A Morning At The Farm, Beginning The Drive Home

I'd fallen asleep early and the dogs, who also enjoy their sleep, were quite happy to accommodate my strange schedule:

I slept for awhile and then got up and fixed myself some dinner (it wasn't even dark yet). The dogs got several more chances to get outdoors. Once dinner was over, the dogs had been outside and I'd listened for a while to NPR, we arrived at the "real" bedtime:

And having been to bed so early, I also was awake extra early the next morning. It was very cold and snowing lightly. I let the dogs out into their shoveled "yard" but stood at the door to keep an eye on them. I looked away for a moment and then noticed that Seamus was on his side in the snow with nothing moving but his head. He'd had a seizure once before so I assumed this was a recurrence. I tried to lift him but he's about 150 lbs now and I couldn't do it. So I called the other dogs in and waited it out. He recovered in 5 to 10 minutes and came back indoors. I've since Googled "Standard Poodles and Seizures" and learned that the breed can be prone to epileptic seizures. The online advice agreed with what my vet had said, that nothing needs to be done unless it becomes too frequent or too severe. It'd been perhaps 6 months since the first seizure and the vet suggested that I only worry if they happen more than once every 3 months. Once Seamus recovered, we all came indoors and began our morning:

Later in the morning, once I could tell that my across-the-street neighbors were up, I drove over there. Yes, I drove in spite of the short distance because by then a freezing rain was falling and it was extremely treacherous walking. They were eating breakfast with their two young boys and we had coffee and chatted. They charged me only $30 for two months of snow plowing! I snapped this photo of my farm as I got into my car to drive home:

And then I turned off the water supply, set down the heater, locked up the farm apartment and loaded the dogs back in the car. It was time to drive back to Albany. Happily, the freezing rain turned into a light snow. I'd have preferred it be warm and sunny, but that just wasn't going to happen in the Adirondacks in February:

Another long drive only 24 hours since the last one. Oh, how I am looking forward to spring and summer: