Missing Blogger...

Where oh where has Astaryth gone....
Oh where oh where could she be???

 

Well, the short answer is that I've been VERY busy in the real world.

 

The long answer?

 

Let's start with my work schedule. Now, I'm one who LIKES to work 10 hour days. You do four 10 hour days and then get a long weekend! I like long weekends. But, when you work for a company that does 8 hour days five days a week and they get a bunch of work.... Well, we have been going in at 6 am and getting off at 4:30 pm five days a week and then doing some work on Saturday also. (53 hours last week and 54 this week total!) Add to that the Sunday feeding of the horses at my boarding barn and you have quite a full week.

 

But Wait!! That's not all! G went and got a different job. We have been doing the whole visiting, interviewing, filling out paper work for that. It took us about 6 weeks to go from "Hey that might be fun" to "O.K. I've got the job". It is requiring us to move, and because we are in a lease, he went up there last weekend, and I am staying down here with all of the animals till the end of May, when I too will move. Now, the move isn't far, just 3 hours north, and we are still in Florida, but we ARE going to be crossing that line into the part of Florida that actually gets things like freeze warnings! Brrrrrr! I wanted to know why, if he was going to get a different job, it couldn't be farther SOUTH, but apparently I was ignored. We first thought about 'breaking' our lease and paying the penalty, but it turns out the penalty is2 months rent.... and our lease is up in 2 months. We decided economically it would be better if I stayed here and kept my job till the lease was actually up.

 

So, in addition to having already worked 53 hours that week, I also had to make 2, yes -2- trips to the new place to get him settled in... followed by 54 hours of work this week. Needless to say, I have been working, sleeping, taking care of the pets and if I'm lucky, reading my e-mail and maybe a couple of journals.

 

Now, I know the next question... What is he doing? He has returned to working for the company that owns the show we worked for while we were traveling on the road. They have a retirement facility for their animals that are too old to work anymore where they go and live out the rest of their natural lives being cared for by some really nice people. I know a lot of people have the idea that animals that 'work' for a living are just discarded when they are injured or too old to work, but not by this organization. They consider their obligation to that animal to be from the time it enters their care till it has passed away, and they go out of their way to make their retirement years a pleasant experience.

 

Some cool aspects of this: When we toured the facility the day G was offered the job, we found that he knew all of the elephants there from working on both units of the show. He also had 'met' the other animals at one time or another. Most of the animals at the retirement facility are elephants because they have such long lives in captivity. So, G's new job is to feed, care for, and find ways to entertain these older elephants. Pretty Cool, huh?

 

Now, for the good parts! Once we are moved, I'm not going to have to work as much! I will probably pick up a couple of things part time to stay busy, but I won't be doing the 40 hours a week thing anymore (unless I want too!) G. wants me to look into going back to school, and I am considering the options. I'm thinking a combination of online and traditional would work best for me. Also, I am looking forward to having more free time to really play with my camera and do some other fun things I've been putting off due to lack of time/energy.

 

And, you will probably be seeing more, not less, animal pictures as I still have lots of friends at the Zoo where G was working, and the area we are moving in to puts me centrally located for 2 -other- zoos! Plus, I am moving into a more rural area with all of the animals THAT implies! So, I am pretty excited about the opportunities for animal photography I am going to have. In addition, I would like to try some macro stuff with flowers and butterflies and the like. All in all, I think the move is going to turn out to be a good one for both of us.

 

I have spoken with G this last week.... Now, I left him up there with NO phone, NO cell, and NO computer access.... He still manages to call me every evening to "make sure I am doing o.k." {snort} The first time he called I was sitting on the couch with my chinese take-out, holding the remote and watching a movie I had been wanting to see..... I wonder who we have to worry about "doing o.k." by themselves {LOL} ... anyway, I have spoken to him, and so far he LOVES it.

 

Oh, and the picture at the top of this entry is one of my favorites of G. and one of his 'girls' out on the unit. Since it is a favorite of mine, I'm sure some of you have seen it. Don't worry.... I have a few new pictures sitting on the hard drive that I plan on posting as soon as work let's up and I can do the required cropping, fixing, and finding appropriatte links for them.

 

And, THAT is the long answer to the question of the missing Blogger known as Astaryth!

MMMMmmmmmMMMM!!

One more strawberry picture.

Last Wednesday I decided that I would dip some Strawberries in Chocolate... MMMMMMmmmmmmmMMMMM!

It's Winter Time in Florida...

What does that mean? Well, winter time in the rest of the country brings you pictures of snow, children sledding, trees covered with ice, the world dressed in white..... But, not down here. Here, at least the part of here that I wander thru on a daily basis, winter consists of fields and fields of... Green!

