Category Archive

Got up to 60 or better today, south wind blew, but wasn’t bad… I did some jobs around here this morning, getting ready for cattle working on Saturday, had to go get some special bolts for the chute so drove Teddy and got his oil changed.. been over a year.. not sure how many miles, but not a lot as he seldom leaves the ranch…I even filled his fuel tank… he is ready for another year… came home and ate a bite then gathered horses and me and Bit went down and moved some cattle out of a couple assures… I go help a neighbor ship his calves in the morning, then will probably move the cows even closer in the afternoon… then we won’t have to big pasture to gather on Saturday.. I go up and help a neighbor do some cow work on Monday, then another neighbor to help ship calves on Tuesday.. looks like the weather is going to be nice for the next week… lots of green grass in the cool season grasses.. calves are looking good and growing…other than that, not much going on.. oh, I did take the big young draft mares down to Hermosa yesterday and a young lady worked with them and pulled their shoes off and trimmed them.. she did a great job and there was some training involved…they ought to be real good when we need to re shoe them,,, probably when it gets icy this winter…

Cool, trying to rain… we have doctored on some sick calves, so it must be fall… we spent most of the day at school with Gabe and Lige for grandparents day… it was fun and interesting to see what they are learning and how they are teaching them.. hope this rain keeps up.. we are seeing some grass greening up.

Woke up yesterday to about 2 inches of rain in the rain gauge. Praise the Lord! We sure wanted some and tho’ it made muddy roads it sure helps the country…

I have been fighting pain in both my feet for years and Cindy has mentioned (some might call it nagging, I won’t!) that I should go see a podiatrist…that’s a doctor who specializes in feet, for you ol’ cowboys who don’t read a lot… so I did… nice young man.. x rayed my feet and what I had thought and fought or quite a few years is arthritis… the big jones for the big toe n both feet are all mangled and nothing between the  bones, just bone on bone… he injected them with cortisone, or some such.. hurt like the dickens, but all of a sudden the pain was gone… I felt like a little kid.. I had fought it for so long, I didn’t remember what it was like to not have the pain.. he tells me at some point I will need to have those bones fused together and on my left foot, my body has been trying to do it on it’s own… by yesterday evening they were pretty tender again, but feel great this morning… he gave me some special pads (well, no, he didn’t GIVE them to me, I had to pay for them…) and I am sure glad that Esteban ( the feller who has been making my last pairs of boots) made them loose…they will put more of my weight on the arch so that is supposed to help also… heck, I may be able to go hike again!

They say travel broadens a person… dang sure easy to broaden when you travel like we do and eat like we do, tho’ this morning when I weighed myself I was a few pounds lighter… sure could have fooled me as we drove over 2000 miles and mostly just sat, ate or slept (sure wish motels believed in providing softer beds… must have some mattress company in cahoots with chiropractors or something!)

Cindy and I took Fr Tyler and Chance and headed out on Sunday in ‘ol Blue, we met Tyler in Rapid City about 1 pm and headed south by slightly west. We camped at a motel in Colorado Springs that night.. the next night, after not much sleep (by me anyway) we went to Royal Gorge and checked it out, Cindy’s second time there, my third and the first for the boys… everyone thought it was cool… followed the Arkansa river west from there with Fr Tyler drooling over the fly fishing available, but he wouldn’t bring his fly rods and didn’t want to stop and rent the stuff… we turned south and headed for Toas (which I had always wanted to visit)  late enough and beings it was Labor Day most things were closed, tho’ we found a fly fishing shop and the boys had a nice visit with the young man running it who also guided fishermen and hunters in fall.. he showed us a lot of cool photos of trophy racks taken by people his guide service helped… not cheap, but looked like if you wanted to spend the bucks they would sure try and get you a good trophy. Left there and headed on down to Santa Fe, got a motel room (with a bit softer beds tho’ Chance didn’t like his) and went and ate at a restaurant within walking distance, Cindy and Tyler had eaten at a few years ago,

