In which I don't complain (much) about weather and we go for a ride!

I have a policy about not complaining about weather that doesn't

require a shovel. 

Blue sky above, sn*w in the pasture.  It could be worse.

There wasn't enough sn*w for that.  The driveway was icy for a few days, but the roads got clear pretty promptly.

I've been feeding hay at lunchtime so our dear Dragon doesn't run low on fuel.

I haven't missed any days of work due to unsafe roads so far this winter, and we even made the drive up to my folks' place in Bellingham for Christmas dinner.

The coffeepot has settled comfortably into the new apartment lifestyle,
and seemed entirely at home during the festivities.

 But the roads, while safe enough for ordinary travel, haven't been very inviting for truck-and-trailer trips.  And when everything was thawed out yesterday and I was set to take a lesson...

When a truck this large has a dead battery, it actually ha$ TWO dead batterie$.  $igh.

(I did manage a quick scamper to Les Schwab for two new batteries, and squeaked in a lesson with Dory before work, but it wasn't the leisurely morning I had planned!)

What's really been missing--for nearly two months!--is a nice trail ride.

And today we had one.

Just me and my Dragon

The lesson yesterday required a lot of core strength work, and so did my physical therapy session this morning.

So my muscles were fatigued and I was feeling pretty floppy in the saddle when Fiddle and I finally got to the trails.

But, even when she is "blade down" and charging the trail at that enormous trot that makes me think of knights and armor and warhorses 

my Dragon takes good care of me.

Her only hesitation all day was at the bridges, and I didn't wonder why.

I could smell all the dead fish, and the smell is not a nice one.

Spawning salmon swim up the creeks this time of year to reproduce and die...not always in that order. 

It's a little uncanny to see rotting fish still swimming.  The eagles don't mind.  Spawning salmon are like wiggly eagle candy.
The smell is not one that is quickly forgotten.

But we quickly left the dead fish stench behind.  You can do that when you ride a Dragon.

And you know?

It's cold out there.

But...

It's good.