First Snow of the Season...

It was a delightful surprise to wake up this morning and find two inches of snow on the ground! The horses I feed are always happy to see me, but this morning they seemed even more excited for their morning hay feed.

While I was waiting for the water trough to fill I took a couple of pictures to share. The snow is nice and wet! Perfect for making snow balls! There's a couple of people I wish were here right now! I'ld surely take the opportunity to throw a big one at them and hope it hit them right in the neck, where it would run down the inside of their shirt! Makes me smile thinking about it! Bet you wonder if you're one of them. Bet you know if you are!

Dad's horse pasture is right at the edge of town. It looks out over the high desert. I enjoy the view very much. There's something special about snow. It cleans up everything and covers up the hand of man.

Everyone hustles something!

Yesterday was my dad's 80th birthday. Nothing special, right? Wrong! He woke up at the usual time and headed straight for his computer. With a cup of coffee in one hand he heads straight to his computer because not much happens in his life until the emails are checked. And then it's off to the Starlight cafe for more coffee and a sweet roll for breakfast. And it was while he was in the cafe that Rhonda brought in this huge plate of cookies and set them down in front of him. "Happy 80th birthday Tom!" Did he ever give her hell! "What are you doing telling everyone here that I'm 80? Can't you see there are 55 year old women here? Couldn't you have said that I was 60 or maybe 65?" My dad is the funniest person I know!

Now let's talk about the cookies. Rhonda brings Dad cookies every week or so. I'm not complaining, since I live here, and that makes me a major beneficiary of her kind acts of baking prowess. But my sister had put his picture in the local paper wishing him a happy birthday. Turns out she used a picture several years old. It was a picture of Dad looking into a mailbox out in the country (people next door to the farm he used to rent) collecting his cookies that they gave him on a regular basis. Now how does he do this? Turns out that my dad is a major cookie hustler. He'll hustle cookies from any woman in town who will bake them for him and I think the number would be much greater than it is except for the fact we can hardly eat the free cookies that come our way now!

And if they're not baking him cookies then they're baking him nasty little panty cakes and delivering them on his birthday! I'm telling you he's the baked sale hustler of the century! You go Dad!

It was wonderful to be able to hang around and watch Dad on his birthday. Cookies, cake, watch, brownies, door mat, a banana cream pie, shirts and candy bars (80 of them which he immediately hid in his room) were all delivered to his house throughout the day by people in the family and in the community who know my dad is simply one of the greatest people around. It was wonderful to see him honored in such a way. Doesn't change the fact that when it comes to cookies the man knows how to put on the hustle! Happy Birthday Dad!

Lessons for Life...

"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I've ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column once more." Regina Brett

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.
2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.
3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.
4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.
5. Pay off your credit cards every month.
6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.
7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.
8. It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.
9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.
10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.
12. It's OK to let your children see you cry.
13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.
15. Everything can change in the bliink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.
16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
17. Get rif of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.
18. Whtever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.
19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.
20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.
21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, and wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save if for a special occasion. Today is special.
22. Over prepare, and then go with the flow.
23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.
24. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.
25. Frame every so-called disaster with these words, "In five years will this matter?"
26. Always choose life.
27. Forgive everyone everything.
28. What other people think of you is none of your business.
29. Time heals almost everything. Give time, time.
30. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
31. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
32. Believe in miracles.
33. God loves you because who God is, not becasue of anything you did or didn't do.
34. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
35. Growing old beats the alternative - dying young.
36. Your children get only one childhood.
37. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.
38. Get outside every day, miracles are waiting everywhere.
39. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.
40. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
41. The best is yet to come.
42. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
43. Yield.
44. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

HOWL! O WEEN at Todd's...

I just spent a week with my brother Todd and his family in Albany, Oregon. It was my great pleasure to be there during Halloween. For Violeta, Fami, and Louie it would be their first Halloween in America. And I must say, it ran the gamut, from a Halloween Pumpkin Carving contest to visiting a haunted house, where someone, who I will not mention by name, wet their pants! I think the sound of the chainsaw had something to do with it but I'm not sure! A great time was had by everyone.

Todd and Atticus are so lucky to have such wonderful people join their family. Violeta, Fami and Louie are delightful people. I can hardly wait for the rest of the family to meet them when they all come to Vale for Thanksgiving. I believe we will have something like 35 people here. What a wonderful introduction to an American Thanksgiving this will be!

Please check out the Family portraits taken of Todd and his family to the left of this post. You can also check out the pumpkins created during our carving contest. Todd won the contest! I'm sure he bribed his kids for votes! I tried to register a formal complaint with the 'Pumpking Carving Association for Fairness' but they wouldn't let me fill out the paperwork. But if you check out the pumpkins in the slide show it is more than obvious that Todd's pumpkin is not the winner.

Todd's new home is beautiful. It's surrounded by pine trees and his property looks over the valley. I saw three does while I was there. Two of them were in his back yard one morning, one of them going to the bathroom in his garden!

Hope everyone had a frightful and wonderful Halloween!