I think we have a winner...!

For the past week or so Breyer has been doing a countdown of live auction models for Breyerfest and while they've had some nice ones, today they announced the one that is THE BEST so far.  I like the color and the pose is okay.  I don't conga the mold but only because I got in at Mistral Hojris and it wasn't one I wanted to go back and get others on.  If I did performance showing I might since it's really only suited for Dressage.  Anyway, here it is

But now that I look at it, granted the angle is different, but is this Totilas?  No.  It's not.  I just looked Zydeco from Big Easy Bash and that one is Totilas and is doing a more extended trot than the one above.  Still.  It's a good thing I'm not going to Breyerfest since I would be spending all my money trying to win this guy.  Good luck to all who bid on him.

Well, that's all there's time for this morning because mom and I are going grocery shopping here in a minute before it gets too hot.

Happy Sunday!

I guess she REALLY wanted them to have it!

I occasionally suffer from bouts of insomnia and when it's too late to want to take a sleep aid, I get on my iPad Mini and start surfing the net...like now.  Usually I get tired enough to go back to bed within a short while, but I wanted to post this first...

I was looking at a zoo nut message board I frequent, I looked along the right-hand side to see if there's any interesting news in the zoo world and saw a headline about someone wantig to feed the lions at the Memphis Zoo...

Woman climbs barrier, tries to feed lions cookies at Memphis Zoo

http://wreg.com/2014/06/24/woman-tried-to-feed-cookies-to-memphis-zoo-lions/

The woman had been caught not once, but TWICE trying to feed some cookies to the lions there.  I mean, who does that?  Not to mention how incredibly dangerous and stupid it can be to climb a barrier.  I wonder if she was drunk or had some kind of mental issues going on like others that've done similar things.  I'd like to be able to say this was an isolated incident, but it's not.  A year or so ago some dude got into the Elephant yard.  Fortunately they got him out before any of the three elephants saw him.  The one at the Bronx Zoo in 2012 wasn't so lucky.  That guy jumped off the monorail into the Tiger exhibit and was injured pretty bad.  Anyway,  I wonder if she was refunded for her recently-purchased membership since she's been banned for life...? Those can be expensive, depending on the zoo and the perks that come with it.  At one time I had memberships at three zoos and all had very different prices.  Only one was worth the cost and is the only one I still have because it was the most difficult to acquire, but it also has the most perks.  They don't just cater to children and have tons of programs for children but none for adults, unlike the zoo that's only 6 minutes away.

Anyway, eyes more to this post than just the article.  Well, the article was the main point, but I have a personal story to share that is related...I used to have this friend that I went on many "Zoo Adventures" with.  She often said we should toss meat balls (balls of meat, not meatballs) to the male Tiger at our local zoo.  We never did and I'm pretty sure she wasn't serious about it, but it was pretty silly.  A girl I work with and I also often say we are going to go to our local zoo and start building the new Tiger exhibit ourselves.  They were supposed to break ground in April, but here we are at the end of June and nothing has happened.  But the point is, there's a big difference between joking about it and actually doing it.

Well, I guess that's it for now.

Random Cool Video Wednesday

Well, it looks like Blogger is back to normal.  I checked in this morning...just now, actually...and saw multiple blogs listed that had updated.  Yay!

So anyway, today's RCVW is brought to you by BrownEyedCountryGurl.  I enjoy watching videos like this and wish I could ride a horse through a drive-through again.  I say again because when I was 14, I think, my dad, brother and I rented horses from a local stable for two hours and because the stable was close enough, we rode them to our house.  That was actually the main purpose of that particular ride.  Anyway, on our way to the house, we decided to go through the drive-through of a liquor store because we knew the guy who was working at the time and we thought it would be fun.

Something that impressed me about this incident is that the horse is being ridden with a bitless bridle  and the horse was very well-behaved even with the cars creeping up around him.  At one point, you can see a Pontiac get a little close to them, but the Nissan you see a short time later keeps a respectable distance back.  I also like the horse itself.  I'm a sucker for Paints.  :)

So there you have it.  I hope you enjoy the video as much as I did.  I didn't listen to it with the sound so I don't know if there's stupid commentary on it or anything.

