In the Dark of the Night

Most of you that know Lonnie and me, also know our horse Maggie, the Missouri Fox Trotter Mare, and that she is also an escape artist.  Yes, she likes to unlock the gates or lift the rope fencing and crawl through it. That is one of the main reasons why Lonnie has low currency electricity running through the rope fencing that surrounds the horse pasture. That is, of course, if any one of us remembers to plug it back in after unplugging it for feeding time or exiting the gate for riding purposes. However, the portable, temporary pastures that Lonnie sets up for better grazing areas, does not have the electric safe guard connected to prevent Maggie, the escape artist from wondering or in her case “running” away, and then her buddies, the other two horses gladly follow her.

Well, last night at 9:00 p.m. it was already very dark outside, here in the country, with no surrounding city lights to illuminate our neck of the woods. When it suddenly occurred to me that I have not seen Lonnie and Quentin return the horses from the temporary pasture to the fixed pasture yet. Quentin had already gone to bed and I saw Lonnie very relaxed, reading his newspaper, lounging on the couch, when I said,” Lonnie, have you put the horses back in their pasture?” At that simple question, Lonnie instantly jumped to his feet, threw the newspaper down and with a slightly raised voice said,” OH NO, I forgot!” and proceeded to bolt out of the house. I followed him to help retrieve the possible “runaways”. He said,” I will round up the horses, if you will just fill their bowls with sweet grain to encourage them (to return cooperatively.)

So he walked quite a distance to retrieve the horses. First he brought back Nitro, the herd leader. Meanwhile, I filled their bowls with grain as always, on the outside of the ropes, then I deliver it to their feeding spots.

All of a sudden I heard Lonnie shout,” Maggie is loose, she is running towards you!” so I rushed to the closed gate to open it for her entry. Just as fast as I reached the gate, which was latched, she was turning the corner in the very dark night at FULL speed with her mane and tail blowing upward by her speed, right for me!!

I shouted at her with one hand upward in a “stop sign” position and the other hand trying frantically to unlatch the gate quick enough for a swift entry and said, “WHOA, WHOA MAGGIE!”

Just as I was about to jump over the gate, because the gate latch wasn’t unlocking fast enough to persuade her direction into the corral, she swiftly turned again and ran past me. PHEW /: and stopped dead on, right where her bowl of grain was placed, on the outside the roping near her feeding spot.

Finally, Lonnie walked up to my area with Rebel, the third horse, and placed him in the corral, then retrieved Maggie, grabbing her halter to bring her back into the corral. He started to tell me, without him knowing what had just taken place between Maggie and me, that she got loose as he tried to grab two, haltered horses at the same time, she looked at the small flash light that he was using to see in the dark of the night and apparently Maggie was startled. She then bit his wrist and then ran in my direction toward the corral where she met up with me.  OH, what a nightmare! I can add this memory to my collections of getting acquainted with country living. :/               October 9, 2013 

 

When I Shop, I Hunt!!

When I Shop, I Hunt!!

When I shop, I hunt!! I love a good 50%-75% off a clearance section in any store .I dig through all the items with the intent and mindset that I MUST find, and take home a deal from this pile, even if it kills me. Almost like deer hunting and bringing one home. Just as exciting for me!!

Today I found a great clearance sale going on out here in the country in little ol’ St. Johns, AND, most of all, I unintentionally embarrassed my 15 year old son while I was there, Cha-Ching,  sweet pay backs. Anyone else raised and lived through teenage years’, knows what I’m talking about.

So, I’m digging through a box of Loofa’s, I don’t know why, I don’t use them, but you never know what you’re going to find in the bottom of any clearance box. Bingo, I found a wallet (the only wallet in that box) with a BIG BLUE emblem of U of M on it. If anyone knows my “over the top fan”, husband, my thinking wheels start turning, hmm, would he use it? If not, he will just put it in his U of M collection room.

 Oh, darn it, interference of the hunt, there’s no price on it. I franticly walked up to a store clerk, and started telling him my w –h- o- l –e,  l-o-n-g  story, how I found this only wallet, blah, blah, blah. Can you please find out the price for me?

 This kind man, with slightly shrugged shoulders, and semi lifted hands, and wide eyed, listened very patiently to my plea. And behind me, my son said,” MOM, MOM” and no response from me because hello, can’t you see I’m talking to someone at the moment? I ignored him.

When I was finished talking, the polite gentleman said,”I’m sorry but I don’t work here.” In which at that point, my son walked behind and past me mumbling to me saying, “I was trying to tell you that, you are sooo embarrassing!”

