Fraudulent E-mails

Good Morning! I had a pretty good scare yesterday. I got an e-mail from the IRS that said I had under reported sales tax income and needed to go to a link to check on my status. As you know, the IRS scares any and all American businesses. My first instinct was to click on the link, just to make sure, and then get out if it was fishy. They had a sales tax number and everything. Luckily our accountant had told us last year that the IRS will never contact us through e-mail.

I did some quick checking by going to the IRS' website, and my accountant was right. IRS never uses e-mail. The scariest thing is that if I had clicked on the link, "they" would have been able to infect my computer, it is not always fishing for more personal information. Now, I am a pretty savvy Internet user and know a lot of the warning signs for fraudulent e-mails, but this one was very tempting to check out since it was from such a scary source, and they had so much info on me. It took me maybe two minutes to research this a little, so take the extra two minutes if your gut is telling you something isn't right.

There have been many times that we sell things on Craigslist, ultimate recycling, right? But, I don't think that there has been one time that we don't get an interested, and fraudulent, response within a day or so of posting the ad. With these responses it has usually been pretty easy to tell that it wasn't a person really interested in my sale item. The language in the response just doesn't have very good English, or not enough interest in the actual item. We had a horse on there once, and a guy responded that the condition of my item was acceptable and he would have his people handle all of the packaging and shipping. I don't know about you, but I don't like to package animals!!!

The following are some real danger signs:

• anyone asking for money up front


• unusual or not good use of the English language


• any file with .exe needs to be checked out, not saying they're all bad, but...


• any e-mail asking for personal information


• e-mails that come from a source "threatening action" (ie: closure, disruption of service or need of verification), related to one of your accounts

The problem with links is that they can be masked, and what looks like the link to a real website, as mine did, can easily be re-routed. In my research for this post I found and interesting piece of information on Microsoft's scam information page. The following is an excerpt from that page:

Phishing links that you are urged to click in e-mail messages, on Web sites, or even in instant messages may contain all or part of a real company’s name and are usually masked, meaning that the link you see does not take you to that address but somewhere different, usually an illegitimate Web site.
Notice in the following example that resting (but not clicking) the mouse pointer on the link reveals the real Web address, as shown in the box with the yellow background. The string of cryptic numbers looks nothing like the company's Web address, which is a suspicious sign.

I wasn't able to "copy" the example, but I didn't know that resting over the link was a good idea, you learn something new everyday! Like I said, I really did not think I would ever fall prey to such scams, but I was within one click with this one!

Royal Llama Adventures, LLC

Tom and Judy

Hunter

Snickers

Jasper

Thunderboy and Judy

Jasper, Snickers, Judy, Pepper & Thunderboy

Well, we made it!!! Yesterday was our first drop camp of the season. On a scale of 1-10 I would put this one at a 7. We did have a few issues, but we did our job and that is always a great feeling.

You see, when we started our llama business we had planned on mostly doing day trips with the city folks and other visitors, but the hunting aspect has really taken off. Llamas are very calm pack animals so they can carry many sensitive things that other pack animals can't be trusted with, like cameras, rifles and scopes. Unlike most pack animals llamas are very calm, even when it comes to sticky situations like fitting themselves and their very full packs into small, tight spaces. They are not easily startled and are not usually afraid of too many things, like the unexpected deer running across our path; that would send a horse into a full gallop, with or without his rider.

We were to meet our hunter at 8 am, so it was a little later than we normally like, as the mountain is a very dangerous place to be once the storms roll in. There have been a few pack trips that I have literally run to get back to the cover of the forest. Now, I know that doesn't sound right, trees being a big target for lightning, but anything is safer than being out in the open above timberline. Up there, rocks are the attractant, leaving a human as the tallest thing for miles around, and being a wonderful "ground" for the lightening to spread it's dangerous tentacles. Thankfully yesterday's hunter listened to us and camped at timberline.

In general, when we work with hunters, we will take them to their camp, and then I will go and get their animal (if they are lucky and skilled enough to fill their tag) during the week. This means that quite a few of our pack trips I do on my own (as Tom will be at work), with llama cohorts of course. To pick them up out of the woods, we can usually wait until it is convenient for us to pull their camps. If it is a busy season, this works out wonderfully because I try not to make my boys work two days in a row. Needless to say I need a break in between as well!

