Friday, August 31, 2007

Trickster Wants A New Pair Of Shoes

Around the ranch, your senses tune themselves to the slow pace of nature and your sensitivity to movement, noise, smells, just everything, goes way up. Out there, the swish of a horse's tail clear across the pasture can catch your attention.


Town's way different. Things move fast and loud here.

Even up over the saloon, where there are seven women (eight, with me here) functioning out of two bathrooms, lots of joking around, and the constant irritation sound of that honky-tonk piano downstairs, the sensory input is a lot more than I'm used to. But I always adjust.

A long weekend with LouLou, Anne, Crystal, El, Penny, Angelique, and Marsh is like one huge slumber party. Our motto? There are no adults around, so we get to do whatever we want.

Last night, they got me all hyped up on an ice cream sundae supper. Usually, just a little bit of sugar makes me so sleepy, I can barely function. But whenever I'm away from Starr Ann, that condition reverses - I crave sweets and they hype me up. Weird, huh? One friend of ours says it's a "compensatory physical manifestation" of the fact that Starr Ann and I really want to have a sexual relationship. Bull hockey!

You wouldn't believe how many times we've thought a friendly tumble would be the perfect way to pass the afternoon. But any trying-to-have-sex-with-your-best-friend fiasco you name, Starr Ann and I have been through it. From cracking up laughing, to not being able to get ourselves situated, to one of us forgetting about that wad of chewing gum in our mouth, to alfalfa crumbs getting down our pants - I'm here to tell you Starr Ann and I were not intended to receive carnal knowledge of each other.

Penny, you could tell, was real disappointed to hear that. So now I'm going to have to invent a hot sex episode between Starr Ann and me to tell them about tonight. Don't worry, I'll eventually remember to mention it's a lie, but not before letting them digest it for a while first. It's what Starr Ann would want me to do.

Anyway, I'm off to the farrier's around the corner. Wanda Sue is the best horse shoer around, but she seldom gets out as far as our place, so I like to have her work on Trickster's feet whenever we get to town.

In case you've never seen an actual shoeing, here's how it goes. Each foot starts out with Wanda Sue bending over, facing away from me, while she pulls the old shoe and trims up the hoof. Then, for the final shaping, she turns around and bends over again facing forward. And Wanda Sue is given to dressing for comfort, if you know what I mean, so when her shirt falls forward there's really nothing else there to keep a light breeze from cooling her off a little. Once the shoe is on just perfect, Wanda Sue stands up straight and arches way back to loosen up her muscles. If you'll recall, horses have four feet. So the above gets repeated three more times. And, Holy Mother of God, it's hot today, so Wanda Sue is going to get that pretty sheen to her skin after a few minutes.

Well, how I do go on. Better get on over to the farrier's. Inventing that scene for the ladies, while watching Trickster get shod, is going to be a piece of cake.