The Roundup!

Today has been great, just like yesterday was and I am not nearly as tired as I was last night.

Yesterday morning after doing my chores, I walked six miles. I wanted to walk eight, but I did not have the time, because I wanted to go over to Kinky's to drink a cup of coffee and visit with him and Bob and Don.

After howdys and hugs I poured myself some coffee and then we got to visiting. After we talked about politics, which I don't care to talk about because it depresses me, Bob cheered me up with his great news about Mama, the sweet, three-legged Pit Bull that he adopted from us, several years ago, that John Kemmerly hand-delivered to him in Louisiana. Then it was my turn to change the topic of conversation.

"I am trying to do my part to help the United States by only buying products Made In America and it is nearly impossible," I said, as I adjusted my soap box. "Do you know these Levi's that I'm wearing were made in Haiti?...." After a lengthy discussion about it with Bob and Don, Kinky walked into the big room to join us and then he handed me an expensive looking sweatshirt.

"Where was this made?" Kinky asked, as he fumbled in his pocket for his reading glasses as I read the label.

"Made In China," I said. "Kinky, I'm serious. I don't think anything is made completely in the U.S.A." Then to prove me wrong he walked back into his office and came out with a U.S. military cap and handed it to me and I looked inside the cap for a label, but it had been cut out, so he went back into his office and returned with another embroidered military cap that someone had given to him. I looked inside and said, "Sorry, Kink. It says, "Made In China" too." Twenty minutes later, after we had exhausted the subject—I returned home and cooked an early lunch for Tone and me.

Two minutes past noon, T., James Dean and I left the rescue ranch in Buttermilk, because we were supposed to meet up with Copper and her friend Lee, who wanted to adopt James Dean, at twelve-thirty in The Inn of the Hills parking lot. And, the reason that we were meeting them there was because Lee and Copper were going to have an eleven-thirty lunch at the Alpine Restaurant—to celebrate Copper's birthday.

When we pulled into the parking lot and parked Buttermilk next to Copper's car we were seven minutes  late, but it didn't seem to matter to them, because Lee was so happy and excited about adopting James Dean. Five minutes later, Copper drove away with James Dean in Lee's arms, to take him to his new fabulous, forever home with her! Thank you, Copper and Marcie for helping us with J.D.'s adoption!

As soon as we got back to the ranch, I punched Carlton's button to see if we had any new phone message, but we had none. Then Tony and I went outside, jumped into Kermit and then took off to the barn to get some apples and horse feed, because we were fixin' to go roundup Little Jewford, our cute, miniature donkey and his horse buddy, Shalom, because they had wandered off to our neighbor's ranch and we needed to get them back to Echo Hill. Instead of writing about this fun adventure, I made a short, two and a half minute video—The Roundup. And, I hope you enjoy it, because it is my first attempt to make a video using iMovie. Here is a picture that I took of Little Jewford and Shalom back at the ranch eating hay.

Around four o'clock, after Tony and I hayed and fed the donkeys and Shalom, at the barn, we jumped in Kermit and took off for the Lodge. When we walked inside the Lodge, Kinky was grinning ear-to-ear. "I'm on a roll, y'all!" Kinky said. "I have just played six games of pool against Frank, Bob and Don and I won them all. Come on and play me, Tone. The Hummingbird Man is the pool champion of Echo Hill!" Tony grabbed a pool stick and the game commenced, as Bob and I sat there and watched. 

For every ball that The Hummingbird Man sank into a pocket, The Medina Bulldog sank one or two more. Near the end of the one game tournament only three balls remained on the green felt covered table: the eight ball, one solid and one stripped ball. Then it happened so fast I couldn't believe my eyes. The Hummingbird Man accidentally sank the eight ball! The game was over and my Medina Bulldog had won! After we teased Kinky about his loss to Tony, I challenged Kinky to shoot a game of pool with me. 

I could tell that The Hummingbird Man didn't really want to shoot a game of pool with me, but he was nice and did anyway and I beat him, too! The same way Tony beat him. Then Kinky suggested that Bob play Tony. Bob won the first game and The Medina Bulldog won the second game, so they decided to play one more round of pool and Bob won, so we came home.

After returning a few phone calls, I decided to tweak my column for "Texas Animal Imprints" magazine, one more time and then I e-mailed my story to Joni Daniel, the Publisher, along with some pictures. Then I said a silent prayer that Joni would like what I wrote.

Ten minutes later my prayer was unexpectedly answered when I received an e-mail from Joni, "I love it!...." Joni had just made my day, so I quickly shot her back an e-mail to thank her and to tell her that she had just made my day and was thrilled that she loved it!

