Disrupting the State of the World as We Know It

Each weekday morning, everyone on the ranch meets at 8:00 AM at the work barn to shoot-the-shit and talk about the chores needed for the day. This morning, Dan went alone as I lounged in my jammies and watched the fire in the woodburner as the living room temperature creeped upwards.

“Where’s Sondra ?!?” the startled man-manager asked Dan and Dan said “she said she had the next two days off,” and wife-manager said “yeh, I told her we didn’t have anything to do since the guest cabin is occupied,” and Dan said “I know, I nearly was late because I usually get dressed when she showers, and she didn’t, and I almost ran out of time.”

Now the feng shui (a system of spirit influences for good and evil believed by the Chinese to attend the natural features of landscape) and mountain mojo (essentially the same thing) of our lives has been interrupted. All because of some quality jammie-time. Wolves will slip on the ice, trucks won’t start in the cold, elk will be off their game wandering through fields, and the ranch horses will laugh at the wandering elk ALL BECAUSE of a spontaneous decision to watch the flames dance on the burning logs. Because of a change in the rhythm. A change in the daily-doings of humble me.

Oh! Sweet world! What have I done to thee?

(Right about now Extended Family members are muttering to themselves: “GRAMMAR ERRORS- run-on sentences, and incomplete sentences, and ‘she wrote: sh**?!!?’”, “I don’t get it,” “i think she’s bored,” “she is sounding a little unstable,” and other concerning comments. 

Accept it, folks. This is how I roll now.)

(It’s a ramble, after all. There’ll be more to come. I’m releasing my pent-up scintillating psyche.)

I’ll pay penance for my erudite miss-step and appease the Internet gods by writing Product Descriptions for Overstock.com (using TOTALLY proper grammar AND a Style Guide), and I’ll bless the many wild animals, and I’ll offer a set of jumper cables for any cold, cranky truck, and I'll tell the horses to behave themselves, AND I'll laugh at the wolves and tell them to go away.

And I’ll go to the morning meeting tomorrow. 

Our feng shui will be reinstated.

REAL issues and concerns while the world obsesses about a silly fiscal cliff and the horror of two generals wrapped up in potential, yet-legal feminine foibles.

Ranch Dirty

Right now my world is a place of mud and ice.  The snows are s-l-o-w-l-y melting, and although they look snowy, they have transformed into icy, gritty, hard-packed mounds that are fighting their last battle with the warmer temps.

(‘Warmer’ mostly means temperatures in the middle thirties to low forties.  And over the weekend we got eight inches of snow, so it’s an ongoing battle.)

Where the snow has given way, there is slushy dirt and gravel.  The ground squishes and oozes mud on boots when stepped on.  The trucks and ranch vehicles are covering in a thick frosting of dried dirt, and the layers continue to grow.

To make it more interesting, our back yard is a sea of torn-up dirt clods with muddy rivulets of water leaking past into the pasture below.  (Last winter our septic system decided to die, and the new leach beds were put in after clearing out the drifts of snow.)  Our dog Pepper loves the outdoors, and regularly comes to the back door with paws packed with mucky dirt.

The roads are a disaster- one has a choice between snowy slush to skate on, or gooey mud trenches that spray mess everywhere.

The pastures and fields are covered with animal poo that, until now, have been frozen poopsicles.  Since the elk, deer, coyotes, dogs, and other critters wander freely, fragrant reminders of their visit are also on the roads, yards and walkways.  Not stepping in some kind of poo is an impossibility.

One bit of hope for Spring are the birds- both robins and bluebirds have returned.  This morning, while walking up to the work barn for our morning meeting, I realized the bird chatter was a new sound.  “This too shall pass,” I thought.  The snows will melt, plants will grow, the mud will turn to dirt, and we’ll have elk babies to watch as they scamper around.

All griping aside, once I resigned myself to muddy boots, coats and clothes, there is an ever-changing panorama of wildlife, weather and mountains to feast my eyes on each day.  Poopsicles aside, it’s a beautiful place to live.

March Mish-Mash

Whew!  March whizzed past quickly this year.  The beginning of the month had lots of snow up here in the basin, while the town of Gardiner proper (in the valley) lost the snow accumulation.  Up in the mountains, the piles of plowed snow on the ranch loomed higher and higher:

Meanwhile, the bison in Yellowstone were on the move out of the park amid much controversy.  Some bison have brucellosis, a disease that could be transferred to cattle.  The policy has been to 'haze', or harass the bison back into the park.  So far, the bison don't 'get it'.  They are happy to follow their instinct of wandering for dormant grass to graze, and with an animal this big, one hesitates to argue.

A herd of 14 decided to take our mountain road upwards and onwards to find better pasture.  A good part of this dirt road has steep hills on either side, and holds about 1 1/2 cars.  They quickly took over the road...

Dan got this photo of the determined buffalo as they marched upwards.  Shortly after, a park ranger drove up ahead of the pack and forced them back down:

I was AWOL from Montana March 15-29, when I flew across the pond and spent a week each with Rachel/Paul and Erika/Ben.  It was wonderful to visit both of our girls and 'significant others'- to see how where they live, have fun visiting their towns, staying up late for silly and serious chit chat, and enjoying each others' company.  Here's a great photo of Rachel and Erika:

Erika's belly is getting bigger by the day, and she has an early August delivery date.  Mama and baby are doing fine.