The clock is counting down to our move to the main building.  I spent much of the morning packing up my desk and I only have one drawer left plus labeling the bigger stuff like my computer and chair.  I'm excited for the move, but it's going to suck not seing my friends whenever I want.  Even when they move over in January, they'll be in a different part of the building.  I'll be able to see them, just not as conveniently as I can now.  I have stuff I'm going to take to Goodwill and when I re-open my desk space on Monday I'm going to have a slightly different decorating scheme.  I'll take pictures, although I should have taken one of what my desk used to look like.  Oh well.  Too late now because I'm not going to put everything back up!  hahahah. 

Happy Wednesday, Everyone!

Something weird is going on...

With Blogger.  Usually when I go to blogger.com it shows all the latest posts on blogs I follow but today it's only showing one with a button that says 'view more' but when I click on that nothing happens.  I've tried it on two different computers and three different thingies...you know, Internet Explorer, Chrome etc.  I forget what those are called.  Hahaha.  Anyone else having that problem?  Also, it tells me there's a new post on one of the blogs I follow and let's me read a few lines, but when I click the link for that specific post it says it doesn't exist.  It's very strange.  not to mention very frustrating because that list on my blogger page tells me when someone ha written a new post.  <sigh>

New Model....

So, last Thursday I got a call from the local toy store I do the majority of my Breyer buying from.  He'd gotten in the mid-year releases and wanted to let me know.  I asked about Harley D Zip, the only one I was really interested in, and he said yes and asked if I wanted him to hold one for me, which I said yes to, of course.  hahaha.  On Friday I went down during lunch since it's only about 2 or 3 miles from work as opposed to 14 or so from home and he showed me what he'd gotten in, including the Harley D Zip.  There were 5 to choose from but since I was on limited time and would probably want to socialize a bit with the owners, I looked at 3 of them and selected one that looked semi-glossy over the more matte one.  I may have mentioned before that I'm not the type of collector that scours all the models and goes over them with a fine-toothed comb in search of the best shaded, best dappled, darker/lighter one but if I see an obvious difference then I'll choose based on that.  Of the 3 I looked at, one was very matte and one was semi-glossy (I barely glanced at the 3rd) and I took the semi-glossy.  And without further ado, here he is

Harley D Zip is the first regular run on this model, but because he was released as a Premiere club model first under the name Latigo, that's what the mold name is being called.  I need to find me a Latigo now

And I have someone that is hopefully getting me Platinum Star from Breyerfest

I really wish they hadn't changed the mane on it.  It doesn't flow as nicely as Latigo and Harley.  Oh, but wait.  Now there's another Latigo mold that will be available, except this sucker is one of the auction items and so I won't have any chance getting him because only one will be made.  Bummer

Such nice, soft coloring.  He doesn't seem to be very popular on Blab, but I like him.  I think the simple color suits him.  Oh well.  You can't please everyone, right?  hahaha.

This week at work is going to be pretty crazy.  We are buried in work and we're moving on Friday.  Well, the move will be over the weekend, but our last day is Friday and we get to leave a little early.  Nobody is likely going to get much done.  When CERU moved they worked for a couple of hours in the morning then stood around and ate pizza before leaving at 1pm.  We'll get to leave at 2, which is nice.  We still have to pack up, too.  Our supervisor wants us to all take an hour tomorrow to pack up our desks, leaving out only what we'll need for the week.  Hahahaha.  We'll only be able to pack our personal stuff then.  But we get to dress casual (jeans/tshirts/athletic shoes) the rest of this week plus next Monday so that'll be nice.  Our regular dress code is Business Casual but most of us stretch it to "Dressier" Casual.  Hahaha.

Well, I guess that's it.  I think I had more I wanted to say, but I can't remember now.  Til next time!

**edited**  Oh yeah!  I remember now.  Rajah is finally available for purchase.  I pre-ordered him back in, what, February?  I was on Blab this morning and saw someone had posted he was now shipping so I went to check my email and saw

Hurray!  Needless to say, I bought him right away.  hahaha.  I can't wait to get him and add him to my Kalahkaari and Marwari models.  I'll be able to still have a complete conga of him (minus customs, but I don't consider them part of an official conga because they were painted from an OF...only official Breyer customs would count towards an official conga)

Well, this time that's it.  hahaha

Random Cool Video Wednesday

I hope everyone enjoyed last week's Random Cool Video Wednesday.  I know it probably wasn't all that exciting in the grand scheme of things, so hopefully this week will be more to your liking.

