A Sunny but Cool Weekend

I went cross country skiing Saturday afternoon. It was wonderful seeing the sun and the bluest of blue skies.

No wind was a plus too. We explored a few new trails, getting into the “harder” but not “hardest” trails yet.

Only one nasty spill. I had my usual problem with going down a hill and having to make a rapid turn at the bottom onto a narrow trail. I almost had it and maybe could have still made it if I hadn’t leaned backward in panic when one ski got tripped up on a branch.

My left collar bone now emits sharp pains if I reach in front and across my body (like when you try to put on a turtle neck — ouch!) so I’m coming up with some new moves to get dressed. The pain is also in my neck but it’s tolerable.

I did a little off road touring to try and get this shot but couldn’t get in deep enough with all the brush. One of the wind storms must have taken its toll.

All that activity made me hunger for some good old meat and potatoes. Plus, I had some buttermilk I needed to use up and found a meatloaf recipe that called for 3/4 cup. The potatoes used up a bit of the buttermilk also. Doesn’t look like much in a photo but the meatloaf was amazing! I’ll make that one again.

I must have still been hungry in the morning. I made omelets with goat cheese and green onions and chives. And no, I did not eat the whole thing — I cut the omelet in half.

With all the cooking I’ve been doing, I’m lusting for a new gas range. The top stove part works just fine, but my oven drives me crazy! It’s about 25 degrees off. But even with setting the temperature 25 degrees higher than the recipe calls for, baking always takes about twice as long as the recipe calls for — as in 30 minutes becomes 60 minutes. I know this information is boring but it’s really frustrating! I’m beginning to think it’s because some overzealous person scrubbed the porcelain right off the bottom of the oven and it’s done something to the way heat is distributed.

Speaking of heat, I went riding in the indoor ring today and my fingers about froze off, even with handwarmers in my riding mittens.

I was going to take a photo of Luke and I reflected in the mirrors at one end of the ring today. I thought it would be especially cool because the glass is a bit frosted up. But Luke was way too distracted by the bobcat cleaning out paddocks, people talking and moving around, horses running, and dogs playing with a ball.

I had to pull out every trick in my repertoire to get Luke to do something besides run around with his head way up in the air. Leg yielding in and out on a circle finally did the trick, and when I got a few minutes of a nice rounded trot, I quit with that.

Java’s training is moving along rather slowly. The trainer I’m taking classes with has such a different style of training than what I’ve ever used that Java is pretty confused. We started working on hand signals, without any voice commands. I’ve never used a hand signal for sit, so when I tried, Java kept confusing it with my hand signal for spin. We’ve been working on differentiating the two all week and she’s getting it pretty consistently now.

Oh, and speaking of hands, this is my new typing fashion statement. My hands are always so cold when I type, both at work and at home, so this is my solution. I think it’s very stylish.