Yet another year has gone by! And somehow nothing much seems to have happened. We've
pretty much settled into the new house, and we're gradually coming to terms with the idea
that we'll never get the verandah complete. Here images from two years ago, last year and
this year:
About the only significant difference is that we're gradually getting something like a
second-rate lawn.
Probably the real issue is that the longer we wait, the clearer it becomes that we're not
really sure what we want. We should probably set ourselves a date to at least tile the
surface, and then possibly put up an awning.
Apart from that, about the only thing still outstanding is the dispute with the builder, which seems to be dragging on for
ever. The main recognition is that builders and lawyers are non-technical, and they don't
even understand our issues. We're gradually coming to the conclusion that people can charge
extra for inferior fittings and get away with it. Life's too short for fighting.
On the health front, it's clear that we're both getting older. Greg will be turning 70 next
year, and Yvonne the following year. Greg's dislocated finger looks better now, but it'll
never be completely normal again:
Apart from that, we're both suffering from minor muscular pains, though nothing overly
serious. Yvonne has started doing
some Pilates exercises, and Greg is
thinking of doing so as well.
Greg has become even more immobile, and spends much of his time playing with cameras, in
particular random technology such as panoramas and extreme macros, which bring a certain
satisfaction by combining photography and computers.
Yvonne, on the other hand, has done a number of new paintings,
mainly Borzoi and a few about knight games
and Champion Phil Leitch from Kryal
Castle and his Friesian
stallion Noble Shadow Valiant.
She also enjoys her outdoor activities and feels pretty fit and enthusiastic about looking
after the horses, doing a lot of riding and learning new skills. Chris, always bubbling over
with imagination and creativity, has found a lot of things to do together and with the
horses, like taking up skill at arms, archery and other similar fun things. Yvonne is
spending a lot of time refining her and her horses' (Carlotta's and Keldan's) level of
education in historical dressage, and was lucky to go to more clinics, held by riding
master Arne Koets, who helped a lot in
the process.
And recently she decided to also get herself involved with skill at arms, and this with her
mare Carlotta (Keldan already being very good at it under Chris' tuition), who has a lot to
learn in this field, and especially overcome her worries about many challenges that occur
during this kind of work. But all looks very promising, and everybody has a lot of fun.
There is also a new addition to the family, Paso Creole filly Valeta NS, of course also bred
by Narrawin Stud. As she is only a yearling,
it will take four more years before she can be ridden, but never mind, it will be fun to
teach her some interesting things in the meantime.
As ever, our animal population has changed. But this time there are fewer animals:
Rani, Sasha and Gabriella have all left us.
Why? Gabriella, the miniature horse, was really not ever planned to be a useful horse,
though she turned out to be surprisingly expensive, since we had to adapt our infrastructure
to her. Yvonne really struggled with husbandry problems, as Gabriella seemed to put on more
and more weight, despite all her efforts, and she hated to have to lock her in so often.
One day a friend visited and immediately fell in love with Gabriella. As she has a lot of
experience with miniature horses, Yvonne decided to let her lovely little Mini go.
And Rani,
the Bengal cat? She turned out to be
quite a handful. She showed a particular love of heights, and it was difficult to hide
anything from her in the house:
She was also seriously upsetting Piccola, so
we somewhat reluctantly found a new home for her, coincidentally with Kelly Yeoh's cousin,
who already had a Bengal cat.
Sasha, the Borzoi, was another matter. We
simply decided that three Borzois were one
too many. Greg's accident last
year wouldn't have happened if we hadn't had three dogs to look after (though Sasha
was the one dog not involved), and it made it difficult to take the dogs for a walk if one
of us wasn't available. He went to Melanie Bahlo, the sister of Chris Bahlo, who is very
happy with him. Sasha loves his new home, where the two boys play with him, the cats and
greyhound Garry have become his friends, and they enjoy their family outings to the beach
and the race course.
In June we stopped visiting the Geoffrey
Cutter Centre and the Eureka Village
Hostel: as we had noticed last year, the dogs were gradually getting fed up with it,
and it was difficult to get them to pay enough attention to the people who were not among
their favourites. Ultimately we decided that, for longer periods, Borzois really aren't the
right kind of dog for this sort of thing.
And that's the summary of the year. As ever, there's a blow-by-blow description in
Greg's diary.
Best wishes for the coming 12 months from Carlotta, Greg, Keldan, Leonid, Nikolai, Piccola,
Valeta and Yvonne.