So, this last weekend was the Festival of Champions in Gladstone, NJ and it was also a selection trial for the World Equestrian Games to pick the short list of riders who will get to compete in Normandy in August and September.  I got to see a few riders have their tests before it moved on to the younger competitors and I turned it off.  I mostly only watch the Grand Prix and Freestyle Dressage because the movements are more interesting that just the basic stuff.  I love Piaffs and Passages and Shoulder-Ins and all that fun stuff.  Add it to music and it's even better.  One rider I saw really had me frowning.  In Dressage, you're not really supposed to see the cues the rider gives the horse, but this girl you could see her jabbing at her horse's sides and her legs were just all over the place.  And she was an upper level rider, too!  That had me real surprised.

 Anyway, I got to see Steffen Peters and Jan Ebeling compete and that was the best.  Steffen had the highest score after his ride and I knew that if anyone could beat his score it would be Jan.  And while Jan had a good ride, he wasn't good enough to beat Steffen.  On Sunday, which I didn't know about,(well, I know about Sundays in general, but I didn't know this particular event was happening on Sunday hahaha), was the Freestyle competition.  That's when they do Dressage set to music.  My favorite.  Once again Steffen Peters and Legolas92 came out on top and that is what the video is below.  It's a bit long, sure, but it's amazing to watch.  In Arizona, we have Dressage competitions, but not at this level, which is a huge bummer for me because I'd LOVE the opportunity to watch the big names compete.

Well, I guess that's it for today.  It's going to be a busy day at work and we have to attend our quarterly meeting/"awards" ceremony thing this afternoon.  Personally, I would rather stay at my desk and try to get caught up, but it's a requirement.  Oh well.  I hope everyone has a great day!

Breyerfest Live Auction

People have been chomping at the bit, wondering when the live auction models would be released and today is the day. 

Looking at the logo for the 25th Silver Anniversary, there's quite a resemblance

The Breyer Facebook page says Tom Bainbridge painted him during his visit at Big Easy Bash, but I have to wonder if he was asked to paint it grey to match the logo, or if it's just a coincidence...?  Either way, it's a nice model with wonderful coloring and I don't generally like this mold.  I like the new swishy tail and different mane and if I were going to Breyerfest, I likely would bid on him.  Not much, mind you, but just for the heck of it!  Good luck to all who enter the Silent Auction for this beauty!

Beep! Beep ! Beep! Zip-TANG!

Odd title, I know, but it has it's purpose...yesterday I saw my very first Roadrunner. Unfortunately, I wasn't quick enough with my camera so I didn't get any pictures. He was on the side of the road, thinking of crossing, but then he dashed back into the brush. I can't believe, after having lived here for all but 4 years of my life, this was the first one I've seen but in my defense I went many years without wearing glasses so when someone would point out a roadrunner, if it wasn't right in front of my face I couldn't see it. Well, maybe not right in front of my face, but it had to be within 10 feet, I guess. Anyway, I was pretty excited at having seen my first one. In case you don't know what one looks like, here's one from Google courtesy of Pima Community College in Tucson

Now for the reason of the title and how it relates to a Roadrunner. Well, I'm sure many of you have seen the Wile E Coyote and Roadrunner cartoons. In one cartoon, it shows two boys watching the cartoon and one of the little boys really liked the Roadrunner and would often say "Beep! Beep! Beep! Zip-TANG!" to sort of mimic the noise Roadrunners made just before fleeing from the Coyote so I thought it appropriate for this post. hahaha. In the cartoon, as the boys were talking, the Coyote stopped chasing the Roadrunner and addressed the kids to tell them why he was always after the bird. It was kind of funny that you were watching a cartoon of 2 little boys watching a cartoon and then the cartoon characters would talk to them.