Once back home, the snow was s-l-o-w-l-y melting.... until yesterday.  A mini mountaintop snow storm added several inches and was a strong reminder that Spring will is not ready to visit.  It was lovely to see all the green grass and blooming plants in the UK!  Sigh.....

And It's Only Monday....

I got the day off today by default.

It was supposed to be an 'all hands on deck' day to do an annual cleaning of the main lodge.  But....

Intermittent snow and a weekend of blowing sheets of wind/snow have left the roads closed (again) with snowdrifts.  One truck is stuck in a drift, and at 3 large equipment snow vehicles are broken.  Temperatures have ranged from -12 to 18 degrees this morning.

So the most of the menfolk are out repairing vehicles and clearing what snow they can.  Dan is in the woodshop building a storage box for the horses.

It's a good day to be inside...... :)

A Midwinter's Night Dream...

Alas, all you who yearn for the kiss of Caribbean sun and sandy beach.  And you, who wail about the travails of cold and snow.... who think the flakes of frozen water are dismal and dull.  Those who think joy comes in hot glazed days or warm humid nights.....  the secrets of Winter are alive for the solitary souls that understand the beauty of the cold.    anonymous

Thank you, Paul for the beautiful photos...... :)

January Silence

After a lovely holiday and a fabulous time making memories with Rachel and Paul, our life has shifted back to the flow of normal life.  Weather on the mountain can be quite different than down in the valley by Gardiner.  The town has had warmer weather, where the roads are often clear and downright muddy.  They get rain; we get snow.  Our basic snow pack of 2+ feet has never left, and this morning we woke up to 4-5 new inches of fluff.  Prior to the new addition, we had a weekend of intense blowing snow.  The valley we live in (called the Cinnabar Basin) funnels the wind coming down the mountains and makes quite a stew of swirling snow.  "Ground blizzard" is what it's called when it's in crazy mode.  The winds comes from all directions, and sheets of snow life up from the ground and take off.

This morning the wind was gone, and everything was still.  We are literally living in the clouds; what looks like fog are cloud formations clinging to the ground.  All the mountains surrounding us are invisible:

Although the roads were plowed and cleared on Saturday, by now they have disappeared again, and the ranch manager was out starting to open a trail so everyone can get out and on to the work of opening the roads once again.  This is a daily chore that takes up a good part of the day....

It's a different world up here.  Good for someone who likes solitude and their own space. 

It's beautiful........

December/Holiday Tidbits....

We're waiting for Christmas with great anticipation, and wish that everyone we know and love has a wonderful holiday!  It's snowing again, but the total accumulation is only about 2 feet now....there were a couple of days temps were above freezing and the snow levels sunk down a bit.  Locals say this is the snowiest November they have seen in years.  We've heard that a herd of 5000-6000 bison are migrating from Yellowstone to the Gardiner area.  I'm excited about seeing hordes of buffalo wandering around town.  We already see deer and elk browsing in the yards.

Here's a photo of Dan clearing off the deck from an earlier snowfall..... yes, we do grill year-round...

And here's an introduction to our new family member!  Pepper is an 8 month old giant schnauzer/border collie mix who's been an absolute gem.  Dan and I both miss Tucker a lot, but he's living a well pampered life in Michigan with his prior doggy daycare sitter.  He's much safer there- at only 8 lbs, there were too many ways to get eaten or killed in Montana.

Pepper came to us named Susie, but I couldn't get used to calling her that- it seemed strange calling her the name of a childhood friend.  We thought the name Pepper fit her well, and so far, she seems to agree.  Pepper is about 40 lbs, and one of the most mellow, calm dogs I've ever met.  We are all bonding well and she's a great fit for us. My deepest thanks to her previous owner for giving us the opportunity to add her to our family.

Dan thinks she looks a bit like a raccoon with her gray face.  I got her a pink snazzy collar along with the other doggy things we needed.  She's a winner!

We're excited about Rachel and Paul coming to visit for the holiday- keep your fingers crossed they get out of the London airport tomorrow!  Right now it's closed, but they are planning a full re-opening tomorrow.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Cold, Silent, Beautiful

My thanks to Don for these photos-

In the summer, this is a deck.

And this birdhouse defies gravity!  I'm sure the birds are much happier in the climate of the South......

Snow Measuring Tool

Compare this photo of Dan's grill to the earlier post..... yes, we have more snow!

It's a good tool measurement of the growing amount of fluffy flakes.... at least until tonight.  The ranch managers graciously gave us two hind quarters of venison, and Dan is butchering the meat and freezing the packaged amounts.  Tonight we have venison on the grilll!

Snow Daze

Winter is upon us... we got a good 14" of snow on Sunday, with  a bit more accumulation each day since.  More snow on the way tonight as well.

Here's the views from our back porch, as well as Dan shovelling snow from the front sidewalk:

Yesterday, Dan, Don (the man that works with Dan) and I went to Gardiner over lunch to get chains for our tires (yep, we found out we need them). 


On the way back up the mountain, we ran into a good herd of mountain sheep that had moved down into the valley with the bad weather.  We drove right through them, and they merely looked at us!




Fortunately, Don had his camera with him, and took these great shots:

Now, if only could see some reindeer..... :)

Today we woke to to a good additional 12" and the skies are white again with snow.  PLUS they are talking about another 1-2 feet of snow this weekend.

Since I'm not the one doing all the plowing, I say 'bring it on!'  I've got internet, TV, and a stack of books to read.  I'm in hermit mode.

Happy early winter preview to you and yours!