This specific hunter is going for Rocky Mtn. Big Horn Sheep. To get this tag is a once in a lifetime chance, it took our hunter 13 years to draw. One of our sheep hunters last year had waited 17 years! So these guys are very excited and really enjoy the fact that their camp was delivered by llamas, and that they were able to bring things that they would have to leave behind if they carried it themselves.

Like I said, this wasn't one of our longest hikes as we talked them into staying in the trees, just below timberline. They will have much more shelter and are not far at all from a water source. The round trip was about 9 miles, you have to remember that timberline, in general, is at about 11,500 to 11,700 feet of elevation. It might not seem all that far when you consider we start at 9,000 feet, but a pack string can not "bush whack", so we stick to the winding trails. This is the first year in a long time that we didn't open with snow on the ground at the top of the mountain, that in itself was a prayer answered! We are usually trudging through 4-6 inches of snow for the last few miles if our hikes, so this was a real treat. We even made it home before the t-storms hit.

Our troubles began when Hunter (the llama), just stopped, no going forward, no going back. I could not get him to move for the life of me. I tell the kids all the time "use your brain not your brawn", but failed to take my own advice. I just drug that llama for as long as I possibly could, and then I'm embarrassed to say, I threw a baby fit! By the time Tom had come back to check on me, I threw my arms up in the air and gave a primal scream! Obviously Tom took those llamas and I just walked away, to get the llamas further up the trail. It wasn't long before he caught up with us and I had cooled down enough to ask how he had solved Hunter's problem. Hunter hadn't wanted to be in the middle, once Tom put him at the end of the pack string he was fine! I wish I could say the same, my baby fit really took a lot out of me-ha! Why hadn't I used my brain like that!?!

Now Hunter is happily moving along at the end of his string, and Snickers decides to lay down, he was "awful tired". So, we gave him as many breaks as he demanded and slowly made our way up the mountain. This is a somewhat new pack team to us, so there was definitely some training involved. Llamas are also pretty trusting animals, and since they are comfortable with us, they did not resist this new experience too much. We took Hunter and Jasper, our experienced packers, Snickers, Pepper and Thunderboy are the newer ones to the team. All three of them have packed before, but not too much with us. It was a little bit of a sad day, because I had retired my lead llama Marcel. He is getting too old to pack, but doesn't realize his age (like many of us). He was pacing the fence as we pulled out, like "Hey, you forgot me!"

The trail that we were on is a very rocky one, it heads up Mt. Rosalie, directly behind the ranch. It is one that we have hiked quite a bit, but never tire of its beauty. The pine forests tower above and the bristle cone pines are twisted from the strong winds. The bark is blown off of the dead trees, so they are buffed to a spectacular shine. Every now and then we got a peak of the top of the mountain that we were climbing, very majestic.

It's the trip down the mountain that we really enjoy. The llamas are unloaded, we have done our job well, and we can finally relax a little. It is also when we have a chance to take pictures. As you can see, the llamas packs re much lighter and smaller than you might think, but they still look a little cranky! I had to giggle when Tom was taking that first picture of us, he says "Damn, I'm photogenic!"

Royal Ranch Royalty

Well, it is Sunday and I promised you an introduction to one of The Royal Ranch's crazy critters every Sunday until we run out, which is going to take a LONG time. I will normally switch it up a bit, last week I introduced you to Shade, my loving nurse cat. So I was going to start today off with a different type of animal, llama, dog, rabbit, turtle, whatever. But, I made a promise to my daughter that her cat Scratch would be the next Royalty. Promises are what got me into this kitty in the first place, to me a promise is to be kept and the kids know it!!!

Last summer, a friend/neighbor broke her foot and we took over her chores. I've got to tell you it was one of the hardest set of "chores" I have ever done. Our friend had only been to our place, to buy hay and what not, so upon arrival at her place I have never been so shocked. There were a minimum of 30 cats, a horse, two ducks and at least six dogs. It goes without saying what the grounds were like,so one of our first tasks was to clean out the shed that is attached to her house that the cats had taken over. We donned our masks, and thank goodness for Park County clean-up days, because we took three truckloads in and didn't spend a penny! But, I digress....

Isabella is my mini-me, we have called her that since she was born, she looks like me, but even worse, she acts like me-Ha! My little partner does everything with me and our friends chores were no different. As you can imagine, the two or three litters of kittens was absolutely enthralling to a nine year old animal lover. I think it was our second morning there, that Bella said she really wanted one of those kittens. Knowing that these kittens and generations above them were WILD barn cats and she could not catch them, I jokingly told her that if she caught one she could keep it. Of course, she made sure to get the promise out of me! I also hadn't figured on how hard the girl would work in the next few weeks, patiently sitting at the food bowl, letting the cats know they could trust her.

