Prepare to be riveted! I have another "follower" AND successfully cared for a horse!

After several months of some pretty intense therapy following my last bout of horse-care duties ("No wonder," I hear you saying in an unnecessarily sarcastic tone as you harken back to a my traumatizing May blog article "Tractor driver...Flip that horse!"  http://amyafterthefact.blogspot.com/2013/05/tractor-driverflip-that-horse.html). "All of your blog articles are traumatizing," you remind me snarkily before snapping, "Can you just get on with it? My time is valuable." No kidding.

Side story ("Sigh," you sigh.): Ran into my friend Geri this morning who told me with delight that, after months, she has finally become a "follower."

Side note ("Sigh," you sigh.) I REALLY don't like the term "follower." I am, after-all, NOT a prophet and I don't even LIKE grape Kool-Aid. As I don't like to criticize unless I am able to offer a solution, I briefly considered replacing "follower" with "fan" but even my ego isn't that big ("Snort," you snorted.) Hence, I would like to replace "follower" with "kind, occasional reader."

Return to side story:  (You glance at the time.) Back to Geri...she had apparently been on her way to work at the school and had some sort of English muffin debacle during the ride and ended up covered in butter so had to return home to change. According to her riveting story, she had to wait 17 minutes for the clothes dryer cycle to end. "What can I do for 17 minutes," she wondered and then shouted, "A-ha! I'll read Amy's blog for the first time in months!" Then, my loyal, tech-savvy friend (we had a conversation about turning on an I-pad two weeks ago) figured out how to successfully hit the "follow" button. Yes! I now officially have three followers (including myself).  I am also introducing a companion legislation to the existing no-texting-when-driving law to include a no-eating-buttered-English-muffins-while-driving amendment.

Return to original story: ("Finally," you snarl, "Your 17 minutes are almost about up.") Any-hoo, my neighbors were heading out of town and coaxed me over with some very specific care giving instructions. I'm used to squeezing the weird medicine into the cat's ear so that was no big deal but then Nance pulled out a horrifying medieval horse-torture device right out of "The Horse in the Iron Mask." Apparently its politically-correct term is a "grazing-harness" but when applied, it transforms the poor creature into Darth Vader's horse. Its purpose is to limit the daily calorie intake so apparently I need a grazing-harness as well. I observed Nance as she deftly and competently put the harness on her horse and my stomach clenched as I realized I would not be able to gracefully duplicate this procedure. I agonized about my potential failure. "Maybe I'll just skip it," I suggested to my friend George. "You know they probably have a nanny cam," he said, already bored from listening to my litany of "problems."

As it turns out, it really WASN'T a big deal. I dragged Savannah down to the barn with me and she watched with admiration as I stuffed an apple slice into the harness and held the contraption up to the horse. Sierra eagerly stuffed her velvety nose into it and I snapped it into place. Voila! ("Wait," you interrupt indignantly, "I wasted 17 minutes of my valuable time to read a boring account of how you successfully took care of your neighbor's horse?") Ouch! Boring seems a tad harsh. But yes...yay, me! Must every story you read from my blog have to be centered around my abysmal failures and embarrassing exploits? Can you not also celebrate my small successes as well? What sort of "kind, occasional reader" are you?