World's Gayest Dog?

Really it doesn't help the look of Flaming Charlie that people give him pink dolls and miniature horse blankets.






Ooooh, the paw.

It's that season again.

A brisk commute,



along half cleared highways



is followed by the trek down the laneway



to find those hungry horses





One could drive down if suitably equipped, which means this



rather than this



That's the neighbour's truck, it needed pulling out. Sensibly, they're off to Texas for the duration.

Some of the snow has to be cleared, at least enough to have room to park. It's nice work if you're just watching it from the window

Off into the mist.

Sailing daughter blew in from Vermont and left for Michigan with the tall Alaskan. They were in a car that seemed quite inadequate for the trip, it lacked of one of the rear windows, the transmission was slipping and the headlining was dangling as a result of the customs search on the way into Canada. The car had tested positive for some sort of drugs prompting that diligent search; it had once been a police car and likely tests positive for every kind of drug.



The car generated a fair amount of mist itself



but they got as far as the road and were away toward Detroit or Port Huron or somewhere equally sun drenched.

Are they dead?

I wondered, looking down from the deck at this:







they weren't dead, they were stretched out enjoying the afternoon sun, more like cats than horses.

Zzzzz,

phooo,

eventually Austin got up, malely.

Auction Fever

A couple of weeks ago there was an auction at the museum. We bought a hutch thing:



Alright if you want furniture, I suppose. This weekend there was another auction, at a church that had gone out of business near the oddly name Badjeros ON. We bought the boards for posting the hymn numbers. The hymn numbers themselves and, irrationally, the hymn books. If y'all feel the need to praise the Lord this is the place for it.

Slightly less weirdly we bought some pews. I carried them out with Dennis, a giant man with a long beard who's much in demand at the moment as a Santa Claus. We passed a couple struggling to put a pew into a little Asian car-ette "you can always tell city folks" said Dennis which made me wonder if we no longer are. We're getting there, we had venison sausages for supper on Friday, we didn't shoot the deer but we did trade eggs for them.

Apropos of nothing, these are the remaining kittens.

Teamwork.

Charlie and a kitten work on his burrs.





This one, and adventure kitty, are all that remain.

Barn Repairs

Snow during the week indicated that serious winter isn't far off. That meant reinforcing the barn.

This is binding a heater pipe to the hose so, inshallah, it won't freeze and burst.



This is cutting down a strip of rubber to form a decorative and draft excluding valence or pelmet over the door. The door on the right is newly constructed and the one on the left patched over the eaten bit.



This work didn't go unnoticed by the residents. This is some sort of review commitee.



This, really, is just a disruption,


especially 1200lbs of it standing on the work in progress.



Chased off the work, the troublemakers ran into the tack room. That was a bothersome moment, wondering how to turn them to get them out. In the end I opened the far door and chased them into the sea of mud.

Now this is a tolerant dog.

Covered in mud from the barnyard he has to go into his crate to dry. That wouldn't be so bad but a cat jumps on top!



Later he's freed and stretches out on the couch but a woman jumps on top!



It's not easy being a yuppie dog in the country.

It's Winter now.

The horses watch the dawn from a frosty field.