Oh, with a slight pause, I said, “so sorry” as I walked away from him also saying,” Well, you LOOK like you should work here.”

Ahh, WHAT was that supposed to mean? As if, I didn’t put the poor guy in an awkward situation already. But I didn’t miss a beat as I proceeded to walk to the front of the store, to find the employee working behind the checkout counter. I started the whole story over again, “I found this wallet in with the loofa’s box and………………..”

In the end, the wallet only cost me $1.00. The embarrassing moment, priceless!

When will I learn to get out of harm’s way?

When will I learn to get out of harm’s way?

It was such a beautiful, mild, mid 70’s kind of day.  Sasha and I walked outside to give the horses some oat bagels and carrots for a treat. We talked to them, stroked their coats and enjoying their company. As I was stroking Maggie’s coat, I was secretly thinking to myself, ”This country living is peaceful”, can’t get this in the suburbs”.

Meanwhile, in the background, Lonnie was staking the ground and connecting the roping to it, which he often does, to give the horses more fresh grass to eat. We call it the “Temporary Pasture”.  It was surrounding Sasha and I, leading to the gate in which Lonnie could be able to simply open it and the horses would walk out and into the fresh grass area to graze. Otherwise, like in the past, we would take the lead rope, hook it to their harness and walk them out to the temporary pasture that was too far out to connect to the gate. After we fed them the treats and enjoyed their company for a few minutes, we headed back toward the house, walking through the temporary pasture to get to that point.

Then in the not so far background I heard Lonnie say,”Ok, come on out” Sasha and I looked up at the same time, and Sasha panicked and yelled, ”MOM, LOOK! Because I was already looking, she meant, they are running in our direction, all three of them. They went from a walking mode to a stampeding mode in seconds flat, as if they were at the races and they just heard the starting gun shot. I tried to calm her down within the few seconds we had before they reached us and said, ”It’s ok, just move over, get out of their way”. Luckily we were next to a tree at that point and Sasha jumped behind the tree. A smart decision made quickly.

One horse, Rebel, ran to the right of the tree and the others,(all of them weighing over 900 pounds each), ran to the left of the tree, RIGHT WHERE I WAS STANDING! All I had time to do in those few seconds was to position myself into the center of the two horses running right in my direction, and pray that they didn’t knock me over and trample onto me. And at the same time, I naively thought, surely they will stop before they get to me. Maybe to see if I had any treats left to give them? But Noooo, THEY DID NOT STOP.  They did slightly separate in the attempt to go around me, but Maggie didn’t quite have enough room between the tree on the right side of her and me on the left side of her. So, the broad side of her body banged into me at full speed, and I was thrown over a few feet, while on the other side of me, Nitro swooshed past me at full speed but slightly veered off to his left just enough so as to not run into me. Unbelievably, I was still standing, but Maggie’s hoof clipped the back of my leg and cut it and in an instant a bruise swelled up and appeared under a cut. THANK GOD, it was a minor injury. It gave me shivers to think of what could have happened.

The odd thing is that about five more feet ahead of them, they ran up to the rope and made a dead stop. I was so shocked, that they stopped dead on for the rope, but not the two people that were just feeding them treats just minutes prior to their blast off run. Ya know, my thoughts were correct, you can’t get all this in the suburbs”. When will I learn to get out of harm’s way?

Again Maggie??

Again Maggie??

Again, Maggie?? Lonnie and I were getting the other two horses ready for an evening horseback ride. So as Rebel & Nitro were tied up OUTSIDE the entrance of the corral gate, Maggie was just inside the gate area. We were n where near ready for the ride & Maggie was already mad that she wasn't on the outside of the gate. She knew that we were leaving without her, again. As Lonnie was putting the bridle on Rebel, I was giving him a treat to open his mouth & Maggie's face was nose to nose with him. I wanted to be fair so I gave Maggie a treat too. Just then, she slammed her nose down on my forehead, on purpose! She lets me know what she wants & it wasn't the treat. She wanted OUT! That HURT!! Well I had to let her know that she was invading my space, so I had to tap her nose firmly, as I yelled NO!! Back up Maggie, but she only took one step back. I swear she acts like a typical female with PMS. As Lonnie and I mounted the horses and began to ride down the driveway & onto the dirt road, she whinnied & neighed while running all around until we were out of her sight. Three and a half miles later when we arrived back home she was happy to see her friends return but I have a major head ache. Note to self, don't stand next to Maggie if she's not invited to ride.