The picture above is of the same field that I took a picture of when everyone was showing pictures of fall. Then, it was a bleak field of black plastic... what a difference a couple of months make!

I live in the center of what is called 'The Strawberry Capital of the World'. And these fields are full of beautiful, red, luscious strawberries. The place I live in is even called Plant City! This weekend begins our annual Strawberry Festival. It will run for 12 days... 12 days of carnival rides, musical entertainment, and.........

Strawberry Milk shakes
Strawberry Shortcake
Chocolate Covered Strawberries
Elephant Ears... with Strawberry topping
Funnel Cakes... with Strawberry topping
Fresh strawberries in a cup with whipped cream

Good thing I Love Strawberries!

The Rest of the Story...

Several people have asked for the 'rest of the story' on Hungry Henry. Soooooo......

The story starts on Thursday when I leave work to find a flat tire on my pickup. Grrrrrrr.... Grumble... Grumble..... Get a lift home and wait for G. to get off work, which he finally does THREE hours after his normal coming home time. By this time it is dark and we make the decision to wait till the next morning to fix the tire. G. is off and can run me to work and then fix the tire at his leisure. No problem. I literally live 4 minutes from work.

Friday dawns and G begins to change the tire only to find that the lug wrench is missing. Sigh! But, no problem, a quick trip to an auto supply store takes care of that and now I have a four way lug wrench with is a waaaaay better lug thingy anyway. Bad tire is taken off, small screw is found to be the culprit, and the spare is removed from its bracket to take it's place on the truck. I'm all happy because I have a full sized spare, not one of those 'donuts' and will be able to jet down, and drop the bad tire off and we can still make our appointment on Saturday.... Except for one problem.... Seems the spare (which I haven't needed for over 2 years) has gone flat! Sigh! Grumble, Grumble. Another trip by G. to auto store and a can of fix-a-flat puts enough air in the tire to get to a station. Air is added and spare is good... YEAH! Oh, and why didn't we just take the spare to a station and air it up? Well, our second vehicle is a motorcycle! LOL!

Saturday we wake up to a beautiful sunny day..... Until time to drive 2 hours to get to our appointment. Now it is raining and icky and we are driving into it. Yuch!

Finally Sunday comes and I am ready to relax, spend some time with my favorite horses, and I head to the barn. It is a little chilly, so I grab my heavy coat and head out. When I get to the barn, I see Hungry Henry. I don't know it is Hungry Henry yet, but I do know he is a cutie. I feed the horses and am patting myself on the back for having grabbed the camera on my way out the door that morning. I go to the car, grab said camera, and snap several shots of said cutie, along with a couple of my favorite wooly bear (my furry horse), and go to take the camera back to the pickup for safe keeping while I let the horses back out into the pasture....... to find.... that my heavy coat apparently brushed against the door hard enough to push the lock down and the door, although not completely closed, IS closed enough to latch... with my keys, wallet, etc, all inside the pickup! GRRRRRRR! A call to G. turns up that he can't find the spare key, but he will come out and pick me up... with the motorcycle... on one of the coldest days we've had all winter... Grrrrrrr!

Well, I have an auto club. Which has a card. That I carry. In my billfold. That's in the pickup. With the key. GRRRRRR! So, we call the police dept. to find out who they use for a locksmith, call him, give him directions (which is fun because he isn't familiar with the area we are talking about... out in the boonies!), and then go back out on the motorcycle, on one of the coldest days of the winter, to meet said locksmith and get my keys out of the pickup......

So, that is the 'Rest of the Story'! I'm hoping for a better week this week. ROFL!

Now that you've read my sad story, I'll leave you with a cute picture. This is what you get when you let your Corgi do the 'Corgi run' and you actually lay down on the ground and take pictures of said Corgi running like a maniac!

Hungry Henry

When I go out to the barn on Sunday morning to feed the horses, I just never know what I will find! Today it was "Hungry Henry"......

I was so eager to get a picture of this little guy that I did something stupid... which will be an entry for another day. If I start whining tonight I don't know if I'll be able to quit, so I won't. Instead I will offer up a series of pictures of Henry.

How do I know his name? Well, just as I was leaving the owner yelled over and said, "Oh, I forgot to tell you about the goat. He just showed up and we haven't figured where he came from yet, so give him some feed when you feed the horses. Someone will come looking for him soon... Oh, by the way, we're calling him Hungry Henry." I laughed and told him that I had already fed Henry some grain as a bribe to let me take his picture.

After all of the horses had finished eating and I turned them back out into their pasture, Henry happily followed them out and was still hanging out with them when I came back for the evening feed. He's certainly made himself right at home!

