After spending the evening with friends, remembering a beloved community member who had passed, I tried to watch the US Presidential debate.
I’d had too much wine for it. I went out into the “quiet” in front of the house. As the night sounds hummer in my ears, I looked up at the moon, thinking of Lori and Dale, who are no longer with us. I sang my favorite hymn, to the waxing moon.
For the beauty of the earth, for the splendor of the skies, For the love which from our birth over and around us lies, Source of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise.
I sent up my wishes for healing and peace.
Then I looked around. Four dogs had come out with me. All four were standing quietly, looking in the same direction as me. I’d swear they were praying with me. It was powerful.
This is a big dog event. This afternoon, when Vlassic and I were walking to feed the horses, all the young cows were standing on the drive. That was tempting!
The walk was weird due to a lot of dust brought in from a cool front. Weird sun.
Vlassic ran after one lone cow, but came right off when I called him. The rest of the way, he walked right next to me, even when the cows got closer and closer, hoping for food.
I was so proud of him! And he didn’t bother Big Red when she was eating, either.
Star is also glad he leaves her alone. And she’s drinking out of the trough.
On the way back, he and Copper played nicely, then the three precious white calves stood right there, taunting him. He was tempted. But, he didn’t run at them when they trotted off.
Step away, dog.
He made a move toward the last calf, but Mama put her head down. Vlassic got the message and set off with me. What a good boy, Saint Vlassic!
Hi, I’m Vlassic, like the picke company, only with an extra s. I am a small, black dog. I travel a lot, now that Suna goes back to Austin more often. I like it in Austin, mostly. I get to hang out with Pickle the chiweenie, play with Anita, and snuggle lots and lots with Suna.
Snuggling makes me very happy.
I have some friends and enemies in Austin, but mostly friends. Last week a dog kept yapping at me until her human took her away. And for some reason, my old buddy, Percy, was mad at me much of the week. But, we sniffed butts and had a nice walk last night. I love walking in Austin. Suna and Anita pick up my poop, so I try to go as much as I can.
This morning, I got to go for a car ride (yay) and we ended up at this place in Cameron, where some of my family are, plus some nice people like Meghan and Jenecia, who give me treats and pet me. It’s a little weird here, but I have toys and a water dish, which helps a lot. Plus, I get to visit and “help” people work!
I’m having a meeting.
Suna took me for a walk today, and that convinced me I do NOT like Cameron. Everywhere I turned there were more dogs barking and running up to me. The first few were behind fences or attached to something that saved me. Whew.
I like the sidewalk, because there are no grass burs. And look, Suna picked up my poop, like she was in Austin or something!
But, a giant dog (Suna says a medium-sized old, sweet dog) came rushing out of a garage and barked LOUD. Suna screamed. She was embarrassed, she told the old human who came running out. In the end, I liked that dog fine, and we sniffed butts. Suna says she has no pictures because she was so busy protecting me. Thanks, Suna!
Parts of the walk were good, like I found a dead thing to sniff, and lots of places to pee.
MMM. Dead thing.
But, danger is everywhere! There were all sorts of grass burs on the sidewalk where the vacant lot had been mowed. I had to stop and remove them, but then, yay! I got to eat them. They are tasty snacks, actually.
Then ANOTHER dog came after me. Suna knew this one would be there, so she talked to it. He wagged his tail, barked a little, and went home. Suna saved me again!
By the time I got home I was exhausted. I tried to regain my strength by eating stuff out of the trash can, but she emptied it.
No luck with the trash can. I’ll just lay down.
Suna felt sorry for me, so she found a nice blankie for me to snuggle up in while she works.
I’m comfy and cozy now!
I’ll just take a nap now, and hope Suna takes me back to the ranch, where my other human, Jim, likes to hang out with me, and where I can run free with the other dogs, even bad ole Penney, who I actually like, now. And my chickens! And all those cute calves. I think I’ll dream of chasing them. Bye!
Just wanna day woo. Taking the day off. So far I have played with dogs and chickens. I had a blast watching Gracie Lou playing with heifers. What’s nice is that they were all obviously playing. Here’s a sequence.
Gracie is stalking. Cows are approaching. Note Gracie’s play bow. There she goes!There they go!
That was fun. Vlassic had to get in the act, but he got yelled at.
Tiny black dog is Vlassic.
I also just hung out with the chickens. Why not? They’re all so glad to see me. It’s great to be loved by tiny dinosaurs.
Love Gertie the Guinea and Fancy Pants. Three roosters. Two real.
Okay. Further adventures await! You have a Good Friday. Lol. The phone capitalized the “good.”
I’m sure Vlassic was looking forward to some fun today, but the weather didn’t cooperate. It was another big rain day. For me, it was fun looking out the window while I worked upstairs.
Wetness and reflections.
For Pickle, the day meant a great deal of panting and shaking. I refrained from photographing her in her distress. Vlassic mostly slept through the storms.
