The week was off to an early start this morning, when the promised concrete work crew arrived before 6 AM to get ahead of the heat. They were impressive, accomplishing two areas of concrete and spreading leftover rock on the driveway circle, making a big improvement here before midday. It was truly brutal heat, but the Karrenbrock guys never complained.
Early morning waning moon 
Equipment arrives 
Workers arrive 
Concrete arrives 
Wet concrete 
Hard work 
Harry approves of the new concrete pad
Susan and I rode Oisin and Stone as the chaos began. Added to the commotion were clouds of horse flies. It was not one of our most pleasant morning rides, but it is always a blessing to start the day on horseback, even when less than ideal. Also, I saw something today I have never seen happen with a horse before. We were riding on the perimeter trail, and Oisin was whipping his long, thick tail at horse flies, when he literally wrapped his tail around a small tree and almost pulled himself down! Susan was riding along ahead of me when they suddenly stopped as though they had hit a fence. Except the obstacle was a tail attached to a tree. Luckily, Oisin’s powerful swish reaction extricated him, and on we went. No picture, unfortunately.
Stone pauses in mid chew to listen to the racket before we tacked up
It was too hot for garden work, so I told Rebecca to stay home and stay cool. I went into St. Louis county with Harry on errands, including getting a new fly sheet for Oisin.
The fly sheets take a lot of abuse 
Oisin is stylin’ 
Safe from flies 
A well dressed horse
And that was our Monday. Bart rested and still no sign of the Pinto cat, unfortunately. The upheaval this morning was not cat friendly. I am holding out hope for quieter days soon, and maybe a return of the wandering cat.
Bart prefers days off to horse shows 
The Crouchers were disgusted with all the turmoil 
A quiet evening for the cats at last
Stay safe, stay well. Peace.
Wow! That’s quite a horse “tail!”
Amazing about the Oisin’s tail! My horse had a huge horse fly dead center on his back. I tried to remove it with a towel from across the fence. No luck, duh. Then, Jesse trotted, quite calmly, down to the far corner of the paddock, he turned, and as if out of the starting gate took off like a race horse, flat out run! When he reached the other far diagonal corner, the horse fly was gone! Pretty cool.
Stone has the right idea.
The fossies are great.