I’m feeling the pain from this weekend, and I just got back from the chiropractor.

The other two times in my life that I’ve had to do that were also due to the horses.

I have a little muscle strain in my lower back. It’s not really surprising, since I jumped back into riding with both feet this year, and I’m really not in the best of shapes. Lumpy is a shape, isn’t it?

But he said I could keep riding, although I’m inferring the restriction to horses that don’t buck. He thoughtfully said I should take it easy on the hay throwing for a few days. So the boys can feed the cattle, which they do when I’m not there anyway.

But it was still a fun weekend.

On Sunday, we got up early to go help Lonnie out at a branding. These cattle are owned by a lady, which is pretty unusual, but then, she’s a pretty odd duck.

Lonnie had his panties all in a twist because this lady hadn’t planned to feed her help. I guess last year, she had a plate of cold cuts. No lunch, and nothing much to drink. Now, I’m not an expert on cowboy etiquette, but when you have a bunch of guys working really hard all day, for free, mind you, to help you out, why, you feed them. It’s not rocket science. Lonnie told her she had to put on a barbeque, and she grumbled about it all day.

Pat ended up being kind of in charge of the BBQ—he brought a friend with one of those big pull-behind grills. I was helping Pat clean the mountain oysters left over from the last branding (got a lot of jokes about that, and Cowboy told everybody how creeped out he was when I castrated our last baby goat.) This lady walks by grumbling about feeding people.

My respect for her, which had been fairly high for a woman running her own cattle, just dropped to the ground. What kind of person doesn’t have the common courtesy to feed people doing her a favor? She was whining that she didn’t know how to cook, and therefore shouldn?’t be expected to put on a BBQ. Well, she wouldn’t be expected to do the cooking. As the cattle owner, she’d be expected to manage the branding. Lonnie actually did most of that, but she did a lot of riding around being in charge. Whatever.

So Pat and his friend cooked, and Judy brought some salads, and it was a great BBQ.

I took two rolls of black and white film, and I think I got some really good pictures. There were really a lot of people in the branding pen, so it was hard to get isolated shots. I did a lot of standing on tailgates and the tops of fences, and my back is telling me off today.

I also neglected to bring sunscreen, so I have my annual horrible sunburn today. I was only wearing a ball cap, because my comfortable cowboy hat was at the other house. I wish I’d had it though, since my ears are almost blistered. That’s fun. I’m going to have to wear the cowboy hat for the rest of the week.

I had a great time though. There were a lot of other women around, and I got to know some of them. I finally met one of our neighbors, and she’s really nice. I’d met her husband and two-year old son before. The kids and I were playing with ball sacks, and those little guys were just cracking me up. They had snowball fights with them, they were sneaking them onto each other’s hats, and Dillon had stuffed his pockets with them. We suggested he put them somewhere else before his Mom found them, since she would have been none too pleased to do that laundry.

Cowboy rode the Big Lip mare, and she did really well. She’s settling back down to her usual self. That trainer that ruined her was there, but I hadn’t met him, and Cowboy didn’t tell me who he was until after we’d left.

I guess sometimes these brandings get really competitive, but this one was just a bunch of people having fun. There were probably 30 or 40 people working, plus families.

I met another boy with Seamus’ first name, and I’ve never met another one of those before. He was 8, and every time his mom called him, I’d look around for Seamus. His dad told me his middle name was James too, and got that that’s what Seamus means.

The guy cooking looked familiar to me too, and it turned out that he was the game warden who’d checked my bear in two years ago. He was really nice, and we discussed the mechanics of his BBQ for quite a while. Cowboy says he’ll get Chad to make us one of those when it gets slow this summer. I don’t need one as big as this was, but they’re sure nice when you’re cooking for a crowd.

It was a fun day. The whole weekend was. I’ll put up a photo entry when I get the pictures back.

Saturday, after getting the horses fixed, was the bull riding.

We ended up with too many tickets due to people canceling on us at the last minute. It was a good thing though, since when I tried to go in, my ticket wouldn’t scan. I suspect the ink may have smudged when I printed it, but it has made me rethink that printing them yourself option. Saved us a wait at the Will-call window, but I’d have been flaming mad if I hadn;t had another ticket right there in my hand.

I don’t know exactly what I expected. It was fun to have the whole family, plus friends, out for the evening. We met for dinner before, and that was fun even with a horrible waitress.

But going to the NFR too often may have spoiled me. I’d heard that the PBR does it up like the NFR, and they did have a big show at the entry. That was pretty neat, and the stadium is brand-new and really nice.

What I really like about rodeo is the timed events though. I’ve always been fairly happy to get up and go to the bathroom during the rough stock, even the bull riding. We do watch a lot of bull riding on TV, but I think that’s more because that?s the only rodeo event on frequently.

It got a little boring after a while. The final round was when it started to get exciting, which is to be expected, as that’s where the best cowboys get to ride the best bulls. We did get to see the high point ride of the season so far. Luke Snyder made a 94-point ride, and it was really something.

Dennis and Lori ran into Big Jeff as we were leaving, and went out to the bars with him and the friends he was with. I’m feeling to old to be doing that shit anymore, so we went home. Besides, we had to get up early for a branding the next morning.

