It Just Never Ends, Does It?

All night last night, a four-legged someone was having a dance party on the roof above the bedroom. This would, of course, be the same night that I had soaked every ear plug in the house in rubbing alcohol to sanitize them, and they blew up to the size of sausages (who knew??) and were unusable.

This morning?

Raccoon poo on the back porch. I looked out there at the pile of "something" I noticed... and sure enough.

I don't even understand how there can be so much poo in one place. How is this EVEN possible?

There are no words...

Bears and Mice and Poop, oh my!

This blog goes through seasons.  A couple years ago, I was writing a lot about food. Apparently, now I write a lot about poop. Sigh. I guess they're related, but one is definitely more appealing than the other, although according to my blog stats, the other gets more attention.

So Eric left Saturday morning. I took him to the airport, and then had a good 7 hours on my hands because Friday the realtor called and left a message saying that he had decided to have a 6 hour open house on Saturday. Because, you know, planning. Well, after I stopped swearing and calling that lazy, good for nothing realtor every unkind name in the book, I worked on a plan to go running in the mountains.

You Can't Make this $%!t Up

We talk about poop a lot in this house. Obviously. Because, as we all know at this point, poo, literally and metaphorically, keeps happening here.

You know where this is going, right?

So, a couple of weeks ago, the homeowner sent workers over to the house to, sadly, closed in the unique selling feature of the basement, turning that particular eye catcher into just a regular old closet.

Well, a closet with random pipes sticking out of the walls and floor, but since there's no lighting in this particular closet, you probably won't notice if you come to look.

Anyway, it took them a number of days to complete the framing, drywall, texture, and paint. During this time, there was frequent ins and outs of the our via the garage. Because closing doors is both difficult and inconvenient, the workers generally left the door into the house wide open.

Enter mouse.

That Time I Nearly Sunk the Tractor

I might just kind of suck at this caretaking thing. Or parts of it, at the very least.

So...

Eric left last Saturday for the East Coast to go direct a YFC Middle School Camp. Now, I like kids and I worked with kids and all that, but if you think for a hot minute that I'm going to go to freaking Baltimore and spend a week's worth of vacation in 90 degree heat and 90% humidity with a bunch of smelly junior high kids, you've obviously been smoking the legal stuff here in Colorado. And yes, junior high kids smell. Especially in 90 degree weather. It's just a fact. That man is a martyr. Also a fact.

So, Sunday I get out and make a valiant effort at mowing the meadow. Now, I've mentioned that it has rained here. A lot. Like A LOT. The pond has been flooded out and the meadow has been half under water since May, and its only recently gotten dry enough to actually contemplate mowing. However, the fact that we haven't been able to mow has not meant that the grass hasn't grown. It has, and I'm pretty sure that had Josie Zolman, one of the seven Zolmans that came to stay with us over the 4th of July (I know, I'll post about that!) had gone into the meadow, we would have lost her and had to call search and rescue.

New Kid on the Block



So, we have a new neighbor. And I have to admit, he's gotten under my skin a little bit. He showed up the night before the Zolman's arrived at our house (blog forthcoming, but we've had 2 weeks straight of company!), and has occasionally wandered through our backyard, uninvited, since then.

 

Road Rage on Paper

I am not a road rager. I come from a family of fast drivers, lead-footers, and at least one family member (side-eye to you there, Dad) that has threatened to mount and RPG launcher onto the hood of the car. I married someone who is increasing impatient with left-lane drivers,  non-turn-signal-users, etc. However, I am not a road rager. Now, I won't say that I'm not above mentally commenting on the character of other drivers (Chris, you know what I'm talking about here) when they do something particularly moronic, but I don't generally act on my five-dollar-word descriptions.

Except maybe last Monday.

Move Yer A$$...

The weekend before July 4 was a movin' and groovin' one, that's for sure. I was up at 5am on Saturday morning, and out the door to climb the Incline. Sometimes you just know it's going to be a good day. I only had to make three catch-your-breath stops and PRed both up and down. Nice.

Headed to the farmer's market and then home to shower, change, and then Eric and I headed up to Denver to help a friend move.

The real action, however, was Sunday. Eric learned that Cripple Creek, a town about 2 hours away in the mountains, had what was called the "Donkey Derby Days" festival. Now, we're down for about anything called a festival, and have, in our past, attended such events as Apple Fest, Johnny Appleseed Fest (yes, different than apple fest), the Pickle Festival, Grabill Days, Greek Fest, River Fest, German Fest, the Peach Festival... well, you get the idea. Cripple Creek is an old mining town turned gambling hall town, with its own herd of semi-wild donkeys. These donkeys roam the streets of Cripple Creek, and are supposedly the descendants of donkeys used in the mines (which, by the way, is a horrible existence for donkeys!) People feed them, and they wander around at will. There's even a hotline you can call for the last known location of the donkeys. Anyway, Cripple Creek has a Donkey Derby Days festival, the funds from which go to support the ongoing care and occasional feeding of the donkeys (trust me though, they never go hungry.)