Saturday, April 26, 2008

last day of fake pre-summer

http://glencadia.com/videos/08april26/

That's the folder in case of broken links.

The ducks can swim now. Quite big.

This is old. Most of these guys are home already.

Here we have most of them (Bailey, Bonnie, Gracie, Django, Nora, Simon, Apple...) out and about.

More of them (above). When the field is planted, we'll have to stay out for a few months.

Sweet old Beany.

More Beany.

Here I tired to introduce Natasha to Django and while she didn't seem to mind the muzzle before Django showed up, after he got in, she tried to take it off... so Django needed to go out of there!

Chickens are still small. They are suppose to lay green and blue eggs. No joke.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

video by video entry as promised

Remember to reload (page refresh or hit the back and then the forward button in your browser) if you don't see the video the first time. That works for me sometimes. And if you can't see quicktime, let me know.

We start out the morning with Willy and Freya running around and me watching two kids, Jim in the barn and my son wants to go to canoeing and I want to take care of the dogs. I try to do all this at once, but as you will see, it doesn't really pan out.

So here we start. Willy and Freya are around here somewhere. Strawberries, kids....

Then Ollie catches Willy and drags him around on a leash for no good reason. Willy seems to roll with the punches.

Now Ollie is getting the dogs all riled up and Bentley and Jasper have joined the chase and Freya finally decides to make a cameo.

Way off in the distance, you might see those four dogs or maybe Ollie. Certainly my very long early morning shadow. Oh and geese getting a rude awakening. Swimming.

Simon eats alone then I thought maybe I could canoe with just Simon and my dogs and Ollie but even that didn't seem to pan out. More of Simon. More and the canoe and Ollie and a lot of mud.

More kids, more mud. One dog.

Daughter Lotta looking cute, more of the same, still no canoeing.

Quick canoe with Ollie and a panoramic view of the pond (which runs big but not deep) and me giving Ollie a taste of the kind of thing I heard as a member of the Koloa Canoe club when I lived on Kauai, Hawaii.

Hay bales. I was hoping for dogs running in and out of the bales, creating a nice static-motion contrast, but they wouldn't do it right. Dogs: Duke (AKA Uncle Charly, who is available for adoption, Adelaine, Princess, Gracie, Luna and Loona.

Same group with nice close ups of Duke. Come on! Someone should find this guy a home! He's a great dog! You have to know someone.

Next up (on deck and out the door): Ming, Bonnie, Hazel, Norman, and Duke and maybe someone else. Fast fly by. These guys move pretty fast. Ming is a little mellower.

Another group. Sajj, Elton, Nora. Bean field. They don't plant this sucker until July for some reason. I mean, I know they want a late crop but they could get two crops of string beans on this one. Their business.

Wellington in the yard, looking for people, ignoring horses.

More of Wellington playing and hanging out.

Moki snapped the leash and ran, against doctor's orders. Betty Lou comes by. Moki only limps when he walks. He can run fine. Here.

Dog yard. All of them, pretty much.

quick note

The videos are taken, converted and are uploading now. They are at:

http://glencadia.com/videos/08april20/

I will go through them one by one later. There are a lot and I guarantee everyone's dog is in there for a long time. I got a "memory card full" error on my camera, which I never did before.

Okay, see you later.

Saturday, April 19, 2008

catching up

First of all, I live in Stuyvesant Falls, New York. This is why it's called "Falls."

Simon is eating fine, not slow, as you will see tomorrow in the videos. Willy took awhile to warm up to me but I'll put him and Freya up swimming tomorrow. They stay close by and are fine off leash. Jasper and Bently also got cheated out of a swim, which I will correct tomorrow. Bentley is good now, not nervous either.

That will be in tomorrow's blog. Today's blog is about Hillary and Barack. Just kidding.

Anyway, all the dogs that got cheated will get blogged tomorrow.

Jim went to the city to pick up a dog today: special pick up $170. YIKES. Well, we do that. Ain't cheap.

Here I am in upstate New York. Four years ago I was a freelance graphic designer dressed in black, dragging around a portfolio, sitting at a computer and going to meetings in midtown. Now, my hands are so rough and my fingers so beat up and calloused I can't put my wedding ring on. I'm stronger, probably healthier, but fatter, have a farmer's tan and come in from the barn for breakfast. I'm happy about it, but I found myself looking at myself in the mirror and picturing this leathered, old man I would turn into, grey and weathered, hair growing out of my ears. Wait, the hair is already growing out of my ears. And my grandfather had the same and he never did a lick of real work in his life: he was a foreign correspondent, covered the Spanish Civil war for UPI in the 1930s. I remember starring into his ears when I was a boy, maybe 11, and being completely disgusted. Then it dawned on me that I would get the same when I was old. And here I am, and here it is. "Hey," he said, "what the hell are you looking at?" End of story. My grandfather here and here and and here and here and here and on and on.

Friday, April 18, 2008

swim, some strange tape Ollie found, Gracie doesn't want to canoe... the story line for today

First, before I get to the narrative, let me mention the dogs not videoed. Moki is on bed rest. Betty Lou is keeping him company. Norman couldn't come out when Wellington was wandering around because Wellington hates him. I owe Norman a walk, and some more ball play in the water, which he likes.