One day as I was feeding the horse I hear "Mommy, Mommy I caught one!" I turned around and here is my beautiful little girl with this screaming, hissing and spitting kitten in her hands. As all good parents do I broke her heart and started saying "No Way" over and over again, partially because I was in shock that the little duffer had caught one. She knows my weak spot, and through her tears, she says "but Mommy, you promised!?!" and I had, so off we head to The Royal Ranch with one really mad kitten.

Needless to say, I was not prepared for a new animal, let alone a wild one, to come into the house. You know, figuring out where to keep it until the other pets mellowed out after the initial invasion, kitten food, those sorts of minor necessities. Bella is of course declaring that he (luckily I am good at sexing young kittens) was going to live in her room, and she would do all of the care taking. His name was very obviously, said my little cat whisperer, Scratch.

So, I get Bell and her new po'd kitten safely tucked away in her room, while I madly dash around the house looking for a spare litter box and something to feed the little guy. The other animals in the house had seen us come in and needed quite a bit of "attention" at the time, so it was not quite an hour when I checked back in with Isabella and Scratch. I could not believe my eyes, they were quietly loving on one another in her bed!!! The smile on that girls face brought the tears, it was my turn to cry this time! By the way, this picture was taken the night of his arrival!

Although Tom is a big cat fan, we were both a little concerned about his reaction. I don't think I had ever mentioned the "deal" I had made with his little girl, because I didn't think it would happen. Tom arrived home after a long day at his shop, and calmly said "that's the one I was thinking about trying to catch"! Well, I guess I was outvoted, Scratch was now a permanent fixture here at The Royal Ranch.

Now, since I have given you such a wonderful story, I will jump on my bandwagon for just a moment. Spaying and neutering animals is extraordinarily important. Although the den of cats at our friends house was healthy, that is not typically the case when breeding is left to nature with domesticated animals. I found a group that would come to the farm and fix all of the cats. In one day, we trapped, operated on and gave shots to 22 cats! This was done by donation only (poor people only got $50 from me for Scratch after all of that hard work!) and it is what the group does on a daily basis. I've got to tell you, the people were very extreme when it came to cats, but to help all of those cats was really worth it. Once they realized that I knew each cat, and who's kitten was whose (I had even been able to tell them which were boys or girls by the look of them), they took my bossiness a little more seriously. The point is, is that there are all sorts of resources to get your animals spayed or neutered, no matter what your income is or is not. (If you have a hard time with this, let me know, I have contacts nationwide.)

Back to an absolutely adorable Scratch; he is the smallest cat we've ever had, people keep asking us if we have a new kitten. We can still tell he is a barn cat though, because he is much more leery of any imagined (and sometimes real) danger than some of our other cats, but he has settled in quite nicely. He learned how to take baths by watching the other cats and is now a neat freak; we have to let him smell our hands before we are allowed to touch him! The bond between my daughter and her angel is so adorable that it tugs at my heart strings.

PS I will not be posting tomorrow, so don't miss me too much, we have our first drop camp of the hunting season.

Credit Card Companies- What's Up With That?

I must be a little goofy this morning, because I gave myself the biggest chuckle. As my business grows, my business needs are changing drastically. One of those needs is a credit card machine. Now-a-days, a company like myself, that does most of its business online, may not need an actual machine to process credit cards. There are all sorts of accounts to wade through, internet merchant, retail merchant and even just a phone merchant. The following is on a statement attached to every single one of these accounts:

Rates and fees may change without notice.

I think I'm going to start writing that on all of my bills; Payments and due dates may change without notice. I mean I just busted out laughing (yes, in my office all by myself!) when I pictured doing this. Really, can you imagine if we did this, treated them the way they legally have a right to treat us as consumers? It is a shame that it takes a person hours to dig through a bunch of mumbo jumbo to figure out how, not if, they are going to get ripped off!

Just an FYI, Costco seems to have the best prices for business services that I have come across. But, be careful of the different types of accounts, the advertised price is only for people who have a retail location and will be manually running the cards through. The prices get higher with online and phone services. Also, rewards credit cards are processed at a higher rate. You know, Rates and fees may change without notice LOL!!!

As I said, picturing this rebellious act was hysterical to me, so the next time you run along a statement that is this ridiculous, just turn it around-you'll feel much better after a good giggle!