So, yesterday I went out on a hunting expedition for wild horses and have decided it is definitely too hot to go out anymore this "season" in a vehicle without air conditioning. And I'm pretty sure all the "evidence" I saw was from domestic horses rather than wild ones. Why I thought that, I don't really know, but it was a feeling I had. So, after checking all my usual spots I decided to go see if any domestic horses would cooperate for me and went driving by my usual places for seeing them. I was only slightly more successful at that, but I haven't uploaded any of those photos yet and I'm not sure I'm going to share them. We'll have to see what they look like. Shooting through some of the fences from a car doesn't always produce a decent photo and I don't want to get out and walk over to shoot above the fence because I'm always afraid people will think I'm harassing the horses. Nobody has yelled at me, yet, but I'm always careful to not stop at a property where someone is outside. During the show season I can go to WestWorld and shoot horses there, but I like going out and finding random horses to shoot. When a former co-worker was still here, she was going to ask a friend of hers who had Arabians if I could shoot hers, but then she found out that the friend was trying to sell them, plus they were show horses and a little protective of them. That's how it seems to be for me. I know people who know people with horses, but I don't know anybody directly whom I can ask if I can photograph them so I sneak around. hahaha. I did take some pictures with my cell phone, though, and those I'll share now because I have no delusions of them being good and since I had my 70-300mm lens on my dSLR and didn't feel like switching to a shorter lens, I specifically used my cell phone. I guess I could've taken out my little point & shoot, but my brain was starting to fry and I didn't want to take it out. hahaha.

So, first we have this ranch at 156th St and Dynamite/ Rio Verde. People live there and they have a pretty nice property with lots of paddocks, but I've never seen any horses in them. I couldn't even swear they even still had horses, but why keep such a large property if you didn't have horses?

Something interesting they do have is large sculptures of animals on the side of the road (the main entrance is on 156th). There's Elk, Bear and some other animals that escape me at the moment. The first time I saw them, I thought they were real, but then I realized they weren't moving. They're pretty neat statues, but where's the horses? hahaha

These next photos are while I was coming down 152nd St towards Dynamite/ Rio Verde (I don't remember at what point Dynamite becomes Rio Verde so that's why I keep putting both names).

While on a different dirt road (a lot of the roads off Dynamite/Rio Verde are dirt) I had seen a large vehicle and quickly realized it was a horse transport, which piqued my interest right away.  I was curious as to where he was going, especially when he stopped in from of Loma Vista Ranch.  And then...

He started to back up.  I had no idea where he was going to turn and if he was going to back into somewhere or what.  Initially I thought maybe he missed his turn or wanted to back in, but then I realized he didn't want to hold up traffic, not that there is much, and that's why he was in the center median of the road.  Anyway, he backed up to the head of 152nd St and...uh-oh...I saw his wheels start to turn towards me.  Slowly he began turning down 152nd St.  There isn't enough room for two vehicles on that road (or most of the others) and I'm sure he saw me so I wasn't sure what he was planning to do.  I ended up pulling over closer to the fence of the ranch on the right and that provided enough room for him to pass me.  There was someone in one of the paddocks of the ranch and the driver stopped to ask him a question (after nodding a 'thank you' to me for moving).  There was a horse with its head poking out one of the back windows, but I don't know if someone was getting a delivery or the transport was there to pick up.  I went to see "my" house on the other side of Dynamite/Rio Verde and by the time I came back to the main road, which was only about 5 or so minutes, I could no longer see the trailer.  Bummer.  Do you wanna hear something silly?  When I saw the horse I actually said "Oh, Hello there!"  Yeah.  Pretty silly, I know, but what can I say?

After that I was going to go to "my" spots over off of Shea Blvd, but I was so hot by then that I went to lunch then spent about 2 hours at Barnes & Noble before heading home.

Onto a different topic.  A couple of days ago the San Diego Zoo announced the birth of a Cheetah kitten and said because its mother had rejected it (very common in single births, even in the wild) they would be hand-raising him to be used as an Animal Ambassador and had paired him with a 7 week old Rhodesian Ridgeback.  Not real sure why the puppy wasn't still with her litter, though, at that age.  Anyway, here's a couple of pictures of Ruuxa,  the Cheetah and of Ruuxa and Raina the puppy

Aren't they so cute?  There's video of them playing together and they get along quite well.  The zoo and Wild Animal Park have quite a history of pairing Cheetahs with dogs successfully.  Why?   Because Cheetahs are natrually nervous animals and dogs usually have a lot of confidence.  The dog's calm manner keeps the Cheetah from getting too stressed out.  Other zoos have been doing it now, too, and the pairings have enabled them to use the cats as ambassadors for their declining species.  Currently they're not available for public viewing, but it's been implied that will eventually change.  I'm going in November, but I don't know if they'll be viewable to the public by then or still.

