The Carols!

Today has been great and yesterday was great and a whole lot of fun, so I will recap yesterday's events first.

Yesterday afternoon, after we ate lunch, Tony and I went to Kerrville to run several errands. Our first stop was at San Saba Caps, so we could pick up the Utopia Animal Rescue Ranch's t-shirts and caps, that our friends, Jim, "The Mineral Man" & Kris, volunteered to sell for us, at our Concert for Utopia. And just so you'll know—they look great.

After Tony filled up Trigger, while I bought groceries, at the H-E-B, on Main Street we headed over to Hoegemeyer Animal Clinic, so we could pick up the rest of the Flea & Tick Prevention pills, we had ordered for our dogs. While we were there, Ashley, the sweet vet technician, came into the lobby to ask us if she could please adopt Lorri and our answer was "Yes," with the understanding that Lorri and Carol must be happy about it.

The reason that I didn't write anything last night was because Chet, Tony and I went over to Carol's for a fun Happy Hour and a delicious dinner.

This morning I got up real early and went outside, at dawn, to start doing the chores, because the volunteers were coming out. I didn't have to do it, but I did it, because I like to have everyone fed, back in their pens and the pens cleaned before the volunteers arrive, so I can visit with our friends, etc. When Tony came back home, at 8:30, we had everything done by 9:00, when Jim showed up to walk our dogs for us.

Around 11:30, I went back outside to see when we were going to eat lunch, at the Medina Highpoint Resort. When I walked up to the barn, where everyone had gathered and laughing non-stop, I found out real quick what they were laughing about.

"I just went swimming," Suzanne confessed to me. "I am soaked from the neck down—thanks to George Carlin. He went into the creek and then he pulled me into the water..." After we had quit laughing, Ellen and June gave Suzanne an empty dog food sack and a bath towel to sit on, so her car seat wouldn't get wet. Then all of us took off to go eat lunch together.

Lunch was a lot of fun. Today I ordered their MOP Burger, because last Friday, June and Ellen had ordered it, without the bun and they had told me that it was delicious. When we started eating lunch Carol showed up, so she could visit with everyone.

As we ate, Carol asked June, Ellen and me what we were eating. "Their Mop Burger," June answered. "It comes with mushrooms, onion and pickles..."

After I had swallowed, I made an idiot out of myself, when I opened my mouth and asked this question, "Why is it called a MOP Burger?" Everyone started laughing.

"Because," June spoke slowly, "it's made with (pause) mushrooms, (pause) onions (pause) and pickles. That's why, (pause) Nancy." A few minutes later, Carol took off for Kerrville, to run a few errands and we left the building.

Later this afternoon, Carol called me, "Nancy, I still have to go to H-E-B and if you want me to, I can pick up Carol for y'all and bring her to the rescue ranch?"

As soon as Carol and I adios-ed each other, I half-hollered down the hallway, "Tony, Carol is picking up Carol and...." And fifteen minutes later, Tony came back inside The Cabin carrying in a big, see-through dog crate, for Carol. "It's perfect, Tony," I said. "Please put it right next to the kitchen table, so Carol can be close to me and Roy. I think she'll be happier in here with all of us. We'll let her live with us, until we can find her a forever home..." Then the phone rang.

"Nancy," Carol said. "Carol is the cutest, sweetest, little dog. Everyone at Hoegemeyer told me that they love her and I can see why. She's riding in my lap and we should be there in about twenty minutes..."

Carol was right about there timing. When the Carols arrived I grabbed my camera and went outside with Tony to go greet the girls, before shooting them, as they came through the front yard gate.

When we came inside the trailer, Carol was acting a little nervous, so Carol held her in her arms, as we took turns trying to calm Carol. Slowly, but surely Carol relaxed, so Carol put her down on the floor, so she could check things out, like Roy's latest, large grease stains, that he recently made from one of his many trash can raids. The good news is Carol was fine when it was time for Carol to go home.

Early this evening, Karon came over to meet Carol and like us, she fell in love with her and thought that she was precious, too. "She looks like a little fox," Karon remarked. "You should rename her Foxy Carol." And that is about it for tonight.

Y'all have a great evening!

Slip Sliding Away!

Yesterday, a few things happened that I forgot to tell y'all about. While I was over at the Lodge visiting with Kinky, Will and Copper, we were discussing Kinky's new book, and the one that I am working on. "Nance," Kinky said. "You need to get your book published now. I don't understand why you haven't."

"I can't Kinky," I replied. "For one thing, I am still working on it. And the other reason is—Mercury is fixin' to go into retrograde real soon, on September sixth through September twenty-ninth, to be exact, and I am not about to get it published during that time frame." Kinky sorta chuckled, and Will smiled.

