Horsey Thanksgiving

Horsey Thanksgiving, everyone.

I am up at an unearthly hour, considering it is a holiday.

Of course, many of you American ladies may be already up, getting the ceremonial bird ready for its long sauna session, and preparing your house for the onslaught of guests.

I guess I have those tasks ahead of me. (Well, not the turkey part. I decided to tempt fate, and am in danger of deportation because I am doing the un-American thing of serving a beef tenderloin instead of the American Turkey.) But right now, I'm up early not for a Thanksgiving Reason, but for a Horsey Reason.

Yesterday, Kelly and her very BFF in the WWW (whole wide world) mended their fences, and have been getting re-acquainted.

It's been so freakishly freezing cold in the mornings that I have been cursing my 'gave away everything I didn't need when we moved 14 years ago' lack of fore-sight, because I don't have an ice scraper for my car, and I thought "I have offered to take Kelly and BFF to go horse back riding early Thursday morning, but honestly, it's going to be FREAKISHLY cold for these parts tomorrow morning, so maybe we should do an afternoon ride in the wonderful sunshine instead."

So after school (half day yesterday) and going out for lunch (the kids voted for the local sushi place), we collected Alice, and I dropped the boys off at home to play Halo, and I took the girls over to the coast for a (potentially warm-ish) trail ride in the late afternoon sun.

We got to the ranch, and a group was just returning. It was pretty un-busy, and Jorge was nowhere to be seen. But the guide recognized us, and, in his broken English (note to self: Really, you would be so well served if you just learned a FEW words of Spanish) pointed the girls to Jorge while he got the horses back on the line.

Soon, Jorge was back from the pasture, and I was signing the girls up for the afternoon ride.

"We came out today, Jorge, because I watned the girls to get a ride in this weekend, and i was worried that you might be closed on Thanksgiving"

"Oh no, we'll be doing the Early Bird Special before we go to do our Thanksgiving dinners. We have to take care of the horses every day, anyways. But if nobody comes, we'll just take care of the horses, and then go home."

I smiled, and decided to indulge the girls ever so much more, "Well, then, we'll be there with bells on. I know the girls love riding on the beach."

He looked at me, as I put down $120 on top of the paperwork ($55 for each hour-long trail ride, plus the tip) and said "Oh, keep your money. This ride is on us. Just make sure you tip the guide, ok?"

What?

A free ride?

Have fun, ladies.

So now, we're up at the crack of dawn (and a beautiful, chilly dawn it is), so we can get out there before all the horses are gone (assuming that there is a Thanksgiving Rush), and it's back to the ranch.

Time to start making new memories, ladies.

I guess it really is a "Thanksgiving Day" today, after all.