On a Snowy Nebraska Road!

This is a situation most RVers would avoid like the plague! We left our job in Deadwood on Thursday and had no choice but to travel in the snow, heading into the Nebraska panhandle, where we will stay for a month or so with good friends to rest and repair— body, soul, and RV. We will sorely miss the 130 or so animals that we tended, especially our favorite ones, a young swamp wallaby, a New Guinea Singing Dog, and a tropical miniature zebu. Caring for critters can be heartbreaking when we get so attached. We meshed well with all the animals. After our stay in Nebraska we'll be well rested and ready for our next job, in Montana, in April. Life is exciting!

I'm OLD!

Yikes! The other day I received in the mail my Medicare card and all the literature telling me what I need to do to be included in this symbol of old-age, which I reach in a few months! Keith keeps telling me I'm not old yet, but will be when I'm on Medicare. I know by posting this I'm giving away how many years I've lived, but, oh well! The government knows it. Guess it's a milestone in my life. The benefit is that now I can go get several little repairs made on my body that I've been putting off for a long time because I have no medical insurance. Kinda like taking your aging car to the garage and asking for an overhaul! Hopefully my later years will be full of rewarding experiences and wonderful people, as I've seen so far. God is good!

Getting skinny!

Our fat cat, Poquita, is a fat cat no more. For some unexplained reason she has lost 6 or 7 pounds. We've had her to the vet and he could find nothing wrong. She's 12 years old. On a similar note, Keith and I have both lost weight, 15 pounds for me and over 20 pounds for him. We can explain our weight loss. We're both doing heavy physical work in the barn and around the ranch in freezing weather. (Nice benefit to a not-so-nice experience!) But what about Poquita? She's doing nothing more physical than sleeping, meeting us at the door, jumping up on the table to beg people food, then going back to sleep. A mystery! Maybe it's a sympathy weight loss!

From Roos to Music

It's been awhile since I posted, so I got out my camera today to see what I could find. Bennett's wallabies are eating their twice weekly piece of wheat bread. They love it and get so excited when they see me starting to pass out each piece. Also partly in the picture is a big eastern grey kangaroo who loves being with the little wallabies more than with his own kind. He's standing by an albino Bennett's wallaby. These guys are from a part of Australia where there is snow, so they spend a fair amount of time outside in the Black Hills snow. The kangaroos, however, are from the desert, so they don't like to be out for long. During a blizzard, falling snow, or heavy wind, we lock them inside so they will keep warm. I'm guessing they get a little bored when they have to stay inside during bad weather.

Here we have Sunnyburst, the dominant male eastern grey. He and some of his "mob" are eating fresh hay just thrown into their pen. These ladies are wallaroos, who share his pen along with 3 female eastern greys. Sunnyburst is the only "boomer" that I don't like to get too close to. He will challenge anyone to protect his mob. When he stands up he is my height!

On a completely different "note", here is what I like to do when I'm not out feeding, watering, and cleaning up after the roos and other exotics.

I am so fortunate to have a "music room" in my 5th wheel! My Yamaha digital piano fits so neatly into one of our slideouts, with room for a couple of file cabinets for music, and also room for Keith's guitar. What a pleasure to sit there in my spare time and pour out my feelings in my music. There is snow outside, and wind, but I can forget it when my fingers are playing Chopin or some other favorite composer, my new book "Fiddler on the Roof", or some of my many fancy hymn arrangements. I think about my "real" piano, a wonderful upright Yamaha, stored in a church in my hometown, and wonder if I might ever have it again to play on. My digital Yamaha is a good substitute and I am grateful to have it.