dancinghorse | Dec. 11th, 2004

I am crazed, I tell you--crazed.

Finished the Christmas shopping today. I think. I strafed the Fourth Avenue Street Fair--in and out in an hour, including stops for gifts and a pause for frybread with honey. Must have have frybread. It's required. I almost fell into Fair mode, which is leisurely and takes hours, but I had too much else to do. It was beautiful weather for it, and half of Tucson was there--temps in the 70s, clear and sunny, what we call Chamber of Commerce weather. Quite a contrast with the past month.

However I had to rush through, then run errands, make PO run, etc. And get back in time to feed horses lunch. After that I went thud for a bit, then fed horses dinner, then finished cleaning the guestroom closet and mostly finished excavating the office. Still left to do: set up shelving system (my dad is coming over with tools for that tomorrow--one of today's errands was to Home Depot for missing hardware), sort and stow all the old mss. and research materials (books were sorted and stowed yesterday), then, like, clean the place. Then decorate for Christmas. We have a real tree, so that gets put up as close to the date as possible.

This coming week I'm hoping to get some time off. I've been working so hard, writing is starting to seem appealing again.

I am working on minimizing holiday hysteria. We'll see if I succeed.

I got an odd message today: Total stranger asking me to help sell a horse I've never heard of, whom she bought from someone I've never heard of. She was convinced I had trained this horse and sold it for its owner. I don't know how she came up with that--if he'd been a Lipp it might have made some sort of sense, but a TB? Capria kills them on sight.

If anyone's looking for a 6yo bay TB, 17.1, very gentle, has done a little dressage, likes to jump, seller will pay shipping back to Arizona or somewhere else warm and dry (he is not doing well in the mud and snow of upstate NY), asking $5500, let me know and I'll put you in touch with the seller.

We're planning a Joni clinic for January 8th and 9th--lady from Austin is bringing her Lipp (Marita's full sister, no less) and possibly a friend, and we're foregathering to ride, schmooze, and play with ponies. Joni clinics are fun--we haven't done one in a while. We lay on a buffet spread--potluck with bells on--and rig up the camcorder and people come and ride and train, and some stay overnight with horses, and Saturday night there's dinner for everybody who wants to stay over. A whole weekend of horses, and this time, all or mostly Lipizzans. We Like.

Meanwhile I am reading proofs for my Alternate Generals story, written years ago and finally making it to press--Baen, April 2005. The story is rather Out There, and it's all Harry Turtledove's fault. He would make a passing reference to Genghis Khan the Jewish Mongol.

In Xanadu did Solomon Khan/The Temple of the Lord decree....

Bad Harry. Bad, bad Harry.