Friday March 23 2007

A Well Deserved Rest

24x36 Oil Painting

The horse in this painting belongs to one of my neighbors and the location is on their nearby (well, relatively nearby - 12 miles south) ranch. They run a very big sheep outfit. This horse is one of the pack horses and carries the camp into the mountains always going along with the herd and the sheepherders. They were a common sight when I lived in the mountains. It's late fall, the sheep are on their winter pastures, his work is done until spring. He's enjoying his well deserved rest.

Today is another beautiful sunny day with a breeze. There are even some bugs flying against the windows. Seems early for that. We got a few sprinkles of rain in the afternoon. The grass in the yard has a definite tinge of green in the last three days. The snow is all about gone off the fields, only a few white spots that are the remnants of the deepest drifts. The back yard and corrals are another matter. Although perhaps reduced by half, there are still very deep piles of snow especially in the corrals. Like my friend Judy said the other day, the drifts are leaking out the bottom.

There was essentially no runoff. The snow and ice kind of morphed to water in the lowest spots and laid there lazy-like down below the creek banks, and everywhere else the moisture just sank right into the ground, so the country is already drying up. Its a big difference from the years when the runoff takes out all the culverts and carves trenches across the roads so deep you can't get across. We have been marooned in here several times until Muddy Creek went down and someone came with a backhoe to fill up the hole.

The horses seem to be enjoying the sunshine. They are going down into the slough and drinking from the creek instead of coming into the corral. They are beginning to shed their winter coats.

Most of yesterday I worked on my WAOW job. Now I wonder what did I do? I must have been still recuperating from the trip to Rock Springs. My job right now is to create wording for a new membership level structure, adding a couple of categories. This will be voted on (hopefully approved) and go into the bylaws which are being revised. There are three of us on the committee. There has already been much discussion by email to determine how the board wants the changes to incorporate the new levels. The message board is an interesting way to have a meeting and we can live anywhere and still do the group's business.

Yesterday Joe had to go to town for his protime test and had lunch in there. He picked up my prescription for me, which was down to 3 pills. I'm glad I don't have to go in for that. Made chicken fried steak for dinner. I got the recipe from one of the best cooks in town, at the Patio Restaurant. He didn't seem to mind at all giving it to me. And after running the cafe all their lives, they soon sold their business. So I'm glad to know how to prepare chicken fried steak according to Billy. He cooked and Annette baked all the pies and ran the place. It was the cleanest place in town. She was always cleaning and setting up new flowers and decorations. It has a counter with stools in the front room with a 50s diner flair and it probably hasn't changed since then. There are a lot of trophy fish, big mackinaw trout, from the nearby lakes on the wall. Sliding glass doors fill the whole back wall, and there is a cozy patio yard creating a nice view from the dining room. The Patio is Joe's favorite place to eat, and that's the first place I ever ate in Pinedale when I first came here.