"I'm with you, Cousin Nancy," Copper said, nodding her head. "I wouldn't publish then either. It's the smart thing to do. I have friends who..."

After we were done discussing the problems caused by the planet Mercury in retrograde, Kinky said, "I have some good news. Ruth Buzzi and Kent called earlier, and they are coming to Willie's Bloody Mary Morning event for my campaign! And they asked me if you and Tone were coming. Y'all have got to go, Nance."

"I don't know, Kinky," I said. "Tony and I really want to go to it, but we've been talking about driving in that crazy Dallas traffic, and now we're not sure." Shortly after that, I returned to the rescue ranch and the rest is history.

This morning I walked eight fast miles! Then T. and I went over to the Lodge to deliver smoothies. Will was there, but Kinky was gone. He was in Kerrville. Before leaving, we invited Will to join us for lunch in Kerrville, because we had errands to run. He told us that he would try to make it, but was not sure.

When we returned to the rescue ranch, I punched in Kink's cell phone number, and invited him to join us for lunch. He told me that he was busy running errands, but he would try to make it, too.

Now here's the part that y'all are not going to believe, but it is true. I'll explain later.

As Tony and I sat at our table, in the orange colored restaurant, we placed a bet on Kinky showing up! I won the bet—he showed up! As we ate their truly delicious shrimp cocktail appetizer, Kinky remarked, "This is really embarrassing for me."

"What's embarrassing?" I asked, with shrimp in my mouth.

"This is the third time that I have eaten here within twenty-four hours." We all started laughing. "Will and I ate dinner here last night. I ate here for breakfast, and now I am eating lunch." Once again, we laughed! Then our meals were served.

Tone and I had chicken verdes enchiladas with beans and rice, and Kinky ate their "Speedy Gonzalez Special," which he loves. It looked good and I might give it a try sometime. Our lunch was delicious and filled with laughter. Then we went our separate ways.

Kinky went to Albertsons, to stock up on some groceries, and we went to San Saba Cap to turn in some artwork. Then we went over to Copies Plus to see Trish, to talk to her about doing some posters for the rescue ranch. While we were there, Randy, of the famous, Randy and Lisa's Save Inn restaurant, showed up! He is Trish's father-in-law. We had a fun visit with them, and then we left.

Around five o'clock, Kinky called and invited us over to the Lodge for a visit. Tony was busy planting or harvesting crops, on his virtual farm, on Facebook, so I went by myself. Kinky and I visited outside by the Friedman Family Bone Orchard for about thirty minutes. Then he asked me to go on a short walk with him.

"Kinky, I'll go, but only for a short one, but not through the woods, because I don't want to sprain or break my ankle. I walked eight miles this morning and it's a hundred degrees outside. Okay?" We took off with the Friedmans.

Well, let's just say that Kinky tricked me! Yes, he tricked me. Twenty minutes into our walk, Kinky says, "Nance, there's a trail up ahead, but I am not sure where. Let's take it. It is beautiful." We marched on. "You know this is where Dylan and I got lost over a year ago." My heart was pounding—from the heat.

"I know. I've walked that trail with you and Ben, and I think it is up ahead, after we cross the creek." That's about the time, when I realized that The Friedmans had disappeared and I was fixin' to do some cross-country hiking in my pink Justin Gypsy cowboy boots! After crossing the bone dry creek, we walked about twenty more feet. "Is this the trail?" I asked.

"Yes! Follow me." I did and I wished that I hadn't. Suddenly, I found myself climbing nearly straight up a tall, rocky ledge, with rocks slipping away under my boots, and me grabbing at every branch, that I could find, to steady myself! "You're doing fine Nance and if you fall, just roll down to the bottom, it's not that far," Kinky said, ten feet ahead or should I say above me.

"Yeah right," I quipped. "I thought you promised me that we would go on a easy hike! I'm buying hiking boots, if I survive this trek with you!" Kinky laughed. I didn't.

When I finally made it up to the top of the super steep ledge, I was out of breath, soaking wet from sweat, but smiling because I had survived! Ten minutes later we were in the Lodge. Then Will appeared. They told me they had oranges, apples and bananas, so I offered to go to the rescue ranch, to get Jaws, my Vita-Mix machine, and make them smoothies.

Ten minutes later, Tone and I were at the Lodge making smoothies for Will and Kinky. As they sipped their healthy drinks, we got to talking about the Blood Mary Morning event. "Nance, you and Tone could drive up to Fort Worth and ride with Ruthie and Kent over to Dallas!" Tony shook his head no.

"I'm not going to Dallas," Tony stated. "Nance can go if she wants to, but I am staying here." We laughed.

