I want my money back

I may be showing my age, but how many of you have heard Meatloaf's Life is a Lemon and I Want My Money Back? Well, that is how I've been feeling lately about 2007. I sat down to write a this blog post and while thinking about what to write, I found myself humming the song, so this is what you get.

In general I'm not a whiner. I can take my lumps and keep on going, perhaps even better than some. However, this was an incredibly difficult year at the ranch, for a lot of reasons. I won't bore you with every little thing, but a few of the highlights are:

• I got laid off work with only 9 days notice (two months later, got my job back)
  
• Christie fractured a vertebra while riding
  
• An unexpected death in Christie's family
• The Black Cat fire and midnight evacuation of 30 horses
• Wind storms that destroyed our fences in almost every pasture
• I had to manage the ranch alone while Christie was out of town for several weeks helping her cousin
• Two bent axles on our horse trailer
  

I could make the list much longer, but then I think I really would be a whiner. My point is that if only a few of these events had happened, I wouldn't be humming "life is a lemon..." This year, though, I feel battered and bruised, and if any of you have any connections at the Customer Service Center of the Universe, I'd like a refund for 2007. Barring that, I would settle for a mulligan or even a do-over.

Now, in order to keep my readership, I'm going to end on a good note. In the past few weeks we found a crew of guys at a local temp agency to help rebuild our fences. They have done amazing work, putting up hundreds of yards of jack-leg. The stallion has not escaped in weeks, and Christie and I actually have time to enjoy each other's company. Some of the stress of the past few months is finally starting to dissipate now that we know our fences will hold up.