Dancing in the night

Okay how many of you were active participants of all our wonderful sock hops we used to have after each home game???
Do you remember the band from Greenwood that was so hot and played at our school often? The Cavaliers. I mean I am talking Beatles lite here.
And all the kids from other schools that wanted to come to our dances since we had the best ones.

I know the kids nowadays couldn't even compare their proms to ours. Remember Stairway to the Sea with the pond and all? What a great job we did.
With all the dancing we did back then, no wonder we all were such skinny little things, maybe that is what we need to do nowadays is join an active dance group. I know I had great wind back then and could run forever.
Can anyone even remember one of the line dances we used to do besides the cha cha cha.

Bonnie and Clyde the coons

I have written in the past and on comments of other blogs, of some of the things that this pair has done. While living in our house back in the woods, we acquired them through a friend at the pet store. It was a anything she can't sell she gives to me relationship. So here they are, two little kits left orphaned when mom drowned. They were very young when found, so they imprinted on me. I had to teach them to climb a tree and everything. Well, as they grew older, they went most everywhere with me. I had them vaccinated each year, but never kept them in a cage, they were always free to come and go as needed. As they got older, they worked in a tag team driving me up the wall some days. They loved it in the house and wanted to spend all their time with me there. Some days, I just had to bodily pick them up and toss them out because they were getting into everything, and I mean everything. It was like taking care of 2 year old triplets at full speed. The one thing I had collected since a young girl was china horses and dogs and had displayed them out on the bookcase. They knew they were to never touch them, but sometimes, they just couldn't stand it. This day was one of them, I had just tossed them out for the umteenth time and decided to rest on the couch, with my feet towards the door. When you come into the house, there is a short hallway, then if you go right, there is the couch and at the far end of it, the bookcase. As I was laying there, I heard the front door open and thinking it was hubby paid no attention, MY MISTAKE, guess who. In Clyde runs and grabs my feet and started growling like a little puppy and as I reached down to grab Clyde, Bonnie had beat it to the bookcase and snagged one of my precious china horses and off they took. I swear, you could actually here them laugh as they ran. I had to chase them out the door and across the yard at a high speed to catch them. As I was walking back to the house, I got to thinking, "how did they get in the house when the door handle is so high," so I made it a point to stake it out and watch.
Sure enough, here they came back. We had a wrought iron railing around the house about two feet from the door. Well, Clyde would climb up on it and stretch out as far as possible and Bonnie would climb on him and reach the door handle and grab it and open the door and as the door opened, they would swing their huge butts around and land on the inside of the door. It was a sight to see. We got to where we would lock the screen door to keep them out, or so we thought.
Another day, I had gone into town for a bit and came home and as I walked in, I saw all these little footprints on my new oval braided rug, leading to the kitchen. They had climbed down the fireplace, and since it had no damper, bam, they were in. I found them in the utility room sitting in the middle of a 50 lb. bag of Purina Dog Chow, their favorite food, tossing it all over the room.

Now these two were not afraid of anything or anyone, they were very friendly and would run out and greet visitors as they approached in their cars. They worked as a team and would scramble up our poor unsuspecting visitors and start going through pockets and stealing watches right off their arms, then taking off at a high rate of coon speed. We had many a chase over that trick of theirs. It got to when people wanted to come and visit, they would call first and tell us to lock them away, like where was I going to put them??It sure weeded out some of the people visiting and that wasn't all bad.

Like I had said before, they were scared of nothing, we had coon dogs in a pen and Bonnie and Clyde would go out and perch themselves up on a fence post and torment those poor dogs to death.

More on them later.......

Pet Lizards and critters

I had no idea that lizards could be pets, let alone have a personality. While living in southern Fl. we lived in a two story house that had a small front porch and a large deck out back. Of course, living in the tropics, the place was crawling with critters, especially lizards. On the front porch we had this one lizard that was very territorial with other lizards and then we got to watching the lizards on the large deck also. They too, were very territorial and they all seemed to stay in their own areas. We got to where we could recognize them and this one guy on the front porch was totally not scared of us one twit. During the heat of the summer, and it can get hot down on that island, he got to where he would position himself near the door and when we opened it, he would rush in and jump into my big umbrella tree and enjoy the air conditioning. This got to be a big game with him and we would just let him stay and he would go out in the morning. Then while sitting on the couch right next to the sliding doors of the deck, we started watching the tree frogs and in the evening when they could come out from the heat, they would jump onto the glass doors and look in. We had to be careful, cause if we opened them, they, too, would rush in for the same tree. This went on for the whole year we were down there.
Now, I know you think, wow, this gal has way too much time on her hands.
Then we moved to the other side of the US on another island and here we go again.
We had a group, herd, or whatever you call 6 or 8 lizards and geckos, hanging out by our front door. I was the only one they wouldn't run from and they would just sit there and watch whatever I happened to be doing. Well, I am a nightowl and always have been, and would sit up late at night and watch tv. This one little guy got really brave and started crawling underneath the screen door and walk right into the house. I would be sitting on the couch and he would look over and promptly walk in and go behind the couch, most likely looking for a snack, and stay for a bit. Then he would walk out and sit in the middle or the floor and stare at me until I would get up and let him out. This went on for the two years we lived there.
I know, I know, you think I have been drinking too many mai tais, but I swear, this is all true.

