A Monday office special.

I’m in such a weird mood. I had a lovely weekend… one of the best times I’ve had in ages… Husband was laid off last Wednesday… The dog is getting sicker and sicker… yet I can’t get rid of this great feeling I have from this weekend. I had this amazing weekend with my husband. We didn’t do anything majorly out of the ordinary, but there was this... I dunno… easiness about that we haven’t had in forever. I think it might be that there is no more looming departure awaiting us. We’re not trying to squeeze in quality time, or grumbling about what needs to be done between now and his having to leave… that whole dynamic is just gone. We’re together for the time being, it’s nice, we laugh and talk and are the best of friends like we always have been.

Tag got his first horse-shoes on Saturday. It was his first time by the way he was behaving. The Farrier, Mark Dietrich did a hot-set on Tag’s feet. He showed up with his trailer and little heating kiln thing and anvil, and he hammered and shaped the red-hot size-5 shoes, and Tag was not happy AT ALL and was getting all worked up. But then we discovered that Tag’s carrot-whoredom transcends all things, and even the scariest thing, like having one’s feet smoking is nothing at all, when there is a little green bucket full of carrots nearby to obsess about. He got almost half a bag of carrots and some apples, but the job was done, and now he makes such a delightful clatter when he walks. ADORE. And his feeties will be safe from further bruising (he tends to knock about a bit because he’s large and bumbling).

I lunged him a bit and then let him free to run, and made him gallop, and boy is that horse beautiful! I’m so in love with the beast. He chased hubby up and down the arena, and he played with his purple horse-ball, and then he went to his room for the night. Hubby and I then went to Joe’s Crab-Shack.. that was fun. Sunday, Valentine’s Day, hubby had one of his ex-coworkers up, a guy named Fraser from Canada up for lunch. Apparently Fraser had been homesick and complaining about the shocking lack of brown gravy in American food. Those Canadians like their brown gravy! So Hubby told his friend to come up and I’d make him a batch of brown gravy for lunch. I made steak and fries, and a huge batch of simple brown gravy (I did not make cheese curds for Poutine... I am not *that* motivated)—I deglazed the steak pan with beef stock, a little bit of milk, some extra salt and pepper, a little touch of Worcestershire sauce, a little bit of corn starch and voila… Fraser was in heaven. He’s like: “There now… It’s runnin’ through my veins again… my blood type … is gravy.” He slathered his steak and fries in it and dug in. Nothing makes me happier to see someone mack down on food I cooked. I like it that I softened his home-sickness a bit. Then the boys went to play with handguns (Canadians aren’t allowed to have those) and then when they came back, Fraser headed back to his hotel and hubby and I went to a nice romantic dinner at our favourite mountain restaurant, the Rendezvous Grill and Taproom. You know it's bad when you don't have to say anything, and they pretty much bring me my escargots -- they know us fairly well there.

Tomorrow, Flower gets tested for Addisonian Disease… if she doesn’t have it, she will have to be scoped in the tummy.

I’m off to go ride Tag and spend some quality equine time.

Enjoy my new Office Special. I made it this morning during a long phonecall. I call it “The Sewing Circle”. It’s made with the regular items, except this time I used the watercolour pencils and wet them down with q-tips I found in the office bathroom. I’m resourceful when I need to be. ;) I haven't sent it home to lighten or mess with on Photoshop, so it looks pretty muddy. Sorry.