Wild Turkeys Too?

Wild Turkeys Too?

Out here in the country, it isn’t uncommon for my husband to point out a wild turkey in the far distance while he is driving. His arm has flung across my face many times with an urgency as he pointed out, my side of the car window, and said ”LOOK, A TURKEY”. Of course, by the time I looked in that direction, as the car is going 60mph, I never could spot the wild turkey that he wanted to show me.

Since he is an experienced hunter, I just had to believe him. If he said that he saw a turkey, then there was a turkey in range of his sight.

Today, I got into my car and started out to do my daily routine of errands, with my son Quentin in tow. I was enjoying the peaceful scenery of the quiet dirt road and going 45mph, with no other traffic around and looking at how beautiful the blue sky bordered the green crops in the distance of every surrounding farm property as I passed by.

Suddenly, as quick as a flash, a flock of about 20 wild turkeys that were hidden in some crops next to the dirt road flew straight up, and over, then straight down into the middle of the dirt road,  right in front of my  car.

I yelled,” OH MY GOOSH!” simultaneously as Quentin yelled ,”WHAT THE HECK?” I slammed on my brakes swerving the car from side to side, so that I didn’t have to cook about 20 fresh turkeys for the Holiday Dinner Buffet. Unbelievably, they all scattered across the road and flew upward again into the air, without me hitting one of them! PHEW! That was to close for my comfort.

In the suburbs, I never came across a wild turkey in the road or anywhere within sight. All my Holiday Turkeys came from the freezer section at Kroger.

 Oh well, I can tuck that into my pile of country days in the “life of country living.”

Just As I Thought I Might be Getting Settled

Just As I Thought I Might be Getting Settled

Just as I thought I might be settling in a little bit to this country living………….

My husband Lonnie came home from work, walked into the room where I was working and asked me if I would like to go to the 4-H County Fair here in St. Johns. I thought about it for a minute. It was the last day, and when I have been to the 4-H County Fair, the suburbs of Oakland County, I had a lot of fun. I reminisced about all the fun carnival type rides, the game booths with the fast talking money makers that talked to me as I was walking past them clearly saying, "No Thanks, don’t want to play that game right now”, and they won’t stop their sales pitch at all until the next victim walks by. The Elephant Ears that tastes so good only at the “fair” and of course, the featured attractions going on each day, like the monster truck event, or the rodeo with the true cowboys roping the steer.

So I said, "That sounds good, I’ll meet you guys in the car after I changed my clothes”. Of course, upon exiting the house my son says, “Come on Mom, you don’t need to look good in order to go to a fair”. That’s true, I thought, but as a suburban girl, we always fix ourselves up a little before going out in public.

Well, to my surprised, when I opened the back porch door, there were chickens and roosters walking all around the porch steps, pooping everywhere. Now, in the past, they would come up onto the porch and poop all over our porch. I said to Lonnie, as he was about to sit down in the car, "Why are the chickens and roosters out?”. You know they are going to poop all over the porch, and we’re going to step in it and bring poop into the house. His reply was, “I felt sorry for them”. I said, “WHAT, are you kidding me?” and he proceeded to seat in the car and leave them out. We do not leave chickens out and drive away in the suburbs. We don’t even have chickens, for that matter. Needless to say, I was not a happy camper.

When we arrived at the 4-H County Fair, I was expecting to have some fun to cheer me up, but when I got there, were no rides, no games with pushy sales pitches, and not an elephant ear in sight, only FARM animals! I could have stayed at home for that show.

Wouldn’t you know that the first huge circus type tent we entered was full of goats and every kind of chicken breed you could imagine? I was so bored, but Lonnie and Quentin had to stop and look at every one of them, OMG! Then we visited the cow and bull tent. As we approached the pig tent and I stopped dead in my track before entering. Something awful smacked me right in the nose, the Stench of PIGS. I couldn’t move another step. It smelled to high heaven. YEP, I had to draw the line right there. That was my fill of the “country” county fair.

OK, let’s go home to see how much chicken poop is on the porch. :-/

 

Clobbered in the Jaw by My Mare Maggie

Clobbered in the Jaw by My Mare Maggie

Now I know what it feels like to be clobbered in the jaw.

My son and I were inside the horse corral watching my husband Lonnie and my daughter Ashley, riding side by side or one behind the other at times, on two of our horses Rebel and Nitro. I was also taking a video of all of them. . It was such a beautiful day, the temperature was in the comfortable seventies and the sun was slowly going down.

