Christmas in the books.

 Dad seemed pleased enough with his waffle iron.   I was going to get him some humorous books but never got around to it.  Kind of feel like I don't *need* to buy him stuff since I do the cooking and cleaning.   Not that I keep the place spic and span but still I spend plenty of time to keep it bearable. 

I baked a 10 lb Sugarland ham.   Quite liked it.  It was not as watery as a lot of hams are, enough drippings to make gravy though.   And just did instant mashed taters.  They came out better than the ones I made from scratch on Thanksgiving and got too watery.  It is nice to have a palate that likes easy foods just fine and Dad likes the instant packets fine too.  I think these Idahoan packets are way way better than the old boxes of instant taters used to be.   I have 4 hunks of ham vacuum sealed and a the bony hunk in a big ziplock, not vac sealed for ham and bean soup.  I'm get this weird joy from getting lots of meals out the holiday turkey and hams.   I don't NEED to be so frugal.  But eating cheaply makes it easy or easier to not worry about cost of the farrier or cost of fuel to haul to a ride for fun.  

I rode Tanza yesterday before baking the ham.   I hadn't been on him in 3 weeks.   Someone was target shooting and he got all angst about he noise so I turned around, then had to keep telling him "I turned around but you don't need to or get to bolt"  Lots of  forced laughing to keep breathing and get through that instead of feeding his goofiness.   Then when I was going down the section road the wind started gusting a bit so I cut the ride short, but it was a nice bit of saddle time before cooking.  

Hopefully when I get back to riding more regularly I can insist that we do not make a big deal out of someone enjoying their Boomstick toys.  I don't need Tanza to be mounted shooting tolerant but he doesn't need to get silly because of someone 100 yards or more off doing some plinking.   

Oh Yay I may have broken the vacuum cleaner.

 Was being so good and emptied it out so it would not overfill and cause it to overheat,  and Forgot to put the filter cone on.  I blew crap out of it with air hose and will see if it will start after it cools off.  Trying to keep perspective.  Vacuums are plentiful and relatively cheap and we even have another functioning one upstairs but I  feel like bawling.   This was supposed to be:   Do some cleanup and then maybe do the Christmas decorating.    Of course cleanup was mainly washing covers from Dad's recliner and then a load of jeans because he has lost so much muscle in his legs that the disposable underwear don't catch everything,  yuck, and he won't rotate to clean jeans even after I bought him 3 pairs for his b-day,  I have to either wash em or at least throw in the hamper myself when I feel like I need to force him to use a clean pair.   I guess biology kills your sense of smell as you age so you aren't so grossed out by your own emissions you kill yourself.  

Thank heavens I bought an ozone generator in early 2020 when the stores were constantly having runs on bleach and cleaning supplies.   I don't know how effective ozone is to kill viruses but it certainly does help with odors.  I bought a second one this fall, so I can run for 20 minutes in my bathroom when my morning constitutional stinks it up and so I have a hot spare in case the one in the downstairs bathroom/laundry room breaks.   I will never build a house with that stupid combo, but haven't go to point of spending tens of thousands to add a bathroom or split the space etc in this 70s house.  I am no longer in germaphobe mode at all, but it sure is nice to have the odor killing machine.  If it was not dangerous to run with people present I'd probably move it around and run it several hours a day.   

p.s.   The vacuum cleaner is alive.   I only put it on for a few seconds so don't know if it is going to have an issue with quickly overheating from the crap the filter was not there to catch.   I got decorations down from the attic.  Proved to myself that I didn't need an extra body to do this.  I put a few of my usual mini lights along the fence.  Will put more up tomorrow.  I suppose I'll put the tree up tonight.  Not right now with the FNM program blabbing.   

Rode Tanzaknight today.

 He is getting pretty good at home about standing for me to get on.  I've been working on not being impatient myself and having him stand for several seconds after I'm set and then he gets a cookie before I ask him to walk off.  I've been doing a lot of forced laughing when I ride to keep relaxed when he is being the double speed energizer bunny.   Bee is in good weigh so I can and probably should cut back even a bit more on their feed than what they are on right now.   I'm tending to overfeed Tanza because he got too thin  for my tastes a couple times when he was younger.  But I really don't need him to be having tons of excess energy from getting more concentrates than he needs.  

The senior software engineer is having a cow because I copied old version of code he modified because the mod doesn't work with one specialized mission.   Well whatever,  if he wants to force the new code to work (I think to skip the one code function that fails for it he can.  I didn't want to mess with it on a weekend morning.  

I am late to feed the horses and get ready for bed.  Sometimes I am tired but can't seem to break away from the computer chair.  I am so weird.  