Which is a whole separate entry’s worth of story.

What a busy weekend. I’m going to have to break it up into sections, or it will get all jumbled together and won’t make any sense at all.

Friday, I left work a little early to get to the Post Office yet again. This time it was their screw up, but we finally got it sorted out, and I finally have a business address. They have figured out that I live with Cowboy, and just hand me his mail across the counter. Much different from his old PO, who required two forms of ID from his sons to even be put on the box. They also asked me to nag him about getting the house box put up correctly. We’re not supposed to be getting mail there yet, but junk mail will follow you anywhere. Lost in the Andes? Never fear, catalogs will find you.

We got in a good evening of roping Friday night. The shoer had been out Thursday though, and as soon as we got Rowdy in the arena, it was clear that something was drastically wrong. He’s not a horse that really shows pain, but he could hardly stand on one leg.

Hmm. Was fine all week roping + no accidents + shoeing = bad shoeing job. And sure enough, he’d been cut on the sole of his foot so badly that it was still bleeding a day later. Poor Rowdy, imagine cutting the sole of your foot, and then having to put several times the pressure per square inch on it. Cowboy called up the shoer, who’s a friend of ours, that night. He said, “Oh, yeah, I know I cut him. I forgot to tell you.”

Come on now. You forget to tell us that you’ve crippled Cowboy’s only good roping horse? And with a rodeo next weekend, in which your son, Chris’ former roping partner, is competing against Cowboy and Chris? How convenient.

No, I don’t like the guy, why do you ask?

Cowboy says it’s too hard to find a good shoer. There just aren’t very many in the Valley, and others that he’s tried have been worse.

We took him back on Saturday morning, and he put a pad and some packing on Rowdy, which at least lets him walk. I don’t know if he’ll be all right by next week. We also had to take the Big Lip mare back, since she threw a shoe Friday too. Yes, the day after she was shod. Quality work, that.

Cowboy just got the Big Lip mare back; she’s been at a trainer’s all winter. We expected her to be in top shape and ready to rope on when we got her back. Well, apparently that guy didn’t do much more than run a few steers on her once in a while. I’m not terribly happy with the guy either.

I got on her Friday, expecting my favorite, willing little mare. What I got was a cranky bitch who humped up with me when we were bringing in the steers, and actually bucked with me when I was warming her up. She didn’t throw me, although she could have if she’d really tried. I kicked her out of it and we went on. But I was not amused. She was bitchy all night, trying to kick the other horses and biting at me.

Cowboy had to rope on her, since Rowdy was lame. He said she felt really fresh, like she hadn’t been roped on much at all over the winter. Which is what he was paying that guy to do. She tried to buck with him too. He was wearing spurs, and she got an immediate manners lesson. We don’t put up with that shit around here, little mare. She seems to have forgotten how to stand tied without pitching a fit too.

She’ll remember where she is pretty soon.

Were going to the PBR tomorrow night. The whole family’s going, except my two kids, who aren’t with me this weekend, and aren’t into bull riding in any case.

I got the limit of ten tickets online, but then our friend called and Cowboy had promised to get him his tickets too. So to make good on Cowboy’s word, I went through the phone system with my name and credit card. Fortunately, I had used Cowboy’s for the first ten. I think that limit’s for scalpers, not incredibly huge redneck families.

I hope Chad didn’t want to go. Cowboy didn’t ask him because he’s really not into to the rodeo stuff, but I got to thinking that he might feel a little left out. I hope not, but he’s a little overly sensitive about some things. It’s too late to get more seats together.

We were also going to go to a branding this weekend. I don’t know whose, but it really dumped last night, and branding’s not so urgent that you have to do it in the mud. If we do go, I’m bringing the good camera and black and white film.

It should be a really good weekend. I’ll post more on Monday. Unless it sucked, then I’ll either pretend it didn’t happen or go on and on about it. Because I’m like that.

Cowboy finished off the bulk of the scavenging project today.

He still has to retrieve the two tanks. He’s bringing in a crane on Friday or Saturday, because this one needs to be lifted out of the vault and over a fence. Yes, it’s nice to know people from whom you can just borrow a crane, but to be honest, that guy is getting one of the tanks. We owe him a favor anyway, as that’s where we’ve kept our horses and roped for the last two years.

The tanks will be nurse tanks for the arena sprinkler systems. You have to keep the ground damp for traction and dust control, and both arenas are on household wells that just aren’t up to the challenge of industrial sized sprinklers. So you fill these tanks at your leisure, and then run the system off of them. Our tank might even be filled from the canal rather than paying to run the well pump. It will also probably irrigate my garden and the pastures.

All of that steel pipe looks like more than enough to build our roping boxes. He got a lot of elbow fittings too, so our boxes won’t have sharp corners. My hips (and the horses) are grateful, since someone’s always slamming into them. The rest of the pipe will be fence posts.

I’m getting very excited about finally having the horses at our house. I expect the horse barn and arena to be done sometime in mid-summer. Cowboy said he’d build dog kennels too. The place is changing rapidly.