Then Maggie, my mare, feeling a little left out would walk along with them without a rider. Well she was a little jealous of all the attention Rebel and Nitro were getting. A few minutes later, Ashley and Lonnie took the two horses they were on and left the corral to ride freely. I put my video camera down and walked up to the gate that my son Quentin had just opened and closed for them. I didn’t realize at first how upset Maggie was when the other two horses left the corral .I saw her run up to me and I fully expected her to stop when she reached me, but as I looked up, our faces met. Then she made a quick left turn and her nose smacked my jaw. My head had an unnatural chiropractic like twist. In a split second, my son Quentin yelled, “MOM, Jump over the gate, Maggie is going nuts!” I leapt up a five foot metal gate, and swung my legs over the top and jumped down in 3 seconds flat, so I wouldn’t get trampled on by a much stressed out, 900 pound mare that had turned around and was heading back towards my direction. Quentin was so impressed by how quickly I jumped the gate, and said, with a huge grin, “Mom that was a pretty fast jump for an old lady.” As I reflected back on the whole scenario, at what had just took place, I smiled, and said ”Thanks”. I guess this “not so young chick”, has acquired some pretty quick reflexes living, at the ranch, here in the country. I felt like a real country cowgirl, making that leap. OH noooooo, does this mean that this country living is growing on me?

Yep, I Met a Few of My Country Neighbors

Yep, I Met a Few of My Country Neighbors

YEP, I met a few of my country, 1/2 mile away, neighbors today.

 At 6:30 a.m. while sitting on my couch sipping my morning cup of coffee, a man in a van pulled in the driveway, I made a bee line into my bedroom to get a robe onto my scantily clothed body, (wearing only a t-shirt and underwear), before he could look in my windows without curtains.( Lonnie Buck, had said to me in the past, WHY do you need curtains, there is nobody close enough to see inside) Ahh, yeah, unless they pull into your driveway, get out of their car and knock on the door, to tell me my 3 HORSES are out and they are about a mile down the road.

 OMGosh, I said,"okkkk, thank you, by the way, where is Grove Rd?". He said "bout a mile down the road at the first corner ma'am, just thought I'd let you know". Instantly, I panicked because I am all alone again, Lonnie is at work, and Quentin isn't home. So I ran to my room to get dressed and in a full state of concentration on a plan to get them back home, I walked out o the door, into our closed in porch,

 looking down to put my shoes on, and I heard a voice of another man at the screen door, trying not to startle me, say "ahemm, morning." I jumped and looked up at a 6 foot man standing there, and said, "Horses out?" He said " Yep." OK, I said, Thanks.

 I ran to the horse trailer to get grain and I filled their bowls in hopes that they would simply mosey on back home, but that thought was dismissed. Then I grabbed a lead rope and jumped into my car to drive over to the horses that were indeed about a mile down the road. I just parked at the corner where all the other neighbors were gathered near my horses waiting for me to retrieve them from their planted fields, that they had helped themselves to eating.

 When I got out of the car, I called Maggie, my mare, over to me with a treat in my hand and she came over to me and I roped the lead around her neck because she didn't even have a harness on her head and proceeded to walk her back home. The other 2 horses sort of followed us but in a fashion of running around us, and back and forth down the road in a very disorderly way. I had to stop several times in order for Maggie not to run with the other two and it caused her to rear up in front of me trying to free herself, but I managed to still hang on and stay far enough away so I didn't get trampled on.

 I finally arrived back home with them and 2 of them willingly went into the corral and the other one, Rebel, whose name suits him, decided he would stay outside of the corral, so I bribed him with a treat in my hand while I stood inside the corral and he surrendered and walked back in with the others.

 NOW, I had to walk all the way back to my car, a mile away , and being that I was all sweaty, from the adventure, the horse flies were swarming around me, at this point, I had wished I had my long hair back in a "pony tail" to swing my head from side to side and swot them off of my face. I reached my car, jumped back in and drove home, all before 7:30 a.m. and the day has only begun, what is next?? ;(

Water Shut Off In The Electrical Box

Water Shut Off In The Electrical Box

Well,  today I have no running  water coming out of any faucet in this OLD farm house. I had water earlier this morning to make my coffee...thats good.

