Lucky Me

I've got to be the luckiest girl around!  Today I had lunch with my two most favorite, handsomest men!  Hubby called from the driveway at my office and said, "Come on down!  Let's go to lunch!"  I went downstairs and hopped in the jeep and there were my two sweet boys, Hubby and Dudley, with a big bag of smelling-good food.

We drove to an old abandoned school and picnicked on the lawn under a big shade tree.  As Hubby laid out the food, Dudley sniffed the containers, doing his best to get a quick nibble of this and that before we shooed him away.  No "people food" for Dudley.  When he figured out he wasn't going to get the better of us, he mosied off on his own to explore, watered the grass, played with fallen oak leaves and then ran back to our blanket, ears flopping away.  He's so cute.

What a wonderful surprise and welcomed break to my stressful day.  Thank you sweet Hubby, for being so thoughtful and for surrounding me with love.  I am so blessed.

Oink! Oink!

There's nothing quite like the yummy smell of bacon frying in the morning!  Some days when I'm on my way into work, I'll drive past the Country Boy Restaurant, or Halfway Market, and I can smell the bacon cooking even with my car windows rolled up.  It makes my tummy start to growl and the rest of the way into work, I'm wishing I had gotten up earlier so I could have eaten breakfast before I rushed out the door.

My office is in the upstairs portion of my elder boss' house, so most mornings I sit at my computer as more tantalizing aromas drift up the stairs from the kitchen down below, where my boss' wife is cooking breakfast.  It's pure torture, especially when I'm dieting, which is just about every other day of the year!  And it's not just breakfast smells, some days she's baking pies or cookies, or has a roast and potatoes in the crock pot and the torture lasts all day long.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but I think a nose could give the eyes a run for their money in that department!

Peter Piper Picked a Peck of. . .

You guessed it!  Pickled Peppers!  We have been loaded down with peppers this year.  Not only did Hubby plant a bunch in the back yard, as usual, but we have sweet friends and neighbors who have been sharing the bounty from their yards and gardens as well.  So many peppers we don't know what to do with them all.  Hubby has been making jars and jars of salsa from his hot peppers, and we've been freezing them for later batches too.  He eats salsa on just about everything but dessert!

When my sweet friend Susan brought me a whole box of banana peppers, I didn't know what in the world to do with them all.  She kept telling me some were sweet and some were hot, but I didn't know which was which.  I got a recipe for pickling them, and stood at the kitchen sink washing and slicing them for about two hours!  When I got done, my hands were on fire!  I never thought banana peppers could be that hot, but they sure were!  Next time I'll have to wear gloves.

Surprisingly, the recipe for pickling them was very easy.  You just take 2 cups of white vinegar, 2/3 cup of sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of mustard seeds and 1/2 teaspoon of celery seeds and put it all on the stove in a pot to boil.  You fill your sterilized jars with the pepper rings and fill the jars with the boiling vinegar mixture to within half an inch of the top of the jar, put the lids on tight and water bath them for about 15 minutes and Voila!  You're done!  I doubled the recipe and it made two pints, so altogether I made about six pint jars with a box of peppers.  After two weeks or so, they should be ready to enjoy.  We love them on hot dogs and sandwiches.  Yum!

Catfish Calamity

About 9:00 Sunday evening, Hubby and I decided to try and plan a fishing trip for the next day.  Nothing like last-minute planning!  We called our dear friend Pudd and asked him if he knew of any good fishing spots and he told us of a couple that weren't too far away.  We talked him into going with us, so off we went to Walmart in search of fishing licenses and some tack.  We got home and started getting everything together, loaded up the truck, made sandwiches and snacks to take along and finally fell into bed about midnight, dreaming of all the monster fish we were going to catch the next day.  Oh boy!

5:30 rolled around way too fast, and it was still dark outside when we got up and headed out the door to pick up Pudd.  Auntie Sue-Sue (Pudd's wife) agreed to babysit Dudley for us, so we dropped him off and headed out for Laurel Hill Lake, a 325 acre lake about fifty miles from our house.  We saw lots of deer and turkey as we drove along the Natchez Trace and it rained softly most of the way.

