Really Real

Albert Einstein said, “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”  Wikipedia claims that reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they might be imagined.  Last week I didn't really get back to reality, at least not fully, because, well...
I had company, an injured dog, a gazillion e-mails, blogs and Facebook posts to read (including many to comment on), extra laundry, and a ton to do to complete my Alaskan Cruise vacation blog.  Although, that was my reality at the time.  This week I tried to establish my usual routines and get back to my real (normal) life.  I was sort of successful.

Saturday I was awakened with the realization that I needed to get started on my walking for the Cumberland County Hiking Marathon, which began September 1st and ends on the 30th.  I had entered Maggie and I in the full and in the half marathons.



Most of the photos in this Blog are from our time out on the trails this week.





The reality that I had 39.4 miles to cover in 21 days meant I needed to do an average of about 2 miles a day.  This seemed very doable, but I knew it could catch up with me if I didn't get started immediately.

Between all my blogging and computer time Saturday morning, I took Maggie on the Overlook Trail hike.  After Joe got off work, he left for Biloxi Mississippi, where he was going to play in a Senior Poker Tournament.

I got Maggie's leg cleaned up (even trimming some of the hair around her wound) because she had splashed it when she went into Daddy's Creek.  I think it is looking pretty good.

I watered the front yard plantings for an hour, rested (maybe even napped some) and then went on another hike... the 2.8 mile loop starting on Hemlock trail.  My daily total was 4.8 miles, well over my required average.



An evening pop-up shower brought high winds and cooling temperatures and was very much welcomed (and needed).




But the rain caused Maggie some angst and she would not do her business before bed.


Sunday, the 15th anniversary of 9/11, on my first steps out of bed at 6 am, I realized I had caused my plantar fasciitis to flair up.  I was quick to get the dog out to relieve herself and fortunately, my pain and stiffness went away as Maggie and I strolled down the street.


I met Shirley at Church, ate an early lunch, then Maggie and I hiked the 3 mile Stonehenge trail that goes to and from Heatherhurst Golf Course.  Seen left, this huge root ball still remains from being pulled up when a large tree fell over during the ice storm.







Seen right, the trail crosses this cart path that goes under Stonehenge road to the back nine of the course.  Notice, the 1/4 inch of rain we got barely settled the dust.

During our hike, we saw some neat features like this rock bridge and the wooden one seen in the back ground.

I like having my collapsible water bowl to give Maggie a drink after each of our hikes.  I don't carry water, but leave a bottle in the car for us to share when we get done with a trail.


After getting Maggie good and tired, I put her in the Mancave and headed to the barn to meet Jan.  I went early to brush Zorro first.  All the horses were full of cockalburs, like this stable horse.

I chatted with Judy while getting Amiga tacked.  She informed me that the owners of the land under the power line, where we ride to get into the Glade, have asked us not to ride through there anymore.  They are afraid of us getting hurt and suing them.  This was a really real hard blow to us because it cuts off our access to the Glade trails. 

Jan was late arriving so I rode Amiga across the road to see how access to the winter pasture looked so we could ride there since the Glade trails were no longer available.  I got off Amiga and did some brush removal, breaking off twigs and bramble, but really needed clippers for the briars. 

I gave up on clearing the trail and went back to the barn.  Jan was still working on cleaning up Cash so just Cheryl and I went out, but only to the edge of the power lines and back.

Seen right, Cheryl on Velvet, and the photo she took of me (left) through the ears of her horse.  We met up with Jan on the way back to the barn and rode a little bit more.

The horses had been fed and a few, including Zorro, were being turned back out for the night.  I took this video of silly Zorro.
Once we were all done at the barn, Judy and I went to the land owner's house to communicate with her on a number of items.  Elizabeth has lived there for 75 years and was a delightful woman, full of stories and history about the land, including the 2,600 acres her mamma sold to Fairfield glade, which is now part of the stable and pasture land, but also where we ride.  I hoped we could work out a way for us to be able to ride through to get to the Glade trails.


Monday I tried to focus on my Blog post of our Alaskan Cruise, but kept getting deterred by other 'on-line' distractions, so made little progress.

At noon I headed out with Maggie and hiked the Forest View Trail.



It was still too warm to feel like fall, but it was sure starting to look like it (video).


This trail starts at the Methodist Church and loops around in the woods between our house and the church.  We can walk to it from the gravel road just down from the Lutheran Church, (which is where Carol usually walked her dogs) but I drove and parked at the trail head.