 As I was sitting in my room, at my computer desk working, I heard my son say "Mom, could you come in the kitchen?" in a very urgent tone. So, I rushed in to the kitchen and Quentin was standing next to the kitchen sink, with one hand on  the cold water handle of the faucet, with it fully turned to the open position. He was about to cook some rice on the stove which required water, and said, "Have you used the water today?" Yes, I said, and we both did a quick eye contact stare at each other that was quickly followed by the sound of gushing water coming from the basement.. At the same time we both ran to the basement door, opened it and lept down the stairs as quick as possible to see the absentee water from the kitchen,  all over the floor in the basement and witness it rushing out from a brown cylinder shaped container.I started raising my panic stricken voice and said,"Where's the water valve turn off handle?" Well when I saw Quentin reach above the brown cylinder container and opened the electrical panel box while saying that Lonnie had shown him where the shut off switch was. I excitedly say "NO, it cant be in there". But Quentin opened it, with his own intent, and didnt listen to me, as usual, but this time Im glad he didnt listen to me because he flipped a switch which turned the water off. Phew!!  

In the suburbs we don't keep our main water turn off valve in the ELECTRICAL BOX??? We keep it with the Plumbing !Thank God he was home this time! I contacted Lonnie at work and he asked serveral questions and determined that we will just have to wait until he gets home from work so he can assess the problem and repair it, before we have is running water coming out of the faucets. There goes my morning shower until this evening

Mouse in the Horse Grain

Mouse in the Horse Grain

Today, when I walked outside to feed our 3 horses their morning hay and grain, they came running over toward the pasture gate, and paced back and forth, neighing for attention to be fed. As I opened the door to the horse trailer, where we keep their grain in a large 30 gallon trash can, I reached in to grab their individual 3 cup containers. I SAW A MOUSE, running around the inside of the trash can as if it were in a circular, caged, circus type bike riding ball. Of course, I yelled and slammed the trailer door shut, ( nobody was home to replace me of the feeding duty) and tried to run away, but I couldn't because I was wearing my son's size 12 cowboy boots,( you know , I just slipped them on for temporarily walking out to feed them and back to the house.) I turned and looked at the horses and thought, "Sorry, no grain for you this morning", BUT they were making their neighing plea's for their grain treat and all standing in they spots to eat while looking at me with 3 sets of big brown eyes. So, this suburban girl, grit my teeth, turned around, opened the trailer door again and sheepishly peeked into the grain container. Yep, mouse still there! I reluctantly tipped the almost empty container toward the opened door and quickly stepped back, and watched the mouse, eewwww , jump into the grass/weeds outside the door. Once again thinking to myself, " What am I doing here, living in the country, feeding horses and dealing with mice????." Wishing we still had those 20 barn cats that were living here last year. This is sooo not me!! Then I filled their grain cups and walked over to the horses and poured the grain into their bowls. At least THEY are happy! Three out of four of us is not a bad statistic. Now I'm taking off to buy more horse grain and chicken feed .

Mouse in the Horse Grain

Mouse in the Horse Grain

Today, when I walked outside to feed our 3 horses their morning hay and grain, they came running over toward the pasture gate, and paced back and forth, neighing for attention to be fed. As I opened the door to the horse trailer, where we keep their grain in a large 30 gallon trash can, I reached in to grab their individual 3 cup containers. I SAW A MOUSE, running around the inside of the trash can as if it were in a circular, caged, circus type bike riding ball. Of course, I yelled and slammed the trailer door shut, ( nobody was home to replace me of the feeding duty) and tried to run away, but I couldn't because I was wearing my son's size 12 cowboy boots,( you know , I just slipped them on for temporarily walking out to feed them and back to the house.) I turned and looked at the horses and thought, "Sorry, no grain for you this morning", BUT they were making their neighing plea's for their grain treat and all standing in they spots to eat while looking at me with 3 sets of big brown eyes. So, this suburban girl, grit my teeth, turned around, opened the trailer door again and sheepishly peeked into the grain container. Yep, mouse still there! I reluctantly tipped the almost empty container toward the opened door and quickly stepped back, and watched the mouse, eewwww , jump into the grass/weeds outside the door. Once again thinking to myself, " What am I doing here, living in the country, feeding horses and dealing with mice????." Wishing we still had those 20 barn cats that were living here last year. This is sooo not me!! Then I filled their grain cups and walked over to the horses and poured the grain into their bowls. At least THEY are happy! Three out of four of us is not a bad statistic. Now I'm taking off to buy more horse grain and chicken feed .

When will I learn to get out of harm’s way?

When will I learn to get out of harm’s way?

