This is an article about Smoke, the donkey from Iraq finally making the trip to the US. One of the big sponsors was Big Ass Fans which also is involved with Longhopes Donkey Shelter in Bennett, Colorado. I talked to Kathy the director, not too long ago & she had been contacted to see if she has someone that would be a friend for Smoke, which I'm sure she will do, no problem.
Yesterday was a fun day, although it got rather long before it was over.......!!! Got up early to feed, so we could go over to Willcox to an open house for Healing Hearts Animal Rescue & Refuge. WOW, do they have a lot of room. Their pens are huge, most looked like an acre or more. Wide open spaces, makes me envious, no mesquite limbs to run into. They've only been out here for a few years, moved down from the Phoenix area, for more room for their farm animals. The farm was a defunct ostrich farm, which I guess is why all the pens & shelters are so large. They have 41 horses, llamas, goats, even John's favorite..............hogs........!!! A couple of them were even larger than Nikki, the one that attacked John earlier this year.
We got to see Last Chance & Missy Moo also. About 4 years ago we were involved in their rescue, picking them up north of Tucson from a woman bringing them down from the Phoenix area. They were very sick little veal calves she had saved from becoming veal, but had no way to take care of them. I got in touch with Sybil that runs the Oasis Bird Sanctuary, who also was a nut for cows & she & the staff at the Oasis bottled raised them. Last year Healing Hearts agreed to take them, & have Chance castrated, which he was long overdue to have......!!! As the only cows, they have a big pen all to themselves.
We got to see Last Chance & Missy Moo also. About 4 years ago we were involved in their rescue, picking them up north of Tucson from a woman bringing them down from the Phoenix area. They were very sick little veal calves she had saved from becoming veal, but had no way to take care of them. I got in touch with Sybil that runs the Oasis Bird Sanctuary, who also was a nut for cows & she & the staff at the Oasis bottled raised them. Last year Healing Hearts agreed to take them, & have Chance castrated, which he was long overdue to have......!!! As the only cows, they have a big pen all to themselves.
One pen had a spotted large standard donkey, a little gray mini donkey & Britches the little mini mule.
What a little cutie, & from what the manager said, so traumatized from her past life, she will never trust people or as the manager said, "let people into her rather large bubble of safety". Her opinion of people is about the same as Tula's.
Met the livestock inspector for this area. We hadn't had any dealings with them since we took in Trudy a few years ago, & had to have her euthanized. He seemed real nice, I gave him a card in case he gets in some burros. He said a year or so ago, they had quite a few show up from the Mexicans using them to bring drugs across the border. They don't bother to take them back, they just turn them loose once the drugs are unloaded.
We had to rush home to feed early, so we could get the race car out to the track. This is military appreciation month & the track has a special race each year between some of the commanders at Davis Monothan Air Force Base in Tucson & some of the Chief Master Sargent's. They called last week & asked if we'd bring my little car in to be used. I think there were 7 cars total. What a goat rope that was.......!!!! They didn't even let the people hot lap or get use to the cars at all. Just dumped them in & turned them loose basically. When they came up to get in the cars we told them whoever drove my car couldn't be much bigger than me or he wouldn't be able to move. So they pointed to this little guy, a little taller than me & not very big around. John asked him what he did when we were strapping him in & he said he was an A-10 Warthog pilot. I tried to tell him everything he needed to know in about 3 minutes before they lined up to go out on the track. Just before they went out, since he was starting on the outside pole, I ran out to tell him to get out in front & just stay there. He told me he probably had a target on his back, because he was the wing commander........!!!! YIKES I swear he looked like he was about 25 years old, certainly not old enough to be a Colonel.
He managed to finish 3rd, probably would have done better, except he ran off the track where I always run off the track.......!!! LOL He got the full flavor of racing, besides running off the track, he hit a couple of cars, got hit a couple of times, got in the middle of traffic, which means everybody was banging on him at once. He really seemed to have fun, he was still excited when he got back to the pits, & thanked us over & over. I told him if he thought that was fun, he should come out sometime when our son Rod is racing the Super Stock, & we'd put him in that.
I had to apologize to one of the women I race with, for orange paint all over the back of her white & pink car..!!!!!!! She said that was OK, I guess her driver left her paint on someone else's car..........!!
Of course by the time we got home, our guys had been in their pens longer than they liked. When I got out to open the gate they were already yelling. John came in from letting them out to tell me Gus' pen was open, I guess I hadn't gotten the side gate latched & he figured it out. Either that or he's learned how to open it. We've had to start clipping Frijolita's gates, after finding her out or where she didn't belong 4 or 5 times we figured out it wasn't us.........!!! So maybe Gus has been watching her......!!!
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