There are many neat features along this trail including rock steps, bridges and the natural rock formations.







  


There are also several cairns...
was this caterpillar playing King on the Mountain Cairn?

Even this deer skeleton can be seen if you have keen eyes or a dog that sniffs this stuff out.








After our hike, I drove to the barn, with Maggie.  She sat here on the mounting block while I used the rest room.  


 Then I took her out into the woods to rest while I worked at clearing the trail to the back winter pasture.



I spent spent almost two hours chopping briar and moving rocks off the trail.  I wanted to be sure to get head clearance for tall horse and rider, and get most the lose rock off the trail for the barefoot horses.








My day ended at Mirror Lake for the last Blast of the summer.  Dave and Daphne played.  They are a great duo to listen to and be entertained by, but only played a few dancing songs that no one got up and danced to.  This was okay by me because I was so tired from the days physical exertion.  Bed beckoned me shortly after I got home and got the dog walked one more time.


Tuesday started with me working on my Blog.  I did a few loads of laundry to give me a reason to get away from my desk.  Cat and dog play was also a good distraction.  I had to take this poor grasshopper outside after they had played (video) with it long enough.  I also went out and watered for awhile.  I discovered tomato bugs on my plant.  Three of the Tomato Hornworms had Braconid Wasp eggs stuck to their back.  The worms get parasitized by the wasp.  When the eggs hatch, the larvae will make a meal of the Hornworm.


I chose an alternative method to get rid of worms and wasp eggs.


I guess I should water more often, because it finally rained!!!  Not much, but two 20 minute showers in an hours time.


Joe got home from his poker trip mid afternoon.  We went into Crossville to do two of the 1/2 marathon hikes.  Well, really walks... it was all on paved surfaces.  Maggie and I did 1.5 miles at Centennial Park and then Joe joined us at Obed River Park for another 1.5 miles.

Seen left, exercise equipment along the path.  I should spend extra time at this sit-up station.

On our way home, Joe dropped me off at Wal-Mart and he and Maggie went to Sub-Way to pick up our supper.


I was up at 4 am Wednesday, which gave me extra time to Blog, so I got two days of cruise info and photos onto that post.  Then Joe and I (with Maggie) went to Hebbertsberg to hike a four mile section of the Cumberland Trail.  We caught up with two hikers who gladly took our photo before we passed them.


The trail was very well constructed with many great features like these rock steps.

It had an overlook (below) with quite a huge drop-off (seen behind me).




The path followed along Daddy's Creek, on the opposite side as the Overlook Trail in Fairfield Glade.  As we walked, I was kind of scouting for a place where the creek could be crossed from one trail to the other, to maybe do on horseback.

Along, actually right on the trail, we saw this Copperhead sunning.  It was so relaxed, Joe had trouble convincing it to move off the trail so we could safely pass by.




In several places there were these big rocks, located on each side of a water run-off stream (dry right now because of the drought).  I wondered if they were natural or had been placed there by the trail builders.  Some of the rocks were huge slabs.





Early on in our hike I got some sand in my boot, and by the last mile it was really bothering me.  It felt like a little pebble at this point.  But I didn't want to slow our progress down.  Once back to the SUV, I took off my boot right away.  I had worn a hole in my relatively new sock where the irritation was, and I had gotten a good size blister and red mark on my heal.  I'll know to stop and empty my boot next time.

I had time for lunch and a nap before going to work at the pool.  We had a good crowd until late afternoon when it got very dark and windy.  It cleared off for an hour, but clouded up and sprinkled around 5:30.  All my customers were gone by then, and after I finished up cleaning the restrooms, I closed the pool.  I only put in four hours.

It was Joe's card night so I sat here at my computer and had a beer and popcorn for supper.  The beer made me too sleepy to do anymore blogging, so it was early to bed.




Thursday morning Joe went in to work and I worked non-stop on my Alaskan Cruise blog with the intent to finish and post it.  A look out my window at the fall colors in back, which aren't spectacular because of the drought.






By noon I had had enough, grabbed a bite to eat, and headed to the barn to ride.  Zorro came right up to me (video) and Amiga was easy to catch.  Then Zorro came with us, all the way back to the barn (video).