It was such a beautiful, mild, mid 70’s kind of day.  Sasha and I walked outside to give the horses some oat bagels and carrots for a treat. We talked to them, stroked their coats and enjoying their company. As I was stroking Maggie’s coat, I was secretly thinking to myself, ”This country living is peaceful”, can’t get this in the suburbs”.

Meanwhile, in the background, Lonnie was staking the ground and connecting the roping to it, which he often does, to give the horses more fresh grass to eat. We call it the “Temporary Pasture”.  It was surrounding Sasha and I, leading to the gate in which Lonnie could be able to simply open it and the horses would walk out and into the fresh grass area to graze. Otherwise, like in the past, we would take the lead rope, hook it to their harness and walk them out to the temporary pasture that was too far out to connect to the gate. After we fed them the treats and enjoyed their company for a few minutes, we headed back toward the house, walking through the temporary pasture to get to that point.

Then in the not so far background I heard Lonnie say,”Ok, come on out” Sasha and I looked up at the same time, and Sasha panicked and yelled, ”MOM, LOOK! Because I was already looking, she meant, they are running in our direction, all three of them. They went from a walking mode to a stampeding mode in seconds flat, as if they were at the races and they just heard the starting gun shot. I tried to calm her down within the few seconds we had before they reached us and said, ”It’s ok, just move over, get out of their way”. Luckily we were next to a tree at that point and Sasha jumped behind the tree. A smart decision made quickly.

One horse, Rebel, ran to the right of the tree and the others,(all of them weighing over 900 pounds each), ran to the left of the tree, RIGHT WHERE I WAS STANDING! All I had time to do in those few seconds was to position myself into the center of the two horses running right in my direction, and pray that they didn’t knock me over and trample onto me. And at the same time, I naively thought, surely they will stop before they get to me. Maybe to see if I had any treats left to give them? But Noooo, THEY DID NOT STOP.  They did slightly separate in the attempt to go around me, but Maggie didn’t quite have enough room between the tree on the right side of her and me on the left side of her. So, the broad side of her body banged into me at full speed, and I was thrown over a few feet, while on the other side of me, Nitro swooshed past me at full speed but slightly veered off to his left just enough so as to not run into me. Unbelievably, I was still standing, but Maggie’s hoof clipped the back of my leg and cut it and in an instant a bruise swelled up and appeared under a cut. THANK GOD, it was a minor injury. It gave me shivers to think of what could have happened.

The odd thing is that about five more feet ahead of them, they ran up to the rope and made a dead stop. I was so shocked, that they stopped dead on for the rope, but not the two people that were just feeding them treats just minutes prior to their blast off run. Ya know, my thoughts were correct, you can’t get all this in the suburbs”. When will I learn to get out of harm’s way?

IS THIS REALLY HOW COWBOYS LIVE OUT HERE IN THE COUNTRY?

IS THIS REALLY HOW COWBOYS LIVE OUT HERE IN THE COUNTRY?

Let me see a show of hands if……… 1.Your Cowboy does NOT use soap when he washes his hands.

                                                               2. When your Cowboy shows his chivalry by killing a bug with his bare hands after you scream at the sight of one, BUT, then wipes it on the carpet, bedspread, or him instead of throwing it away.   :/

                                                               3. Does he look at you with a slightly tilted head and say,” WHAT FOR?” after you say,“ Oh My Gosh!! Aren’t you going to wash your hands after killing it?” Then his reply is, “Nahh, its ok”, he then proceeds to crawl into bed next to you. EWWW!

 Please go wash your hands WITH SOAP, then come to bed.

                                                                 4. Does your Cowboy come in the house after hand feeding the horses that have licked and drooled on his hands and then goes into the house and touches everything in the kitchen to get something to eat, WITHOUT washing his hands?

 Are you kidding me? “Please wash your hands, before touching any counter tops, or the refrigerator handle or any food in it…… WITH SOAP” and his response with the roll of his eyes is, “WHAT FOR?”

                                                                 5. Does your Cowboy bring in his travel mug when he gets home from work then set it on the counter top and tell you,” Don’t have to wash this, I washed it at work?” When I further investigated that statement and asked, ”Did you use SOAP when you washed it at work?” His response is, “WHAT FOR, I’m just going to use it again tomorrow.”

Yuck!  I put it right in the soapy dish water as I was washing other dishes. There it goes!

Is this really how Cowboys live out here in the country?  My Cowboy says I’m too germ conscious. I think the key word in that statement is “conscious,” and I am, about cleanliness.

Where I come from, back in the suburbs, we use SOAP with our water to wash everything! :)