Hope you enjoy him as much as I did.

Super Bowl???

The Super Bowl? Phhhhhht!!!! Who needs the superbowl? The only good part is the commercials, and now with the aid of the internet you can actually see all of the commercials without actually having to suffer thru the game! Having said that, here I sit with the game on the TV waiting for the next commercial break ;P

So, What could possibly be better than watching the Super Bowl with all of it's commercials (oh, and that football stuff)? The Puppy Bowl II, of course! And, the Super Bowl may have The Rolling Stones for their half-time show, But the Puppy Bowl II has the Bissell Kitty Half-Time Show!

Come back later and I'll have something to say about what I thought the best commercials where, and maybe even something to say about the Half-time show.......

I'm Famous...

Well at least sort of <g>

Seems that Kim over at I Shaved My Legs for This? is the Guest editor this week... And guess who she picked to share the honor with? Yep, ME! Well, me and some other people <LOL> Be sure to pop over to her place or the Journals Main Page and check out all of her picks.

Since I'm probably going to be getting some extra visitors here in the next few days, I thought I would do a little 'about me' entry.

Although this Journal was never meant to be a 'showcase' for animals, it often becomes one because... well they are and always have been a big part of my life. I was born into a family that loved animals, and I can't remember a time in my childhood when there wasn't at the very least a dog and a cat in my home... and often assorted other creatures...   Add to this the dogs/cats owned by my Grandparents and Aunt/Uncles, and I was exposed to pets from the time I was 3 days old.

My first home was with my Grandparents... in Kentucky... You know, "Land of Beautiful Horses and Fast Women" <eg>. My grandfather's favorite story was always about how I threw such a fit at the age of 6 months that they had to go and get a neighbor to come back and let me have a ride on his horse so I would quit crying. Now, I don't remember this, but I wouldn't doubt it. My Grandfather always claimed that my love of horses began at that moment.

I managed to own a horse by the time I was 20, and by 24 was living in Florida and actually making my living caring for horses!! From there, it was just luck that led me from place to place. The people I originally worked for in Florida owned Arabian Horses. Seeing that the market for them was falling, the owner took the horses he still owned and added a few different breeds to them and started a dinner theatre in Orlando. I was lucky enough to return to work for them in the early 80's just as this was taking off.

Working at the dinner theatre, I was exposed to many different types of riding, all kinds of horses, and a lot of really cool people... some of which had been or were still circus performers. One day one of them recommended me to a trainer who had just arrived from Europe and would be training an act for the circus that would include Friesians, Arabians and..... zebras! I was quickly sold on the idea of not only working with 2 breeds of horses that I admired, but Zebras! The chance seemed to be to wonderful to pass up, and my boss allowed me to take a leave of absence to go work with this trainer for 6 months and help get the act ready to go on the road.

By the time the Fall rolled around, it was obvious that, although the act was well on it's way, it was nowhere near ready to just be handled by anyone, and the trainer convinced me to go with him on the road and travel with the circus for 6 months and finish their training..... And I never looked back.

During the 6 years I spent working for the circus, I was an assistant trainer for this first act, then Head tiger groom for another set of animals, and finally a Senior Animal Handler... which meant I helped out where needed. It was a wonderful experience and I crossed the entire continent twice, was in New York City at Madison Square Gardens three times, went once to Mexico City, and even visited Canada,  and along the way had many adventures. Most importantly, I met the man I currently share my life with.

A little over a year and a half ago, G (my significant other) was offered a wonderful opportunity to work in a zoo. This was a dream of his since he was a child, so how could I say no?? We came off the road, and while he went to work for the zoo, I found a job that I could do while I look for the 'right' job for me. Luckily for me, since G and several of our friends still work with exotic animals, I still get the opportunity to be around the animals I adore...  Still, I look forward to finding the right spot for me to continue to do what I love.

While waiting for -my- dream job, I have several 'furkids' who keep me quite busy. We have Morgan (the Pembroke Welsh Corgi) who is the darling of my eye. She is almost 3now, and I've had her since she was just six weeks old. D.K. (short for Devil Kitty) is a 'tuxedo' cat and 11 years old. I've had her since she was a 5 week old kitten. And finally, but by no means last, is Boo, my horse. He is a black bay Arabian who I actually helped be born. On Jan 1 (all horses have their 'official' birthday on Jan 1!) he was 16 years old.... but, he will get his birthday celebration in the spring anyway <g>

So, that's the short form...... The newer pictures you find here in my Journal are from our local zoo or aquarium... although I do on occasion get to a little more exotic locals. The older ones... well, they can be from anywhere <g>

Hope you enjoy your visit... And Thanks for stopping by!