Hurray for another weekend!  I have laundry this weekend.  Oh joy!  I hope everyone has a great one!

Random Cool Video Wednesday

So, today I was looking at different Breyerfest videos on YouTube and when I see ones in the right hand side that look interesting, I go and watch it. It doesn't always have to do with horses or BF, but that's okay because you can only watch so many BF videos a year. hahaha. Not because they get boring (although, between you and me, they do start to get a little boring), but because there's only so many of them out there. I like seeing the "ticket arrival" and the "experience" ones where people videotape their trip there. Those are the most fun.

Anyway, I think today I'm going to start a "Random Cool Video" day. A lot of people have Wordless Wednesdays and Throwback Thursdays, but since many of my posts don't have pictures, it'd be hard to have a "wordless" day and I don't have many shareable pictures from the past like some others do so a "throwback" day would be difficult. So, here we have Random Cool Video Wednesday. Today's Random Cool Video comes to you from CoastGuardNews channel on YouTube. Why was I watching a Coast Guard video, you may ask? Go ahead. You can ask. I will tell you. When I was in my 20s I became fascinated with the US Coast Guard. I had been enjoying Cops for at least 10 years by then and that was the only reality type show on at the time (maybe Rescue 911 and Real Stories of the Highway Patrol were on, too, I don't remember) but when Cops started I grew to like the law enforcement reality shows. I've always wanted to be a cop or a firefighter and I was an EMT for 8 years. Anyway, sometime in the 90s they did a show about the Coast Guard that was like Cops and I became fascinated with them. So much so that I really considered enlisting. I didn't, but the fascination never went away. I love the Coast Guard series on the Weather Channel and whenever I go to San Diego, I look at the air station everytime I drive by. If a helicopter is getting ready to take off, I'll see if I can find a place to park so I can watch it and when I see a boat on the San Diego Bay I'll watch it for awhile.

I think this video is real neat because it's a self-righting test being performed on an unoccupied Rigid Hull Inflatable. They have other boats that are capable of self-righting, but I believe this is the first RHIB that is capable of it. It's a pretty neat video, I think. I couldn't imagine being in a boat that is capsized, though, even if it does right itself. I hope you enjoy watching!

Equine Gates/ Trail Gates

Just now I was looking at another blog that I follow and she was talking about a recent trail ride in New Mexico she had taken with a friend. She posted a picture of the gate you have to go through to get to the trail part and I found it very fascinating. I couldn't find a "contact me" to ask for permission to use the photo so I'm going to just link it and you can go look for yourself...


I've never seen a trail gate that looked like that. Here in Arizona, at least in the Phoenix area where I've seen the gates, they look like this (scroll to 2nd picture)


I find it very interesting that the gate for the open space in New Mexico was what looked to be a de-constructed pallet on the ground, sort of embedded into the dirt. I know the concept is the same...keep motorized vehicles out...but it still looks strange to me. I've only ever seen trail heads in Phoenix and San Diego and both use the same sort of gate. So my readers out there who live near riding trails, what sort of gate is used?

Our weather has been brutal this week. 107. 109. A few days of 110. It feels like an oven outside. I can't wait for the fall again. hahaha. Around here, commercial stables don't generally operate in the heat of the day, rather having trail rides in the morning. People who own horses generally ride early in the morning if they're not lucky enough to have their own indoor arena to ride it. How does the weather affect YOUR riding? Do you have a certain high temperature in your mind that if it reaches that you won't ride out? How about low temperatures? How cold does it have to get before you decide to "put up" the horses for the season? Do your rental stables have weather guidelines for their trail rides?

My group had Claims Center training early today. Hurray. Now all that's left is Integration and Playground before we go live next month. It's pretty exciting because the stuff we learned today will turn a 10 minute task into a 1 minute one. Everyone will like that, especially when you have a bunch of them to do. Like I have this week. Like I have right now so I'd better get to it.