Tuesday morning we went off and looked at the first church built in the US, about 1500 and some, so it said.. cool little church with a cool bell you were supposed to whack with a rubber mallet.. I did and supposedly that means it will bring you back.. I hope so, lots to see and do there, but sure is pricey… then on to the Lorretto Chapel.. the story is that when the nuns got it built they realized they had not left room for a staircase leading up to the choir loft.. so they prayed a Novena to St Joseph for a miracle and lo and behold a feller walked in one day carry carpenter tools and went to building the stair case.. he made it a spiral, but it has no central pole… when it was finish and the nuns went to pay the man, he was gone.. he had only his bed and board while building it.. the wood has been analyzed is not the wood from anywhere close by and no one has ever figured out how he managed to do it.. you can’t touch it but you can see it up close.. Chance and I marveled over his craftsmanship, when you consider the few tools he used to make it… the nuns think it was St Joseph himself who came and built it and then disappeared.. I believe in miracles so I sure won’t argue it… we then visited the basilica which is much larger and ornate and a beautiful building on it’s own, tho’ much more modern,, we then went in search of art galleries, but we were directed to the old part of the city which has narrow windy trails and not conducive to a Dodge Dually pickup.. we found lots of galleries, but no near by parking and my feet were hurting already so we said adios to Santa Fe ad headed towards Durango Colorado… managed to stay at the same motel I had stayed at a few years before that I thought was sketchy and high priced.. this time it wasn’t so sketchy, or high priced (goes to show to stay away from Priceline dot com and them others like that .. they charge too much for their fee!) Went to the Straiter Hotel, an old hotel, downtown, for supper.. kind of a cool place where much of the goings on at the Durango Cowboy Poetry gig takes place in October.. I had been there the last two years.. waitress was over run so service was slow, but it sure wasn’t her fault so she got a good tip… went to bed and got up and headed out the next day headed for Mesa Verde.

Mesa Verde is a place I had always wanted to see and we didn’t spend nearly enough time tho’ we did see most of the high point and got some good photos.. I might try and post some on here if I can figure it out… I sure will on Facebook and Cindy already has… it is amazing that people lived there longer than we have been a nation and not much left to show where they went or why they left.. we left there about noon and headed north and a bit west then back east and spent the night in the town where Doc Holliday died… Glenwood Springs. Marty and I had camped there for a night the previous year on our way to Durango.. we passed thru Paradox valley, which was another place I always wanted to see… and came by Moab with Canyonlands, which we found out was once called Robbers Roost on the old Outlaw trail… also saw the place or close to it where Butch and Sundance blew up the train car, scattering money every where, as they used to much TNT to what ever explosive they used…

Got up Thursday morning and headed east then north and got to Kremling Colorado a bit before noon.. followed our directions and went to see Caitlynn Taussig and her mother Vickie and sister Cameron and father Jim… had a great visit, got to play a few songs together and then headed out and got out of their hair.. cool looking country, really wide open and not cluttered up with trees like so much of that region. They call them parks and they do look like it, in the bottoms of the valleys. We got out of there about 2:30 and headed towards Walden and got a bite to eat there and headed north and east again, going thru’ Laramie were Cindy got a couple lugs of Colorado peaches (we couldn’t find any fruit stand near Grand Junction as your on the interstate and it was late when we went by the evening before..). sat up straight and throwed the reins at ol Blue but a nice feller along the way with a badge on his chest stopped there runaway and warned ol’ Blue to keep it to a lope instead of a run away…we turned off at Mule Creek junction and discovered our State loves to slow people down with road work along the way we went but finally got to Rapid, dropped off Tyler and got back home about 12:30 last night.

It was a great trip and everyone seemed to have a good time… ol’ Blue wasn’t even tired tho’ he did eat quite a bit of feed on our over 2000 mile trek.. he’s a good one.

Went to a horse sale last weekend. Bid on a couple colts but evidently my taste is too good in horses as they went higher than I was willing to pay. Went to another one today… part of it was a dispersion sale… mares went pretty high and again colts were higher than what I was willing to pay… went up and checked cows at the summer pasture yesterday morning.. everything looked copacetic… drove the big percheron girls and hauled some bales this past week, ran here and there… summer is slipping away and I still got summer type things to do. Chance and the boys rode along with me last night and we went to a saddle bronc match.. good show…got hot this week, so we are hoping for some cooler temps and some rain..