I had a long and enjoyable ride on Amiga, going on the new trail we cleared to the back winter pasture.  Then I caught the long ride trail and went down to Daddy's creek.  We even took time to go to the swimming hole (seen left and above).  It, like everything else, was very low on water.  Daddy's Creek is really just pockets of big pools and no flowing water.  All the creek crossings on the way back to the barn were also completely dried up.

On my way up the hill by the water fall (which has no water falling right now) I stopped Amiga to let her rest and I wanted to look deeper into the woods for a possible place to cut a trail into the Glade.  She turn to look at me, as if to ask what I was up to.  If you look closely at the reins, I am not pulling her head to the left.  The tight rein is on her right, because she was turning her head to the left.





Next I rode Amiga along the woodland, right of the power line, before the hill to the cemetery, to see if there was a place along there to maybe cut a trail.  There were possibilities.





We almost stepped on another serpent (Black Snake) on the trail.  Half of him (including his head) are in the weeds.  He had no desire to strike or move away.

Once back to the barn and finished with Amiga, I spoke with Judy and John about the dilemma of riding into the Glade without going on the neighbors property along the power lines.  I felt greatly encouraged by their attitude and efforts towards resolving this matter.

Joe had hiked on his own after work and it was getting late, so I opted to skip a hike.  I really wanted to finish up my Alaskan Cruise blog.  I had it almost done after a few hours of work, just before I was going to stop for dinner... and then disaster struck.  (The invisible serpent?)  I lost everything on the post I had done... all the typing and photos.  I called sister Carol and she helped me copy the Preview page I still had open.  But the Preview page would not let me edit it anymore.

Also, none of the video links would work.  I was tempted to turn off my computer and re-boot, but didn't want to loose the opened Preview page.  I also couldn't copy from the 80 page word document I had made because the photos only showed up as links and none of the spacing with words and photos were correct.  I called Cathy to see if she could help, but like Carol, she was not familiar with my blogger software (or whatever it is).

I was ready to be done with computers all together.  So much of my time is spent here... and for what?  Are we really real when we communicate through the internet?

I got a kick out of this left photo.  Some things never change.  While standing right next to someone, we can each be in our own little world while reading (a hard copy or from our electronic device).  But today, we aren't just getting the news from a paper, we can be talking to someone, spamming someone, getting spammed, or maybe even reading real news.

Joe fixed dinner, I ate quickly, and then worked here till midnight, finally getting my Alaskian Cruise blog posted.  The error had cost me a lot of angst and an additional six hours of time.  I couldn't believe this had really happened.

Friday morning I looked over my Alaskan Cruise blog and made some adjustments before publicizing the post.  I got caught up on this week's post, and then went out to finally spend some time working in the yard.  First off, I needed to water a bunch of plantings again.  The air had cooled to highs in the upper 80's but it was still very dry.







I moved rock that had been piled at the back corner of our lot, where the concrete part of the ditch ends.  Then I worked at finding rock to fit into place, to form a wall at the high end of this rock slab.  I didn't have time for the actual cement mixing and work.


Once Joe got home from work, we drove up to the top of Black Mountain to hike the summit trail.


Spectacular views and rock formations could be seen on one section of this trail.


Part of this trail over-lapped with the Cumberland Trail which is still a work in progress.



We left the section of the Cumberland Trail to take the stairs down to where the overnight campground is.  This video gives you an idea of the scenery.










Walking on these large rock outcroppings and looking down (video) at where you could fall if you tripped or mis-stepped, can be a bit nerve racking.

On the way home we checked out the hamburger place in Hebbertsberg, but it was closed.  We also stopped by the barn.  I was going to put Amiga out for the night so she would not be so wound up the next day for an early morning ride.  But she was laying in her stall so peaceful and relaxed, I decided to leave her be.

I cooked a frozen lasagna and made a big toss salad for dinner.  Most nights we sit on the back porch to eat, even though it has been almost dark out with the sun setting earlier these days.
I could not stay awake to finish this blog post.

What is really real?  There are so many internet hoaxes these days; internet relationships being catfished, photo shopping, scams, mis-information, identity theft, and even virtual games that people get so wrapped up in that it kind of becomes their reality.  How do we know what is really real?


This same confusion is inherent in all of the political media.  I don't know what to believe any more with all the conflicting information, lies, and political propaganda.  I feel the need to be thick skinned to all the negativity and find it all extremely disheartening and discouraging.
Hiking out on the trails gets me away from all that, but then, I have bugs (ticks, chiggers and mosquitoes) that get under my skin... literally.