Catch Up!

Right before Christmas, we were trying to still play "Catch Up" with clients.
The ten inches of rain our area was soaked with threw us off schedule quite a bit,
and necessitated a truck swap to get in this last client.
The Big Green Beast work van had to be swapped out for Brutus and his 4WD..
Because our last stop was under water.
Still.
In the shot above, I tried (maybe not that well,) to show
where the water from the swamp was still up higher than the road.
Now, this is a normal situation.
And normally, the swamp stays put with small berms.
But even three days after the rains stopped,
that ten inches was NOT letting go.

The road took a beating...
And Brutus got a careful work out in 4WD to get us where we needed to be.

Always fun, riding around....
Someone from Tundra Country asked,
"Don't the gators move in water like that?"
My initial answer was, yes, but more towards summer and breeding season.
Then I asked around some, and learned that yeah,
it's still warm enough for those suckers to be active.
Oh.
Joy.
Didn't see any though, so all is good.

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Remember these feet?

I did a shoe removal. Set up a time for Dear Husband to go and check the mare,
and we ran into technical difficulties.
Never have been back out....

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This sweet face,
and the feet below,
Are attached to one of my favorite stops.
Molly, the little mule who is about three weeks older than dirt.

I know this shot does not show much, but Cub tried to get the best he could.
If you look real close to the one above and the one below,
you can see that this foot is still...
well,
crooked.

It's crooked because her hind feet used to look like this:

Yes, this hoof is in bad shape, to say the least.
Normally in cases like this, the feet shoot forward and curl back up,
towards the cannon bone.
Molly had to be different.
She grew her feet both off to the side:
one went under her belly, pointing to the other side,
and the other just shot out sideways.
The off side hoof is now flat on the ground again,
thanks to Dear Husband's skill with tools,
and my grit in hanging onto her!
The near side hoof has a bit more to go yet, before it looks and acts normal.
But Molly is determined,
as is Dear Husband,
and I know that in 2010 she'll have four feet on the ground
as God intended.
Even if she IS three weeks older than dirt-
she still deserves and is getting excellent care.

That's a good start for some Catch Up time. In the works still is the Balance post, which I will do my best to get up tomorrow. Provided of course, that Sonny decides to NOT be such a .... *ahem*.... let me re-phrase that a tad... Provided that I can sweet talk my Dear Husband into coming out and holding onto Sonny for me, so that I may have a hand in using the camera AND controlling my rotten horse!