty(the buckskin) is the only one who is ridiculous. Moon actually looks pretty darn good. I swear that horse is still growing. He's 12 this year and looks incredible. Talk about a late bloomer huh?

I suspect all of the horses I plan on bringing from SD, except for long, tall and naturally lean VooDoo, are at least as thick as Frosty is at the moment.

So what to do with fat, soft horses?

You all share what you do, while I try to put my very simple thoughts into more words than, "Ride 'em". ;-)

Fat Boy

I would say the buckskin horse has wintered well...


Too well!...


Oh good god, this is ridiculous...

I'm gonna call him Claus(Nix that...for now, he will be known as the Sta-Puff Pony-LMAO) until we get some of this blubber off. No kidding, when I was brushing him this afternoon, his belly(and everything else) giggled like a bowl full of jelly. Ick!

Back To Normal

I am unburied and going back to my regularly scheduled life.

The weather is getting decent and there are barrel racings coming up. I'm anxious to get back to doing what I do, which according to some isn't very much. At least my horses appreciate my time-LOL.

I Died!

I've died and gone to H*LL!

Sorry about the lack of posting...and visiting!

I am suck in Administrative purgatory, well on my way to deeper depths(think flames)!!

I had to let my admin go and because I thought it would be such a good idea to move almost every administrative task over to our office...guess who gets stuck doing it?

Gee...aren't I a smart girl??

NOT!!

I almost threw everything back at the "other" office, but at the last minute MH and I decided best to continue to trudge forward.

Onward...

Forward...

Hhhooooooo!!!

I'm missing my pony time!!

It's dark by the time I get home, change and get to the barn.

I feed Beretta and pick her stall...although it has been nice the last couple of days, so she is back in the round pen. At least she is getting some sunshine. All I get to do is stare out the window at it. No wonder stalled horses are a bit bonkers.

The other guys, especially Shooter are feeling pretty neglected. All I see of them, in the glow of the pickup headlights, is their heads hanging over the fence.

This situation will have to be remedied before March, as I will be moving them to the new property after the closing.

It was kind of nice to not have to do a huge amount of chores this winter. But, dang...I actually miss feeding my own horses.

Not that I think the BO is not doing a great job. He is. I just miss the required interaction with my herd.

So, if you don't hear from me for awhile...someone send a search party.

I'm probably buried under a stack of paperwork.

It's A Go!

Things are looking good on the home deal.

I almost got too wrapped up in the mold issue. While I was wheeling and dealing with the bank, the estimate came back from the mold inspectors and the estimate is under $8,000.

Okay, not exactly a tiny bill. But less than half of what I thought is was going to cost according to how bad the home inspector seemed to think the issue was.

The bank is entertaining either reducing the price of the property by $10,000 or paying for the closing costs. All to avoid having the word 'mold' appear anywhere on the contract. I can live with that.

Didn't I tell ya all I was a 'horse trader'?...LOL

The mold can be cleaned up anytime after the closing and before anyone might want to move into the house. The clean-up will be guaranteed for 20 years. Kool!!

What a relief.

It was kind of getting to the point where MH was considering selling the LQ trailer to cover the costs. Ya know the one I haven't even got to use yet?

It it had come to that though...you can bet that LQ trailer would have headed down the road. The property is much, much more important.

Not so secretly though, I'm glad it didn't have to come to that.

Other than a few odds and ends, we will be heading to the closing table March 3rd.