"You're a baby, Tone. Nance, you could ride up with Ben and Will!" Kinky suggested.

"Great!" I said. "I can just hear Will telling Ben about me riding with them. 'Dang it Ben! Nancy is going to ride with us!'" The men started laughing.

"Nance," Kinky said. "You can ride up with Little Jewford and me, but you'll have to drive up to Austin, and spend the night in Dallas. How about that?"

"How about we drop the subject for now," I said. "You're wearing me out." They laughed, again. Then Kinky challenged Tony to a game of pool. T. declined because he was wore out. Kinky then challenged Will to a game of pool.

While The Hummingbird Man and Will took turns sinking their balls into the pockets, Kinky says, "Y'all, this is my imitation of Cousin Nancy earlier today. She calls me and says, 'Kinky, I've got some great news for you! Ben is coming down tonight!'" Kinky, Will and Tony started laughing! "Nance," Kinky teased. "I'd say that is good news, but not what you would call great news." The Hummingbird Man won the pool game.

Y'all have a great evening! I mean good evening! I mean a great evening!

Hello New Mexico! Here Comes The Hobbit Express!

Today has been a lot of fun! This morning I went to Kerrville, because Cindy Pickard had asked me to do her a favor. She had asked me to meet her at San Saba Cap, at ten o'clock, because she was getting her signs aka 'vinyl skins' put on her new FJ Toyota! I was one minute late.

When I arrived, Cindy was outside, with the owner, discussing the placement of the beautiful signs. "Hi Nancy," Cindy said. "I want you to meet John Baker. He owns San Saba Caps." John and I shook hands. "Didn't these turn out great!" My long time best friend asked, as she showed them to me.

"They're beautiful," I said. When Cindy and John were done, I told John that I had been in the embroidery business for over twenty years, and that I was very impressed with his work. Then we went inside his store, and Paul McCullar, came up to us and said hello to Cindy, and then he introduced himself to me. Paul and I quickly got to talking about being in the embroidery business, so he gave Cindy and me a tour of their work area, where their embroidery equipment is. Wow! This company was big time! In fact, they had so many sewing heads—it made my head spin!

When Cindy and I left San Saba Cap, we ran a couple of errands. Our last stop was at Pier One. When we walked out the store's door, I was carrying a sack with two gifts, that Cindy had bought for me!

On our way back to San Saba Cap, we ran into a traffic jam—and we were stranded at the corner where Wolfmueller's Books is a few doors down from. As we watched some kind of giant government equipment, that was causing the backup, slowly start moving. I looked over at Cindy, and saw Jon Wolfmueller waving at me from the corner! Cindy quickly rolled down Trigger's window, "Hi Jon!" I half-hollered. Before Jon could speak, the traffic jam was over, and I had to take off! Sorry Jon.

When we pulled up at San Saba Cap, Cindy and I were in shock, when we saw her beautifully decorated FJ! "It's perfect!" Cindy said, with excitement in her voice.

"OMG Cindy, it's beautiful!..." John came out and met us, as we climbed out of Trigger, and he was wearing a bigger smile than Cindy was. Here are some pictures that Cindy took of it, when she got home. By the way, Cindy named her FJ—the Hobbit Express! I love it!



Late this afternoon, I went over to the Lodge and had a fun visit with Kinky, Will Wallace and Copper Love! Copper is the artist, that did all of the artwork for Kinky's new self-published book, Heroes Of A Texas Childhood, which should be coming out real soon!

Around four o'clock I returned to the rescue ranch. Twenty minutes later, Will came over to borrow some tools from Tone. We had a nice visit with him. As soon as Will was gone, Kinky showed up with two people from Southern Living magazine! "Nance, Tone," Kinky said. This is Jennifer McKenzie Frazier, and Robbie Caponetto. They want to shoot me over here."

After howdies and handshakes, we all went into Outer Space for a short visit, with these two nice people. When Robbie pulled his camera out and started shooting Kinky, I went to get my camera. When I came back, I asked Robbie if he would mind if I shot Kinky, too. He had no problem with it! I shot Kinky seventy-three times! Here is a picture of Robbie and Jennifer and a few pictures of Kinky.



When the shooting had commenced, we took them on a tour of the rescue ranch. They loved my writing cabin, and admired the painting, 'The Von Kinky Family Singers,' that Dusty Pendleton had done! Then we went on the dog tour. Jennifer fell in love with several of our dogs, while Robbie shot Kinky several more times with our dogs. Jennifer told me that the article will probably be in their upcoming November issue of Southern Living! I can't wait!

Before I go watch a movie, I want to say that I met four new people today, that impressed me, and that I really liked. Thank you, Paul and John, and Jennifer and Robbie! Y'all rock!

Y'all have a great evening!