Yeller hoss and more............

I loved the comment from Greybeard, telling about his friends dog and the trailer. I can just see that dog now. It is so amazing what these animals can do.
Since I was always connected with animals, people just took it in stride in this little town we lived in. They were always bringing their beaten up, downtrodden and abandoned animals to me. I always had the most diverse group of animals you ever saw.
They were used to my animals, pretty much having the run of the town.
We had a huge back yard that had amazing grass that grew at alarming rates, so it was not unusual for me to bring my horse home from his retirement farm and tie him to a tree with a 50 ft. rope and let him graze.
Well, one day, I didn't get out to "rotate" my horse fast enough, so he proceded to untie himself, he was amazing at this, and took off for greener pastures, literally. After much searching, we found him about a mile from home, munching knee deep grass under a apple tree, retied to the tree. So, not only was he smart enough to untie himself, but he could retie himself in a different location. Just as I was having this conversation with my big ole yeller hoss, about how he accomplished this latest feat, when the neighbor came out.
I promptly apologized to the owner and he quickly told me, "no bother, we knew who he belonged to and besides, my grass needed cutting." After that, we had several neighbors asking us to tie my horse in their yard. Gosh, they got free fertilizer for it.
Anyone who knew me, knew this ole hoss was very special to me. I would have kept him over any man, in a heartbeat. He was always good for a laugh and excitement.
He had the intelligence that few people have, let alone other animals. Over the years, he taught me alot. I truly think, he was half human sometimes.

Coon Hunting

Now being from the midwest, here is a sport that was a huge rage back when. Yes, I know, even I had my own dogs. I had this one ole dog "Joe," a beautiful black and tan and one of the strongest dogs I have ever seen. We had him hooked to his dog house in the back yard and I must say, he lived pretty high on the hog. When he got bored, which was often, he would take off and drag his beautiful, big, doghouse to whereever he wanted to go at the moment for a visit. It was a common thing for the neighbors to call and tell us Joe was down visiting again. It usually took 3 or 4 men to load that durn house back up into the pickup, but here a 60 lb. dog dragged it around like it was nothing. Anyway, even though I had my own dogs, I would never kill a coon, I always preferred to go during running season, the time when you are getting you dogs into shape and before the actual season. I just couldn't bring myself to kill any animal, I had spend almost 7 years in animal technology and at the time had two pet racoons that I adored. They were hand raised when momma drowned during a flood, so they had imprinted and I was now momma.
We called them Bonnie and Clyde and the names fit. More on them at a later date.

Golden Horse

Anyways, after a few weeks, the owner wasn't getting much riding time at all, so he brought his little horse down to my house for some much needed help and unloaded him out of the trailer. We took him into the field and proceded to walk around him several times, looking like the cowboys in the movies minus the chewbacky in the rear pocket.
After several failed attempts to ride him and him laying down each time, I told the proud owner, "Buck" just straddle him while he is laying there and hold on real tight to the horn and don't look back.
Now I am a real peaceful person, but this horse was trying my patience. So I went and got a nice, smooth, flat. flexible board that had a little sting to it and walked up behind the horse undetected and swatted him once across his fat little bottom and jump straight up into the air rider and all. I think the noise scared him more than any pain was dealt out, but he never laid down again.

Aloha to all,
After some pushing and shoving from some dear people, I finally started my own blog. I hope to keep this on the happy end of the spectrum and hear and to share some funny stories about people and their pets and just about people themselves.
I think one of the best parts of my life was when I became the owner of a horse. I had never experienced such freedom before. Running thru the fields back home and down dusty trails, several of us from the neighborhood became a gang that rode after school and on weekends. We were envied by all that saw us with our new found freedom. With our hair blowing like crazy in the wind we would have races and try all kinds of new things with our trusty steeds. We experienced things that only a few get to try.
Having always been a animal lover and owner of many, I finally became an animal technician.
I have so many stories to tell of my experiences and hope you too, will come to enjoy them.
I didn't just work in a small animal clinic, oh no, I was the lucky person to get to work with the zoo vet and what a trip that was. I also worked for a large animal clinic and got to go to many calls in the middle of the night. Usually on first time calvings and most generally ended up with a c-section being preformed.
So here we go buckaroos, saddle up and lets go.
I think one of the fondest memories I have, was of a rodeo that came into town each summer. After the rodeo was over, the horses were put up for sale. Now you have to understand, these were not your everyday horses, these were the broncos the cowboys rode. You never were for sure what you were going to get, you just knew it was going to be the ride of your life.
So, one year, a good friend decided it was time for his big purchase and off he went to make his choice. Now I don't want to say he bought the dumbest horse in the lot, but after being around that ole hoss alot, I wasn't sure if he was the dumbest or the smartest, since everytime someone got on his back to break him and possibly in the future train(who were we kidding) him, he would lay down. Now, I am not talking just your everday lay down and sunbathe position, but lay down and ignore the world position.
After several weeks of this, the proud owner was not gett