Okay, now here's the main folder in case a link doesn't work or something:

http://glencadia.com/videos/08april18/

Also try hitting refresh if you don't get it the first time. And let me know if you have trouble with quicktime files.

Here is Ollie with his lullaby tape. Sitting by the tree as I head out to the dogs. No dogs in either of these. Here he tries to mix German in there...

Nora Sagg Ming and Bonnie -- out the door.

More of those guys. Yet more.

Pond, same group.

More, can you believe.

New group. Princess, Hazel, Adelaine, Elton. Go!

Same group running free.

At the pond (same). Sense of pond with fade in...

Dogs bothering Ollie.

Wellington and Gracie. Jim working on stuff, Ollie playing with a saw and some wood.

Same as above.

Natasha (barking), Jasper and Bentley rough housing, most all the other dogs too. (Jasper and Bently are not ready to go running off leash yet.) General yard activity.

Willy, Freya and Luna here and here.

After 9258 in the main folder, we go canoeing, Gracie says no thanks, we get some ducks, see some horses, feed some chicken babies and so on. You can look around at those if you want to... they're really for my mother.

http://glencadia.com/videos/08april18/

Thursday, April 17, 2008

write up from yesterday: watch the goose video

What great weather. Should get out to the barn. Now, I will go through the videos from yesterday one by one but they are in the folder linked from the last entry, plus some that I'm uploading now.

This is old. A lot of these guys are home.

This is how ollie sends email. No dogs.

Lula going crazy.

More of Lula not swimming.

Ming, Adelaine, Clarence, Gracie, Duke (aka Uncle Charly available for adoption), Scout, and few more. Here.

Same group here. Looking for a good spot to swim.

Swimming, then a goose meanders, saunters, eases, strolls, paddles, casually passes by and NO DOG BARKS at him. Most don't even notice! PATHETIC!

Same group. More running.

Norman and Nora. Here. Woods.

The whole bunch back home. Here.

Jasper and hay bale. Hard to film and hold a leash and he is definitely thinking about running away.

Same as above. Still hard to make video.

Ming, Betty Lou wants to go back to Jasper. Love?

Gracie. Small but casts a long shadow. Everyone else too.

My little girl looked particularly cute in orange.

Still orange. Still cute.

My horses. Hungry.

Children carrying ducks to the pond.

Almost there. Don't drop the duck!

Yes, they swim!

Back to dogs in the evening. All.

Jasper joins the group. Yikes, he's looking for trouble,

So far so good.

More kids.

The end.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

swimming, first day 2008, tax day, great videos

but no time RIGHT now to give you the links... definitely look for the goose. Very funny. Here is the folder for today and I'll be back after I get this baby to sleep...

http://glencadia.com/videos/08april15

Saturday, April 12, 2008

warm day



Adopt this dog or tell you friends! A great dog available!

So here goes today's videos.

Letting a whole bunch out (Fenway, Cleo, Tibet, Scuba, Duke, Clarence) here.

Off they go here.

Chaos and disorder. Here.

Lucy and Bill here. An odd couple.

Duke is for adoption. With all the others here.

Very nice dog! someone you know should want him! Here.

Bonnie doesn't like Lady. Norman is okay. So out she goes. Here.

Bonnie.

Jasper and Betty Lou. Here. More of these two.

Lula.

Everyone.

More Duke. Look here.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

warmer in here than in the city

Pretty rare but true at this moment. We're sunny and downstate has clouds.

While I make some space on my hard drive to finish download videos, I'll write up some reports. I have two days of videos and I have to convert them so it takes awhile.

KIMA: She's funny. Nervous at first, which is normal enough, she started to act like she really liked me. Today she wouldn't come to me again so I had to bride her to get her leash on and go for a walk. Moody.

I will post videos of her going for a walk. On the leash. If I trust the dogs offleash, they get in videos out and about. On the leash its kind of hard to record video. You'll see when I add the video links.

BILL: He comes very well when he's called. If you have good treats. Works great. His person is in Israel meeting the Prime Minister and Abu Mazen and trying to sort that situation out. Bill is just a big gulump. I should like to the blog about the trip... and I will.

CLEO: Some dogs don't like her. Can't imagine why. My dog is completely in love. I think it's maybe a love triangle anyway. Otherwise, she's having a ball.

JASPER: I put him him a limited selection of dogs even though he seemed fine with everyone except my dog. He likes Betty Lou and they were wrestling over this toy lobster for a long time.

Everyone else is fine. I want to take them swimming later today, so do check back.

NEWS FLASH: VIDEOS are in this folder. I will break down and describe each one soon.

Saturday, April 5, 2008

some off lease, some not trusted

http://glencadia.com/videos/08april05

Only two videos today and almost all are in both.... thanks. Blogger doesn't let me upload right into the page lately and I don't know why....

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

the frogs came out april 1 this year

The frogs come out all at once. From quiet to loud in a few minutes. It's dramatic and a definitive, single marker of spring. This year it was April 1, for the record. Frogs! They do go back to sleep... it's cold now and I don't here anything.

Here is the folder where all the videos for yesterday are.

We got ducks. But first dogs. More dogs.

More ducks. Keeping the ducks in the shower was a bad idea. Stank! Here they are now.

Baby girl.