February 4, 2007

Hot Water Heater

Just about the time I think I might get ahead a bit on the care of my orchard (the latex paint has been out and ready for use for a month now) life intervenes. Saturday afternoon I noticed the small closet where our hot water heater resides was wet. I opened the cabinet and found the heater was leaking about a teaspoon of water a second. Not good. Home Cheapo trip lead to the discovery that hot water heaters have gone up from $100 to $399. (So much for the fiction that there is no inflation.)

Today was hot water heater replacement day. It went well enough so we even got a chance to hop on the horses for a little bit this afternoon. Our new big horse was perfect, sweet and good mannered.

When our old horse died, six years ago tomorrow, it left a huge hole in our hearts. He'd been our first horse and died of cancer of the spleen which is not common. My husband was too broken up to even look for another horse for several years. When we began looking, the right horse was hard to find. We're older than when we bought horses twenty years ago and no longer want to 'yahoo' up mountains and chase each other around. Now its more just an amble about the neighborhood. There are lots of spirited horses but few that are happy in a quiet existence. Bo the new horse is unique in that way. Until he arrived, our life was subtly out of balance. Now he's here things seem to fall into place quietly in an inexplicable way. His puckish sense of humor and true gratefulness for the ever-full feeder make going out to the barn each day just better.