My mom sent me this poem in email today: “When I am Old” (Author Unknown). She said that it is her statement for when she is older. I can completely understand. Just change chestnut mare to bay mare…

When I am Old…
I shall wear diamonds
And a wide brimmed straw hat
With silver and leather on it
and I shall spend my social security
On white wine and carrots
And sit in the alley of my barn
And listen to my horses breathe.

I will sneak out
in the middle of a summer’s night
And ride the chestnut mare
Across the moonstruck meadow.
If my old bones will allow.

When people come to call I will smile and nod
As I walk them past the gardens to the barn
And show, instead, the beauty growing there
In stalls fresh-lined with straw.

I will shovel and sweat and
Wear hay in my hair as if it were a jewel.
And I will be an embarrassment to all
Who look down on me.
They’ve not yet found the peace in being free
To love a horse as a friend,
A friend who waits at midnight hour
With nuzzle and nicker and patient eyes
For the kind of woman I will be
When I am Old.
– Author Unknown
(Googling for the author didn’t turn up any names.)

Imagine the surprise of finding a horse in an automated teller booth. A customer at a bank in Berlin, Germany, arrived in the early morning to find a horse (looks like a Belgian from the picture) in the teller stall with the drunk rider asleep on the floor. Police were called to take care of the situation.

Have to admit that it’s a creative use for an automated teller area… But what was someone doing with a horse in the middle of Berlin?

Pictures and story on Yahoo

I love my house. Most of the time. Except for some of the creative home improvement I’ve had to correct. Lots of things to learn to love, and to hate.

Like bugs. When I moved in, I found cockroaches, ants, box elder bugs, silverfish, and a slew of other creepies. The house had more insects than the local woods. For the first time, I hired a pest control company to come out and deal with the ants. The company has done a reasonable job with keeping the pests out.

I’ve discovered that this section of town is notorious for ant problems. After I had bought the house, I asked the prior owner if he had had trouble with ants. His face paled and his voice dropped an octave, “Oh yes.” I knew I was in for trouble then…

So today the ants have discovered the kitchen. I found ants crawling on the refrigerator. I’m a neat person. I do my dishes, keep the garbage taken out regularly, and put food away. Nothing is left out. There were ants crawling along the door of the refrigerator. And in the refrigerator. (shudder)

This was the night for a late night cleaning spree. Any where I saw the ants crawling on the floor has been sprayed down with cleaning solution and vinegar. A friend of mine suggested sprinkling diotomateous earth outside the perimeter of the house to deter ants. I’ll be doing that tomorrow and asking the pest people to come back out again… They just sprayed for ants a little while ago–after I found ants in my bed.

Ishani

I began working on this DVD before the Hoover (old desktop PC) crashed and burned. The hardware difficulties created an issue for transferring the video from the tape to the hard drive and then processing the DVD. A new Mac Mini and several iterations later, the DVD is finally finished.

Way back in March, Moria of Bellydance Superstars came to Knoxville. The evening after her sold-out workskhop, she performed at a hafla at World Grotto. She was joined by an amazing array of dancers.

I was asked to videotape the performances (although not Moria’s because of her obligations with Bellydance Superstars) and produce a DVD, if possible. Here it is, at long last.

If you have been waiting for this, thank you for your patience.

More info here: http://ceffyl.net/wordpress/world-grotto-dvd/

I keep learning more about belly dance and realizing just how much I don’t know. I have over 10 years of dance in ballet and jazz. Yeah, it’s been a while, but still the concepts and movements should still be (somewhat) in muscle memory, right?

Nope, not as much as I would have hoped. I remember how to count phrasing and memorize choreographies. I remember about audience interaction and nuances in phrasing. I remember being flexible. I remember being able to do things that I can’t do now.

One of the ladies in my dance class has been spotting me for posture. It’s been a great help. Not only does the instructor help, but having someone who is standing next to you remind you periodically to hold your shoulders back and up, raise your elbows, and chin up. Nope, it’s not annoying. It’s a great help! It makes it (painfully) obvious that this person needs a lot more training.

I’ve started correcting my posture when I’m standing, sitting, or walking. Whenever I’m watching a DVD or looking at photos of other dancers, I study their posture, where their hands are, how they move and what the audience’s reaction is. Hopefully being aware of their moves will make my own better.