Knowing full well that my day had been a great one and couldn't get any better, I decided to celebrate it and have a little fun. So I sat down at my computer and using Photoshop, I designed and came up with a pretty, funny business card for myself, that I hope will make people laugh when they read it. I can't wait to show it to y'all, but I think it still needs just a little more tweaking.

Right before dark, right after I was done working on my business card and saving it to the desktop, the dogs started barking outside and then a man, dressed in brown, knocked on our front door and stood back, just as T. was going outside to see what was going on. Seconds later, Tony came back inside with a package of pears, but they weren't just any old pears. They were "Harry & David" organic Royal Riviera Pears"—sent to us by Karen and Terry Cauthen, wishing us a Happy Holidays and A Happy New Year! (Karen, is the kind hearted woman who rescued Clark Kent off of the highway last year.)

As T. and I each ate a delicious pear, I looked at the beautiful box once again and about fell over with excitement. "I can't believe this, Tone! Look here. It says right here, that these pears are "America's Rarest And Finest!" We're talking Made In America!"

"I can't believe this!" I said, as Tony looked at the box. "I didn't think today could get any better and it just did. Karen and Terry have also just made my day for the second time today. Isn't this great! I love these pears..." Thank you, Karen and Terry!

This morning while I was walking with Leslie, I decided to invite Kinky, Bob, Frank and Don over to eat lunch with us. After I had walked six miles I picked up the phone and punched in Kinky's phone number. Two minutes later I was in the kitchen cooking lunch for six—to be served at noon.

Kinky arrived ten minutes early, so he could have a picnic in Outer Space with Toto and our dogs and before Bob and Don walked over. Lunch was a lot of fun and the men ate it up and told me they loved my cooking, before Kinky left to go back over to the Lodge, because he was expecting an important phone call. 

While Don and Bob ate some of Ben's delicious "Miles Of Chocolate" for dessert we had a fun visit. But, when Bob tells me that he has known Kinky for over thirty-six years and that he first met him when Kinky, Bob Dylan and Dennis Hopper came down and visited him at his home in Mexico, I nearly fell off my bar stool! "The first night that they were there, we stayed up all night playing Chess for fifty dollars a game. I won all of my money back just before dawn," Bob said, as we all laughed, as the dogs started barking outside to let us know that Kinky's, Tony's and my good friend, Fourth Coates had arrived!

After introducing Fourth to Bob and Don, they took off to go walk around the rescue ranch and visit with our dogs while we visited with Fourth inside the trailer and caught up with each other's news. When we went outside, Fourth says to Tony, "I want you to take a picture of Cousin Nancy and me in Outer Space." We laughed and then T. shot Fourth and me.

While we sat in Outer Space visiting, a car drove up, so T. went to greet them, so Fourth and I could visit and I had a blast. Fourth is a great man with a greater sense of humor and he had me laughing so hard that my back started aching when he told me about his and his lovely, sweeter-than-sweet wife, Lynda's plans for the holidays.

When Tony walked into Outer Space he told me that our super friends and nearby neighbors, Don and Gerri Dickerson were here and wanted to see me, so I went to visit with them and Fourth and T. took off in Kermit, to go visit with Kinky over at the Lodge.

After howdy's and hugs, Don and Gerri introduced me to their friends Ervin and Cindy. After shaking hands with them and welcoming them to the ranch I said, "Why don't we all go into Outer Space to visit?" And they all started laughing. As we walked towards the trailer, I told them about Outer Space, the cool, screened-in-porch that my brother Ronnie and my nephew Tom had built for us in just one and a half days. 

After a fun visit with them in Outer Space we went over to the Lodge, so Gerri and Don, the people who   rescued and gave us Harley, our first baby wild hog, several years ago, could say hi to Kinky and for Cindy and Ervin to meet him. To say the least, since it is nearly forty minutes past nine, as I write this and need to wrap it up—we had a really fun visit.

Late this afternoon I had two phone calls. The first one was from Lee, thanking us for letting her adopt James Dean, who she is convinced is the sweetest dog on Earth and the other call was from Sandy Wolfmueller, to let me know that she had found another Susan Albert Wittig mystery book for me and she would hold it for me.  

It is now time for me to go to bed, because we have an exiting day planned for tomorrow with Mari and The NoMads. This has been a long blog tonight, so I may take tomorrow off, but I promise to write about our fun day tomorrow, on Monday. 

Y'all have a great evening.