When we got to the lake, we were amazed at how big and beautiful it was.  It reminded us of a spot we fished in Oregon, minus the pine trees and smell of juniper in the air.  It was a gorgeous place.  We stopped at the bait shack and picked up chicken livers, minnows and worms and headed off to find the perfect spot along the bank.  Pudd caught the first fish on a bobber, a bright colored sunfish (or as we call them back home, bluegill) about the size of his hand. 

Hubby set me up to fish for catfish and loaded my hook with a big glob of bloody chicken liver.  Gross!  I cast it out and plopped down in my chair to wait for the bite.  Soon enough, my pole was bending and I was excitedly reeling in my first catfish!  Oh boy!  I squealed with delight and the noise echoed across the lake!

The weather was perfect for fishing.  It was nice and cool as the clouds kept the sun at bay and we had a light drizzle every so often to keep the temperatures down.  There was the perfect breeze and the lake was calm.  There weren't many people there, which was surprising for a holiday weekend, but we did see a few boats around the edge of the lake and up near the dam.  It was peaceful and quiet.

That is, until I hooked another monster!  Pretty soon, my pole nearly jerked right out of my hands and I jumped up and gave it a good yank to set the hook.  It was bent almost in half as I cranked the reel as best I could.  I was screaming and yelling and Hubby was standing next to me while Pudd shouted out for me to slow down and hang on!  I just knew I had a record-breaking fish on the end of that line and I was determined to pull it in.

I had the line a little closer to the bank when all of a sudden SNAP! went my line and ZING! it came flying back towards me and THWACK! there it came and CONKED! poor Hubby right in the eye with a loud THUD!  He doubled over clutching his hand to his eye and I just knew I'd yanked his eyeball out with my hook!  I think we all held our breath as we waited for Hubby to straighten back up and when he did, he had blood coming down the side of his face and I just knew that big old globby chicken liver had flown out of the water and hit him right in the eye!

I surveyed the damage, the monster fish long forgotten, and Hubby checked my line to see what in the world happened to my hook.  The line had been snapped and the hook and bait were nowhere to be found.  The blood coming down Hubby's face wasn't from the liver at all, but from him!  The sinker on my line, which was about an inch long and made of solid lead, had popped him right in the eye on his brow bone and there was a big gash with blood oozing out.  Poor sweetie!  I felt awful!

In all the commotion with me and my monster fish (which was probably a turtle, we later agreed), poor Hubby had left his pole unattended and it was bending like crazy toward the water as he had a fish on the end of his pole too!  I screamed and pointed toward his pole and Pudd ran over to set the hook for him and reel it in.  Pretty soon that pole was bent nearly in half and THWOP! it broke right in two!  Poor Hubby!  This was not turning out to be a very good day.  Pudd felt awful that he'd broken Sid's fishing pole, but all was well and Hubby was able to fix it right back up and continue fishing.

We laughed and told stories, had a nice lunch, mosied around the edge of the lake to try a few more spots and ended up catching a total of four fish altogether.  It was a fun day, despite the mishaps and hopefully Hubby won't be deterred from taking me again real soon.  Next time, we'll bring his helmet and a first-aid kit though, just in case!

The Bulldog and the Bloodhound

Dudley got his first official girlfriend this weekend and he's smitten!  Our neighbor's dog Scarlett got loose and decided to wander around the neighborhood in search of new surroundings.  I guess she got bored down there at the end of the road with no one to play with but goats, pigs and chickens.  She found her way into our yard and when Dudley caught sight of her through the screen door, he went wild!

He actually heard her coming before he even saw her, as Scarlett wears a goat bell around her neck and you can hear it clang-clang-clanging a mile away.  She lumbered into the yard on those long legs of hers, ears flopping this way and that, and she climbed up onto our porch.  When Dudley caught sight of that humongous, gorgeous red-head with those droopy brown eyes, he nearly busted out the screen door!  His tail was wagging so fast he couldn't even walk straight. 