Big, pre-nap yawn.
He “helped” me a lot in Zoom meetings, or acted as dead weight in my lap. He apparently gets bored hearing only one side of conversations.
I’m a cute dead weight.
He got a lot of licking in, too, especially after walking in the rain. I was really proud of him for managing to do the needful outside.
I’m about to jump in Suna’s lap.
Pickle finally got to safely go out around 5 pm. She can really hold her bladder! We got to see our neighbor, Katie, who was in the same boat. Rain is very hard on small indoor dogs. We humans were sad that book club got rained out for the second week in a row, too. Sigh.
I’m better after my walk. See, no trembling.
Vlassic is not complaining. Time spent with Suna is good time for him. He got to destroy a dog toy, so now he can spend the rest of the evening watching HGTV with Anita and Suna.
Ahh. Life as an indoor dog has its benefits.
I know Vlassic enjoys ranch life, but he sure isn’t complaining about his time in the big city, even when it’s storming outside.
I wrote this last night but fell asleep before I could publish it. I already post too much, so this is good.
I admit it. We don’t give the ranch dogs very many official dog toys. That’s because up until now, an expensive toy for hard-chewing dogs usually lasts about ten minutes (we DO have a rope toy that’s lasted a long time).
These two and a tennis ball are the hardy survivors.
But, yesterday I felt so bad for them, knowing three toys had been sitting on the counter since the last time I got home from Austin. I tossed each dog a toy, and fun ensued. Penney immediately took the gator outside.
Today I was surprised to see all three toys still in good shape, and all in the house. It’s been fun watching them play. They’re all a bit more gentle than they used to be. Penney kept chewing that gator, but eventually Carlton got ahold of it and slowly but surely got the crinkles out.
I’m in no hurry.
Meanwhile, Harvey fell in love with a toy that’s all the parts of a hamburger on a stretchy string. He really wanted the burger part, but every time he used his paw to get at it, the parts would slip and he’d get a face full of burger parts.
I’m gonna destroy this, yes I am.
Eventually he gave up and just held it, adoringly, between his feet.
My Love Burger
A little later, I looked down and he was holding it in his sleep. That is so NOT Harvey. He never cared for toys one way or another.
As the evening went on, the toys were traded around. Neither Carlton nor Penney could destroy the burger, and they didn’t like the blue blob much. Harvey switch allegiance to the partially eaten gator.
I feel disloyal to my burger.
Penney cane sniffing around, so he then hid the toy! This really made us laugh.
Gator? What gator? Just this ball of stuffing here, that’s all.
After dinner (we made turkey!), Penney finally disemboweled the gator, while Harvey and Carlton played together with the burger. Wow. Dogs acting like normal dogs! Not destroying toys instantly!
Maybe I’ll get them more toys. It did help to have multiples. Much less fighting.
I’m baffled sometimes about how humans managed to connect so deeply with some other animals.
Fiona wanted to see my sister so badly this evening that she barged into the hay area just to be near her. Why? She’s full of love and wanted to share? I don’t know. But I do know equines sense our feelings.
95% love, 5% sass.
And tonight, though I want to go to sleep, I can’t move, because two dogs are glued to me. They’ve done this all weekend, perhaps somehow sensing I could use some comfort.
Carlton is on both of my legs. Penney is glued to the right one.
Yep. There’s a real connection between humans and animals. Even the chickens! It’s made my life better.
I got an interesting surprise as I was heading to the office to write a bunch of blog posts. I saw a large group of black vultures (my favorites, because they seem more…attractive than turkey vultures) pecking away at something over by where the pond runoff comes out of the culvert under our driveway (which is secretly a dam).
You can see by the debris how high the water was yesterday.
I thought maybe they had a snake, and I thought I should go see what kind of snake it was. However, it was not a snake. It was this!
It’s a fish out of water! Poor thing!
Oh, what a bummer. It appears that this delicious largemouth bass must have passed through the culvert and gotten dumped into the runoff area. It must have ended up in a part that was too shallow to swim in. Sniff.
Also, check out the attractive green bottle flies. I guess only a naturalist would say that. Sorry if it’s sort of icky for you.
But what did that tell me? It told me we have giant bass in our pond!* Who knew? Mandi should come fishing, or someone who likes to fish, anyway. Now that it’s mowed to the edge, the pond should be easier to work with. I figure we also have catfish, since I’ve seen channel cats that got pushed through the culvert before. Mandi and I totally failed at catching them, darn it.
As if that wasn’t enough excitement, when I got to the Pope Residence, I saw all sorts of things flying around right above the grass. What could that be? I spent some time trying to follow them around to see what they were, but then I realized I just had to look DOWN and they were everywhere. I thought they were Japanese beetles, but when I looked it up on iNaturalist, it said they are common green Junebugs. I guess they all decided to hatch after the rain.