I Should've Taken A Picture...

Ugh! So, here I was at work, doing some legal invoices and eating my Raisin Bran Crunch cereal for breakfast. Somehow, I'm still not real sure how it happened, but I managed to bump the cereal cup on my desk and it tipped over. For several seconds I just stared as milk and cereal went everywhere. I managed to keep it from reaching my computer or keyboard, but it did get my mouse a little. No big deal. But that's not the worst part...well, aside from my breakfast now being GONE, a bunch of the pictures I had under this plastic desk mat are ruined. :( I had a picture of a horse from a notebook cover, a bookmark with a tiger on it, a picture a bobcat who is very hard to get a good picture of at the zoo...all ruined. I was able to salvage a notebook cover with a pair of cheetahs on it, a picture of a bald eagle from the zoo and my picture of a king cobra with his hood spread that I got at a reptile sanctuary. My desk is sticky and I'm still hungry. Plus I got milk on my pants. I should've taken a picture. hahaha. Oh well.

Earlier this morning I noticed there was an email in the "promotions" folder of my Lotus Notes. It's usually garbage but I decided to see what it was and saw it was from Southwest Airlines telling me they were having a fare sale with prices starting as low as $49. The last couple of times I got those emails, a roundtrip ticket to San Diego was still almost $200 and figured it would be that way again but I decided to look anyway and O.M.G! I was able to get a roundtrip ticket to San Diego for $98!!!!!!!! It hasn't been that cheap in several years. So then I had to book my hotel and rent the car right away so I know it's done. I'm going in early November in hopes of seeing some of that 3 Day Event I mentioned in an earlier post. I need to go see the new Tiger Trails at the Wild Animal Park and I'd like to go see a sanctuary called Lions Tigers and Bears. I would like to go to the zoo, but we'll have to see what I can schedule.

Well, I guess that's it for now. Until next time!

FINALLY...more wild horses...

I don't know why it took me so long to upload this last batch off my camera, but I finally did it today. I'm not overly pleased with them, that's for sure. Not like I got a couple of months ago. I guess being able to get so close to that band and have them not try to run and hide in the bushes spoiled me. hahaha.

Anyway, I don't know if I've seen this band before, but it might be the ones I only saw 3 of up on a hill last year and then they moved down into a ravine. The 3 I saw then were all bays, and this one was mostly bays. It worked out pretty good how I ended up getting their pictures. I saw one near the side of the road so I went up and found a place to turn around to come back then make another u-turn to get back onto the same side of the road as they were. It's a divided highway where I saw them so it wasn't easy getting turned around. Fortunately there were no cops around to see what I was doing or I would've likely gotten a ticket. Anyway, there wasn't really a landmark for where they were and so I just had to kind of drive along the shoulder of the road here and there until I could find them, but then I stopped at one point and I saw one of them so I let them come to me.

This pair surprised me in their behavior. The "foal" looked to be more than a year old and should have been weaned by now, but not only did she nurse, but her mama let her

It was very sweet, nonetheless, to see the two of them together.

Then I went to the spot where I'd gotten the last batch of photos in hopes of getting lucky again.  I think there was someone else who was "hunting" as well because they drove in as I was leaving and then I passed them again when I was leaving another spot.  I was surprised at the lack of people there, though.  I've never been there when nobody was camping or just hanging out so it made me a little nervous, but it was also kind of neat because the campground was FULL of squirrels.  Lots of adults...

And the CUTEST little babies in the world!

They were everywhere I looked!  It was the neatest thing ever.  And one of the bigger ones actually came right up to me and walked between my feet as I stood there.  I couldn't see much because I was afraid to move and scare it off, but it was really neat.  I've never seen so many squirrels!

Well, I guess that's it.  All this week I have to work 7:30a-4:00pm due to our new system rolling out soon.  We're having training for it.  Oh joy.  I came in at my regular time today in hopes of getting a decent parking spot in the shade, but all those spots were filled up so I volunteered to do OT, which was made available to us.  I wasn't going to, but I don't want my car to be an oven when I leave at the end of the day.  Besides, OT means money for Rajah, which should be coming up for balance due sometime this month.  I already have the money for him, but, you know.

Anyway, until next time!