We let him out for a closer look and that was the beginning of what I'm sure is to be a great love affair.  They hit if off right away and chased each other all around the porch and yard.  It wasn't long before Dudley was huffing and puffing with exhaustion and we had to pull him away and bring him inside before he keeled over with a heart attack. 

The minute we set him down inside, he collapsed on his side, his fat little belly heaving as he tried to catch his breath.  He was barking and growling and flailing his legs as his body betrayed him from being able to continue his play with his new love.  Soon he was fast asleep and snoring loudly, probably dreaming of his sweet Scarlett.  What an unusual pair they made!

Puppy Pandemonium!

Our house has officially been turned upside down and inside out!  We are worn to a frazzle and don't even remember what it feels like to sleep in anymore, let alone sleep through the night.  Dudley has taken over and we're reminded that you don't own a bulldog, the bulldog owns you!  He is definitely king of the castle and we are his lowly servants, attending to his every beck (or should I say bark!) and call. 

I think we're still a little rummied, going through our days like zombies, still in shock that we are parents again.  It's been forever and a day since we had a puppy this young in the house, and we're having to go through the aches and pains of potty training, fending off sharp-as-razor puppy teeth and watching where we step because he's always under foot.  Don't get me wrong though, it's not always "No! No!" and "Ouch!" and "Well for heaven's sake, you want to go out again?"  He does have his sweet, cuddly side too, where he snores in your lap or gives your chin and neck puppy kisses.  And we're running out of room on the computer for all the cute photos and videos we're constantly taking.  He's just so adorable.

According to the puppy potty training websites, we're doing everything right as far as trying to train him, but we were discouraged to learn that it takes up to six months for a puppy to be totally potty trained.  Ugh!  My carpet will never last that long!  Just when we think we've outsmarted him, he throws us for another loop.  He's a sneaky little guy, but oh so cute.  It's hard to get mad when he looks up at you with those beautiful blue-gray eyes and that sweet, wrinkly face.

Our hands and arms and ankles are covered with puppy bites and bruises, so I've taken to wearing gloves when I play with him in the evenings now.  Puppy bites are the worst!  We've bought him a dozen fancy chew toys, but his favorites seem to be our ankles and hands.  He's a ferocious little bugger.  The only good thing about him playing so rough is that he wears himself out so easily that soon enough, he's snoring away.  He's cutest when he's asleep.

We love you Dudley, and we're so happy to have you with us!  Bulldog love is the best there is and we're the happiest two parents in the world right now, even if we are a little tired and worn out!

Never a Dull Moment

A lot of things have been going on around our little place since I last wrote.  Life on the Hollow got turned upside down when we lost our sweet Tubby, but nonetheless it moved along.  Cooter made sure we didn't forget he was our baby too, as he kicked down the fence one day while I was home sick with a migraine.  I was laying in bed with a pillow over my head, wishing away my throbbing headache when all of a sudden I heard what sounded like thunder outside the bedroom window.  I thought to myself, "Oh goodie!  A nice rainstorm to lull me to sleep!" and I slumped down further under the covers.  A few minutes later the thunder rumbled again, only this time I realized the thunder wasn't accompanied by the patter of raindrops on the roof and the sun was shining just a little too brightly through the window for it to be storming out.  Uh oh!  That wasn't thunder!  It was the tell-tale signs of horse and donkey hooves running around the house!

Sure enough, when I got up and looked out the window, there was our neighbor's horse in the front yard and low and behold, there was Cooter standing right beside him!  I got my shoes on and called my nearest neighbor to help round them up.  I knew the horse would be no problem at all, but catching Cooter was going to be a different story!  Long story short, my neighbor and I spent two long hours in the hot sun trying to catch that stupid, old donkey but we never could.  The best we could manage was to steer him into my neighbor's pasture where at least he'd be fenced in and couldn't run amok through the neighborhood causing mayhem and destruction all along the way.  That evening, it took four grown men to rope my wayward donkey and bring him back home.  That was a sight to see, for sure!  I watched from the safety of my back porch as two country boys, a city boy and my sweet hubby (who's a little of both) run up and down my neighbor's hillside chasing that donkey, lassoing him and then holding on for dear life as he drug them all around the pasture and back home.  Cooter's nostrils were flaring and he was covered in sweat and you could almost see the steam coming out of his ears, he was so mad.  Hubby fixed the fence and all was well.  Even my headache was long gone.