Another Thanksgiving in the books

Just dad and I and 4 dogs.  The dogs did not get any turkey or sides.   We had a 4th dog for a good part of the day.   I think his owner or family was gone for the day.   He whined and whined wanting in most of the day and then about 5 pm he was gone.  I guess we are the unofficial dog hang out for the neighborhood.   We had a great Pyr for a few hours on Tuesday morning.  I went driving around the neighborhood with the  boxer/pitbull ??? yesterday and recognized the GP so now I know his name and that he is just a couple lots over.   Pitty really acted like he wanted to jump out of the car at a couple of places so I'm thinking that was close to home for him.   I think he probably heard his owner's vehicle and sprinted home yesterday.   

I rode Tanza today.  Just a short dirt road ride but it went well.  It was super nice out.  Of course the FNM are making a huge deal out of "we will probably break the record for most days between measurable snowfall"  

The meal turned out OK.   I was disorganized with getting taters on the stove to cook for mashing and the dressing in the oven and had a time getting the turkey into a shallow pan to serve it but gotRdone in the end.  

I rode Tanza in his pen yesterday

 It was a nice warm day and I had a bit of time between meetings so I decided  I should grab a quick ride.  Breeze was going pretty good so I decided to play it safe and just ride in the horse pen.  This is good for us anyway to work on just listening to my direction and speed signals.  I do tend to leave too much to the horse when I'm just riding field roads.   The thigh hematoma did not bother me any.  The only thing it really bothers for is my back stretches with one leg crossed above the other knee.   The nature of that stretch is some forearm force on bent knee and this gives a good hip stretch.   My forearm goes over the hematoma and it is too tender to do the normal stretch.  

I have got to get cracking with making dentist appointment and appt to clean out office at work.   I think they changed my exemption and I am not required to WFH now, but I'm not going to want to get a stupid covid test on a weekly or possibly even 2/week basis and before the stupid vaccine mandate I had discussed working mostly from home and the now deputy director had said "you know that means you won't be able to keep a private office"  It will force me to go through the office books and papers and throw out some stuff.  

I have fallen off on all decluttering at home and need to get back to that and to doing more cleaning.   I don't mind scrubbing something but routine dusting and such seems so futile.  When the obvious dust and stains are gone I notice secondary stuff and being arid high plains new dust moves in within a week.  I'm trying to convince myself that more dusting and stuff will be worth the nicer surroundings.  

I don't know how to shake off my fears or depression

 I don't even know which is the bigger mental hurdle.   I am depressed about covid paranoia, and that my riding buddies that I enjoyed so much in 2020 think that I'm a crappy horse person and making Tanza into a dangerous horse by not vocalizing loud enough for them to hear when he and I are on the same wavelength and I'm being a wussy and slowing through rock cuz I don't want a hoof bruise or stumble and fall.   I am also now a bit scared after coming off of him and him stepping on me when he was freaking out about the long latigo strap last week.   

p.s.   I rode Razz after writing that.   I think he may have a bit of 'white line disease'.  That is a misnomer.  I think white line disease is an actual disease.  Razz looks like he has some loose hoof sole and may have a bit of black infection area next to his hoof wall.   I think that me skipping trimming him thinking he'd have more hoof so wouldn't be ouchy footed may have backfired.   Farrier comes next week, so Razz will get trimmed and I've located his hoof boots,  so if he doesn't have a sore tendon or ligament he should be good to go.   My bruised thigh did not bother most of the time.   Felt like the buckle was rubbing when buckle was actually down at my ankle when I got on but I barely noticed it most of the time.  

Off the hook for T-day travel

 Bro called dad on Monday for dad's bday.  Dad was still talking to sis so had to call bro back.  But bro didn't have insurance check/cash in hand when the modular home company had house ready and it took a good while for that to get sorted and other delays so they will not be back in Paradise for another couple months it sounds like.   So I get to stay home on Thanksgiving weekend.   We will be dog-sitting for our wonderful next door neighbors.    S and kids are driving to Indiana to help S's friend deal with funeral for friend's DH while friend is recovering from severe covid.  I guess covid contributed greatly to the DH's death as well.   She was in hospital and he got sick and neglected to take his insulin or whatever diabetes medicines,  and he ended up having a fatal heart attack.    P will fly to Illinois, spend thanksgiving with his mom and then they will all drive back together.   

Fauci should be in GITMO for helping China develop that nasty disease.  There is no possible good enough reason to be messing with gain of function research in the first place and then to fund it to happen in China?  Of course they were either going to use it as a weapon against the rest of the world or let it out by negligence.   But the FNM is covering for Fauci so far.   And Trump was advised and believed the advice to trust Fauci.   Well I never thought Trump was perfect;  but it rankles a bit that he STILL seems to be unready to fire Fauci if the election had not been stolen.  

Stupid Tanza bucked me off and stepped on my thigh on Saturday.   The bruise/hematoma is still somewhat tender.   I have been blowing off doing any riding even of RazzMo.  I need to get on Razz and take an ambling pace ride soon.  Will be good for both of us.