You know I haven’t used the term dancer to describe myself since I was in middle school and high school. I have always loved dance. I wouldn’t say I’m a dancer yet, but I would definitely say that I love dancing.

The vet visit went well today. Both of the girls got their shots. Isis tickled me: quite a few times when I went out of her sight, she would nicker as soon as she saw me. Yup, that’s my kid.

Isis was a model reformed mare — she used to be terrified of vaccinations. Today, she was great (and distracted by horse cookies). It’s taken a few years for her to calm down about vaccinations. I’m just greatful that the years of slamming me into the wall are over. Age or training, who can say?

Rajiyyah was also very good. Horse cookies are such great distractions. My vet was amazed at the marked change in Rajiyyah between the vet’s visits. Rajiyyah has put on weight and muscled out beautifully.

Rajiyyah has been coming around. Really since this past Wednesday. I skipped out on an extra belly dance class to work the kids. It had been a week or more since I’d been able to do anything with them. That workout was one of the first ones where Rajiyyah focused on me and wasn’t acting like an child with attention-deficit disorder: trot? okay, I’ll trot… but there’s a birdie! The difference? I quit using the lunge whip.

When I worked her on Sunday, I did an experiment. For most of our workout, the lunge whip stayed on the ground I and used the end of the lunge line to make noise. She was awesome. Relaxed, laid back. The second I picked up the lunge whip, her body language changed. She was nervous, her tail came up, and she looked at me sideways. Whip set back down and she relaxed. Interesting.

This is just too cool. I finally got the Windows XP environment setup to run the software I’m documented. And Parallels worked smoothly, beautifully even. A self-contained environment for Windows. With Windows running using Parallels, the beta software even recognized the USB dongle that authenticates the software (and allows it to run). The dongle was plugged into a port in a daisy-chained hub. Amazing. The dongle never worked on the real desktop if it wasn’t plugged directly into the case.

Cool. I’m likin’ this. Only thing I need now is to get the RAM upgrade on the Mac Mini. I am taking Tuesday off for the vet. Hopefully I’ll have time to take the machine in to be upgraded. (Irks me to have to take a device in for updates. I’m used to doing my own upgrades. RAM is usually pretty easy. Not, apparently, in a Mac Min.)

I’m doing a big experiment tonight. I’m actually installing software I need to document on a virtual machine running Windows XP. All of this on a poor little mac Mini. It is getting maxed out pretty hard. It’s getting another RAM upgarde tomorrow, which will help. Lots of externl storage available too, so that can’t hurt.

I’m running Parallels with a VM with XP Pro. So far, so good. Even running a VM you still have to constantly patch Windows. How annoying. It seems to be running okay, though. Everything is going smoothly… here’s hoping the software (and dongle) are recognized. Otherwise I’ll be doing either boot camp or else up grading my portable to WinXP Pro. Not the best maching ot have to deal with that on. I’d rather not mess with it. Poor little thing has had a rough life.

I’ll post after the reboots have finished to say how the VM work went.

I didn’t actually end up riding. Walking around on the uneven ground made tweaked my knee, so I I cleaned my saddle and bridle. I brought the girls in and watched them eat grass in the little paddock near the barn.

Rajiyyah has gained weight. Not too much, but enough that she is starting to look pudgy. This is Rajiyyah’s first spring on the rich Tennessee pastures. I’m trying to manage her weight very carefully.

When you have a horse who needs to be worked, you can’t just let it go one more day. One more day becomes one more week… I did lunge Rajiyyah for about 45 minutes. She was awesome. We did walk, trot, canter both ways of the ring. A little bit of collected trot with the side reins. Amazing. It’s like this spring she has settled down. She got a bath afterwards. Happy mare.

I did not really do anything with Isis except inspect her fly bit issues on her belly and treat the rain rot. She was happy to just have her grazing muzzle off.

I’m heading out to the barn again. I have to be careful how much I do. I mowed yesterday (manual reel mower — no motor, high grass… lots of work for a postage stamp size yard). Apparently, I twisted my right knee enough that it’s been swollen. I cancelled dance practise today so instead I’m going out to the barn.

On the one hand this doesn’t seem very bright… on the other hand, I’m not going to be putting near as much stress on my knee by doing light riding as I would by doing yard work or by belly dancing…