They are pretty.
One at upper right is taking off.
Well, whatever they are, there are a LOT of them. I hope there are some at the ranch, so the chickens can have a treat.
And here’s a treat for YOU, readers! A nice picture of how cute the dogs are as they sleep with Lee. Maybe that will cleanse your palate from the fish, flies, and beetles.
Snoozy Penney and Harvey. Photo by Lee Bruns.
* I am aware that this is a normal sized fish. It is big to me.
Hi, readers of Mama Suna’s blog! I’m Vlassic, and I’ve been hanging around the Hermits’ Rest Ranch for the past two years. I like it here a lot. Wanna know why?
I’m long, but I have longer legs so I can jump high.
I have so many friends! At night I sleep in Jim’s RV. He is so nice to me, and feeds me (I don’t go in the big house because Penney acts weird in there). When I go outside, I spend half my time with my bird buddies, Bertie Lee, Gertie, Fancy Pants, and Clarence. We like how cool it is.
Stay out of our coop, dog! The black chickens don’t like me so much.
The rest of the time I spend with my new friends, the Bull calves. It’s SO much fun there! Calf poop is so delicious, and they have a wonderful water bucket just the size for me to cool off my black coat.
Wait, Rip, it’s my turn! Photo by Meghan Land.
On good days, Mama Suna takes me with her to visit my other friends. Sometimes we ride the little bumpy car. Tonight, though, we walked. It was a beautiful night.
Rays!
I chased two of the 18 series cows, but just a little, to remind them of how we used to play when they were babies. Mostly I was good, though, because I wanted to see my friends.
Here are two friends, Big Red and Apache. The horse is jealous, because the hen gets fed first.
I love this place! There are so many smells of cattle dogs! I have many places where I simply must pee. They need to know Vlassic rules…when they aren’t here.
Take that, other dogs.
There are other fun smells here, too. I especially like donkey poop. Mmm. Thanks, Fiona. Sigh, I was disappointed she didn’t get to come out and play. I love making her put her head down and shake it.
I sure love poop. Why does Mama sweep it up?
The other great thing about where my friends live is that they have an even bigger water tub! I like to swim in it, but not when it’s full.
Big Red and I like to drink from it when it’s full!
After all the friends were fed, we went back. I had to investigate this new hay. It looks funny and smells different. Mama said it’s sorghum, whatever that is. I made sure to pee on it, so it won’t smell so new next time I come.
Funny hay. Needs pee.
As we passed the cabin, Copper the dog came outside, so I ran like the wind.
I’m outa here.
I ran and ran. Meanwhile, Mama saw a new cow patty on the road, that had appeared since we came by before.
That cow patty has a head.
As she got closer, she realized it was a turtle crossing the driveway. She told it hello, but for some reason, she did NOT call me over to introduce me! Geez! I’m nice to all the other animals!
Pleased to meet you. You can leave now.
After rolling a bit in some silage (it’s an acquired smell, but I’ve acquired it!), I ran back to Rip, Poop Nugget, and Buster, to see if they’d pooped any more.
We were just digesting over here.
Then, to end the evening right, Lee and the other dogs showed up! We played! Then it rained a little. Not enough, but it made Lee and Suna smile. We need rain, because my pond is gone!
Yep, Chris didn’t get to go look at farm equipment yesterday, so he did the next best thing and headed over to the Sale Barn. There were more inexpensive young cows to be had!
Where are we? What happened? Where’s Mama?
He saw lots of good ones, but stayed within his budget and returned with two new friends for Rip.
One is pretty big and muscular. It makes you wonder what the rest of his herd looks like if he’s a reject. He’s older than Rip and the other one, so we wonder if he’ll take milk from a bottle.
I’m big and pretty.
The other one is small and skinny, like Rip, and a very dark brown. When he laid down, he looked just like a turd, so I’m calling him Poop Nugget. I’ll let Kathleen name the other one, because I know there are more characters in that television show. She may well rename Nugget. I don’t have naming rights to their calves!
I’m a fuzzy little nugget.
I’m sure Rip will be happier with friends, and also when he gets over his mild pneumonia. He’s on antibiotics. He doesn’t like shots. Who does? Just ask Vlassic!
Those other guys don’t know what they’re missing. Mmm. Milk.
Speaking of dogs, Vlassic and Gracie seemed to think the calves were invaders, and kept chasing them. They ignore Rip. They also ignore the birds, who wander around with no worries.
We don’t like these strange calves.
Chris and Kathleen tried their best to get the new babies to drink from a bottle, but they weren’t interested yet. Maybe they’ll be hungry and less confused today.
Rip says he will drink it if Nugget won’t.
There was lots of mooing last night. Let’s hope they settle in and grow big and strong. They have an expanded pen to roam in and lots of cattle cubes. Our ranch family will do our best to give them good lives.
The Hermits' Rest 