It's Sunday and a day for a ride. The plan was to leave at 8:45 for Pt. Reyes so I set my alarm for 7:00 to feed Cowboy and Dexter. After a bad night's sleep, I finally drifted off just in time for the alarm to go off. Not a good thing. Tired and cranky took on a new meaning. The boys did get fed and I was only a little bit late by the time we left, but I wasn't in any better mood. The fact that, with the addition of Cowboy's new barefoot boots, I am toting about three loads of "stuff" to the horse trailer isn't helping. The weather at the Five Brooks trailhead was cool but sunny. Cowboy was in a fabulous mood and charged cheerfully up Stewart's Trail. Dexter's mood was matching mine and he was irritable and spooky. We finally discovered that, if we put him and Laura in front and had Cowboy and me bring up the rear, he was in a much better frame of mind. Due to muddy conditions, we stuck to Stewart's Trail and picked a lunch stop along the road. I was hungry and anxious for my lunch--which, as it turns out, was still back at the trailer. Laura sacrificed half her sandwich and Dexter sacrificed his Wheat Thins with peanut butter (his favorite snack). Dexter didn't actually offer up his snacks but I ate them anyway and now I owe him. I've forgotten many things in my life, but NEVER lunch! I'm blaming the barefoot boots--seems like I mentally count off the steps necessary to get ready to ride, and adding a step means that some other step drops off the list. Like putting the lunch bag on the saddle, for instance. After lunch, we continued up the hill, but finally Cowboy came to a stop--his sign that his back is bothering him and my sign to get off and walk. Another part of the fitness program! I stayed afoot until we got to Firtop, a nice pasture area at the top of the mountain, where we let the horses graze for a bit. Cowboy requested that I dismount on the way down the mountain as well, so we still have lots of work to do on his back issues.

We got back home and put the boys away, and I started the process of cleaning Cowboy's filthy paddock, retrieving the rest of my gear from the trailer, and preparing the horse's evening meal (Cowboy is on the weight-gain diet and Dexter is on the weight-maintain/prevent gut problems diet, so meal prep is a bit time-consuming). Laura brought my beer over--I grumbled about how many steps there are to unloading and feeding and she pointed out that it is all in the name of the fitness program. So is walking back over to her house with beer in hand to get the 25 lb pail of Platinum Performance that is a staple of the boy's diets. And don't forget the weight training involved in carrying that pail back to my house, counterbalanced by the beer in the other hand. I tried talking Ken into releasing another 24 lbs of beer so I would be truly in balance but he seemed reluctant.

So the Year of Beauty and Health is off to a stumbling start, lacking organization and planning but still progressing after a fashion after 3 days. I'm trying to come up with some sort of tracking and inspiration system. And I'm hoping to get more sleep tonight.

New Year's Resolution: only watch TV when there is something on worth watching, and I haven't already seen it. Result: In spite of over 100 channels at my disposal, I'm not watching much TV.