Loaded up early this morning to go help the neighbors with fall shots.. took Hub to ride. Hub is 6 or 7 and had sporadic training… it was a great day to ride him.. lots of cows to sort off and much up and alley and a gather and moving pairs later.. wore me out but good for him.. real nice day, cool this morning and warm this afternoon, no breeze to speak of… I am tired, but it’s a good tired… got some rain yesterday and the day before, not a lot but it will help green pastures up.. life is good.

Brought home a coulee 2 year old Percheron fillies to drive this winter… Chance and i harnessed them up and took a drive yesterday.. one is a bit scared when you harness her but once they are hooked they are sweet hearts… big.. 17 hands at least.. when they fill out they will big girls.. turned them out tonight on pasture and man were they excited..

Went to the wagon ride Tuesday after stopping to get my pickup alignment checked… spent the night and came home last night, got up this morning and me and some minions went and gathered bull, brought them to the corrals and sorted 4 off to go south and 2 to go u north. Ari went with me up north.. cattle were all real close to the gate so dumped the bulls and rode south to the neighboring pasture and found a cow and calf we’d try finding  a couple days ago.. calf was a bit sore fitted, so I suppose he was laying off by himself last time we looked.. after playing ring around thew rosie at a water hole we finally got the ol’ hussy back in our pasture and followed her to our cows.. checked them and everything looked good, bulls were all at work… we went on in to Faith and fueled up the pickup and us and then drove over to check on a colt some kids been riding for me.. man, they have done a nice job.. Ari even rode him a bit as did I.. they still need to ride him a few more times then he can come home.. I think I am going to like him.. I mowed some grass n a stack yard as we have bales made that need hauled in.. think I am going to ride along with a neighbor to Billings to the horse sale this weekend… about it for now.

Went in to town yesterday afternoon, for Cindy’s sisters wedding.. she was a beautiful bride..we are getting old, Cindy had to work today so we left fairly early.. got home about 10:30.. we were going to move some cows today but one calf was missing.. not sure how we did it, but we have a cow in the bunch with out a calf.. haven’t found any dead ones so don’t know what the deal is.. she sure messed up our plans.. guess we will do it tomorrow after Mass… I worked on leather today, basement where my shop is stays pretty cool so it was a good place to work… looks like it is going to try and rain on us tonight.. fixed up a barebones saddle for me seeing as Gabe has stolen my other one… went out and rode it on Pard this afternoon and looked at the cows.hot wind blowing… I bet these guys who have hay down are liking it as it really ought to be curing the hay quick..

We’ve been having a great summer.. rained a lot.. people have been having a hard time getting hay put up between the rains, until the past week or so… grass and hay everywhere,,, sure looks better than last year!

The boys found some pasture away from here, so we sorted pairs last week and weekend and got some hauled up to it.. had some get in the neighbors right away.. pushed thru some poor fence in a mud hole fighting flies.. Game and I went up early Monday morning and gigot them back.. heard of one of our cows in another pasture.. we couldn’t find her.. came up short on the count but there are so many little water holes with so much grass around it that we decided she may have gotten back in and we just missed her.. pasture is pretty rough and the only good way to see it all is horseback… I dropped Gabe off for summer church school and then went home.. got a call about noon for the next door neighbor to this pasture and his neighbor had found her…so I loaded up a horse and went back… got her back and she was hot and tired… Tae checked the next morning and din’t see any tight based cows so hopefully she found her calf… we need to sort off more this weekend and haul them u there…if we would have known we were going to have summer grass, we would have ear tagged, cow and calf the same… oh well, ain’t no high step for a stepper!

Been getting some rains.. country is really looking good. We got the calves branded up on Saturday, with the help of a great crew. Been raining ever since, seems like and supposed to rain off and on this whole week.. let it, it makes the grass grow and after last year, maybe some people will remember that…

I tho to the Hills on Tuesday and stay over.. drive a team hauling people to a chuckwagon dinner and show each evening.. they fit me out with a real nice team of big black Percherons…. sure would be nice to get to winter them and feed with them all winter.. or maybe better yet, just use them once in awhile, because we will have so much feed available, we won’t have to feed! 😀