It's beginning to look a lot like... Chaos?

First of all, I have to apologise to all of the UK and Ireland.  You can all blame the weather on me.  I tempted fate - I looked at the sand patch yesterday and thought, hey, it’s drying out a bit. Sorry guys.

So, because of me, the forecast for the next week is *%?&ing brutal.  The wind is howling around the house as I type, and it’s meant to get worse throughout the day, and then as it eases off we’re in for another cold spell, with lows between -2 and -5 on Saturday and strong winds making it feel colder – UGH!  There’s potential for snow, too, but I take some comfort in the fact that we rarely get much snow here in the South – fingers crossed on that one!

The cold spell will be broken by a storm on Tuesday, followed by more cold, followed by another storm on Friday followed by more cold.....

So much for my horses getting some dry ground to stand on.  Sigh.

On a brighter note, I was riding Flurry in the arena yesterday and glanced up at the vegetable patch as I passed.  My eye was caught by a creamy white spot in the hedge – more Shaggy Parasol mushrooms!  Mushroom risotto for dinner! This must surely be the last flush - with all this cold wet weather coming they’ll probably just rot away as they stand and not be able to spawn.

The last week has been pretty hectic for both of us.  Anne did three fund-raising “gigs”  for IGDB and hit her target.  Being the glutton for punishment that she is, she’s going to do a few more days anyway – who knows, she might double it!   She has had loads of family stuff going on too – birthdays, visitors and a graduation and now her daughter Polly has headed off an a whistle-stop tour of Ireland as the support act for Danish singer/songwriter Agnes Obel – exciting stuff! 

My mornings are completely tied up with the horses, dogs and chickens.  Denis is back, which is a huge help.  Between us, we’ve been lunging GiGi for Anne some days as well as doing Aero, and I’ve been riding Flurry for about forty minutes a day (scraping the muck off his head, neck and girthline takes another forty minutes).  They’re all making steady progress, although Aero’s “wraps” will fall off soon and I expect he’ll be a bit sore again.  If I get a chance between the storms this weekend, I will post more video clips of them.

Boots are ordered (Renegades) and will arrive with my sister just in time for Christmas.

Flurry trying out the borrowed Renegade boots

Cinnamon went for blood tests to see if we can find a reason for her excessive drinking (and widdling).  Dave-the-Vet had a good listen to her heart murmer again.  He graded it as a 3 or 4 (out of 6), so we had a chat about her generally ie does she cough much – the answer is “a bit”, probably every day. The conclusion was to put her on heart medication.  She doesn’t seem like a sickly dog, but hopefully this will help her maintain her youthful outlook on life for longer.

Do I look like a sick dog?

I’ve done some research on the car insurance front.  The company Anne is with will indeed cover us abroad for 93 days, but they were very vague about what happens if you stay longer than that.  It seems to be possible to insure a foreign registered car in France, so that looks like the most likely outcome.  We’ll have all of January to sort it out anyway.

Meanwhile Christmas planning continues.  Next week is going to be even more hectic – Polly and Agnes are playing in the Triskel on Sunday, Tansy has her first ever gigs on Wednesday and Thursday, pre-Christmas/farewell dinner for Anne & family is planned for Friday and we have tickets for Munster v Scarlets on Sunday the 18th.  Christmas shopping and a get-together with my South Munster Dressage buddies has to be squeezed in there somewhere too.  

Finally, it's probably time to start making lists of Things We Must Not Forget!