A week or two later, we had another farm animal incident.  Hubby and I were sitting in the living room watching tv one night with the front door open.  It was dark out and the lightning bugs were flickering all over the lawn, crickets and tree frogs chirping away and MOOOOOOOOO!  A cow bellowing in the front yard?  Good heavens!  Sure enough, right outside our front door there stood a great big longhorn cow with horns so big they stretched across her head four or five feet!  Sid jumped up and ran for his jeans and boots and I grabbed the phone and the flashlight and started calling the neighbor that owned the cows.  Of course, this late at night, no one was answering the phone so it was up to us to round her up.  He jumped in his jeep as she headed up our neighbor's driveway toward the back pasture.  Way in the back, there was a fence down and this one lone Mama cow had gotten out.  She was crying for her baby, who was back with the rest of the herd.  It was dark as pitch out, and the cow was black, so all you could see was her eyes glowing in the tall grass and hear her mournful cry.  Sid finally got ahold of the owners of the cows and they came down and helped get her back in the fence before the rest of the herd got out too.  Another session of fixing fences and all was well.  Sheesh!  Too much excitement for what's supposed to be peaceful country living!

At the end of July, we brought home another sweet bulldog puppy in hopes of filling our house with some good old bulldog cuddling and snoring.  We fell in love with that cute little bundle of joy, but our time was cut short after the vet found a birth defect and we had to give him back.  Our hearts were broken and the house was empty once again.  We tried to busy ourselves as best we could to keep our minds off the sadness.  Hubby found someone willing to sell us hay for the donkeys for the Winter, so we cleaned out the hayloft of the barn out back by the pond and got it ready for the new hay.  The hay was delivered late one evening right before dark and the forecast was calling for rain later that night.  We went into panic mode because we didn't know how in the world we'd be able to load 145 bales of hay into the top of that barn with just the two of us.  Luckily, we were blessed with several friends and neighbors who showed up right at dark and we all headed back to the barn and got it loaded within two hours!  We had four strong men, three strong boys, a sweet girlfriend to one of the men and me, huffing and puffing to do my share of the work and we got it done without any injuries or mishaps.  Praise the Lord for them all!

Hubby had a birthday party and again we were surrounded with loving friends to help us celebrate.  Later in the month he went on a nice long motorcycle ride with a bunch of his friends and they had a wonderful time.  We had a nice visit from my beautiful Sister and her two dogs that didn't seem to last long enough.  Her visits never do.  She could stay a whole month and it wouldn't be long enough for me.  We ran around town together, shopped and got our nails done, went out to eat, visited and made new friends.  We met a sweet couple from Oregon who live here now and turned a historic trolley car into a food truck downtown.  I never would have met them if Tiff hadn't been with me because I'm the shy one and she's the friendly, outgoing one of the family who doesn't know a stranger.  We also met a nice man who owns a bookstore in town and reminded me of Wild Bill Cody.  He showed us all around his wonderful store and we spent a couple hours looking through old books and swapping stories.  Another person I would have never met if it wasn't for her.  She's so adventurous.  Her dogs got to experience the country life, rolled in cow poo and barked at funny looking long-earred, loud-mouthed donkeys.  Things they don't get to experience living in the big city.

The night after Tiff went back home, we got a wild hair and called about another bulldog puppy.  Just so happened we were able to meet up and bring one home that very night!  We never dreamed it would be that easy!  All of a sudden our life was filled with bulldog love all over again, just like that!  He's nine weeks old and we named him Dudley and he's the cutest thing ever.  We've had him for a week now and he's claimed our hearts and made our house a home again.  You'll be hearing a lot about him, I'm sure.

Life has it's way of ups and downs and you just have to hang on tight and experience the ride.  That's what we've been doing, and will continue to do.  Thank you Lord for our crazy, silly life!