Have a Miracle of a day!

Did You Miss Me?

Good Morning! So sorry about yesterday, I know my regular readers notice when I don't post for a day. The reason I was unable to do so was because we finally got our new barn delivered!!! You see, it has been a long time coming. We ordered this building about six weeks ago and really got the run around for quite some time, lost purchase order, cancelled delivery dates, you know, all the fun stuff.

We finally demanded $ off, that seemed to get them moving (we did save $100, though), they were scheduled for 7 yesterday morning. As you can imagine early morning is a little crazy around The Royal Ranch as I am getting kids off to school at two different times, and of course the plethora of animals are all demanding their breakfasts.

I've got to tell you, as exited as I was to finally get it here, I was disappointed that the installers could not speak any English (they must not have been able to tell time either, they got here at 10). That's not entirely true, because they got the point across that if I paid them cash, they'd be able to do a few upgrades that would have cost me a fortune to go through the company. You know me, I love to save a buck, so this was all fine and dandy. But, the more I got to thinking about how so many people are suffering from lack of work, that these guys should at least know how to communicate in a business fashion. I have a real problem with "Americans" refusing to learn, and use our language. Especially if they are taking jobs from other well spoken Americans.

So, sad to say, I would definitely not recommend Coast to Coast Carports, but I got a great deal on a beautiful new hay barn, even if it was a rather large pain in the butt!!! Now all I need is the hay to fill it. For now, Tom is enjoying it, we've got our old beater plow truck and my trailer parked in it.

Have a miracle of a day!

Cat Free Zone

The other day I went to make my bed and found this! Yes, that's right, 4 cats sleeping in my Cat Free Zone!

I am a very firm believer in trying to set limits; I limit my caffeine, I limit my sugar, I even place all sorts of limits on my kids. So, the cats should be no different. Many years ago, when the cats started outnumbering the humans, I declared my bedroom a cat free zone. I think this makes the cats want in even more, because if the door is left open for a millisecond, this is what happens.

I am not exactly allergic to cats, but them sleeping on my pillows bothers me. I deal with animals all day long, I don't necessarily have to sleep with them and their dander (Gigi, a dog I inherited from my grandma, GG, is excused from this rule of course)! It seems perfectly acceptable to me, but Tom loves having a kitty to sleep with and the kitties love it right back!

No, we don't purposely try and get matching cats, they tend to find us!

Have a miracle of a day, and don't forget to stick to the limits you impose upon yourself and others-Ha!

Practicing Yoga

Good Morning! I just finished my Yoga workout and decided that it is the subject I want to cover today. I can hear those groans, "not another hippie idea from Judy"!!! But, really, Yoga is a very important part of my life. It relieves stress, helps on my bad brain days and keeps me very toned in the process.

There is a program, called Namaste Yoga on Fit TV that I do. It is great because it is only one half hour long (22 minutes if you FF through the commercials!) and it has been very beneficial to me. My family teases me that I have the "big guns". Yoga has helped me get the cut in my upper arm to show my bicep, and my legs are also toned enormously through this program. I am also very flexible for an old gal!

I think there is a stigma attached to Yoga, that it is not a very hard workout or that practicing yoga is an "oddball practice". To be honest, I thought so too. In a past lifetime (you know BC, before children) I was an ACE certified personal trainer, too bad I found out after I went to all of that trouble that I didn't like working out in front of people-Ha! Anyway, it was a very strict certification process, so I did learn a lot. It wasn't until recently that I had to give Yoga a try because traditional workouts were just too hard on my joints. I can't tell you how much I instantly enjoyed this very challenging workout.

Another great aspect is that anyone (over weight, over bored or over aged-ha!) can do Yoga. Until one builds their strength, all postures can be modified to the level which the Yogi is at, the stretches just aren't quite as deep and the strengthening is done for a shorter time. I also believe that it has strengthened my immunity system-a big plus in today's world!!

The following is from the Namaste Yoga website at Fit TV:

The word "yoga," from the Sanskrit word yuj, means "to yoke or bind," and is often interpreted as "union" or a method of discipline. A male who practices yoga is called a "yogi," a female practitioner, a "yogini." Today, most people practicing yoga are engaged in the third limb, asana, which is a program of physical postures designed to purify the body and provide the physical strength and stamina required for long periods of meditation.

I do it in the morning, since I have them recorded I can do it early, before the kids get up. It is a great way to get you moving and then you have the rest of the day to enjoy without feeling guilty!

Have a miracle of a day!