Watermelon... another letter finish

Getting OOTT (out of town trainer) to help me this weekend was probably the smartest decision I've made in a long while. One of the reasons I'd been hesitant is she can be extremely demanding and I just can't take that sometimes. Fortunately, turns out she is one of those people that can change her coaching technique depending on who she's coaching. So, for me it's a lot of, "take a breath, pat your horse, take a breath, slow down half a mile an hour, take a breath..." you get the picture. I was pleasantly surprised that she had me figured out and treated me just how I needed to be. As a result Naners and I were able to get straightened out before our stadium schooling round on Friday and it was an absolutely lovely round. We were slowish, I'd half halt ten strides out, again at fourish and then she was quiet enough I could let her do her job. OOTT has us figured out.

We had a nice dressage session Friday afternoon where we got us put back together and it translated into a lovely dressage test Sat afternoon. It was calm. No rockets. Not our best test at a 38.2, which put us in 2nd, but I was very pleased.

By the time stadium came around it was Hot out. 85. It snowed at our house just a week ago. Fortunately, jackets were waived. Not a ton of warming up, because we didn't need to. She jumped everything in warm-up like she had the day before. We get into the arena and she jumped big over fence #1, fence #2 went nice, fence #3... stop. It was a scary bumblebee lattice. Stop. Stop. We're out. They let us try it again, no go, so we trotted an x-rail on our way out. Then of course I cried a bit. OOTT asked me what I did wrong and I knew I was totally looking down. She reminded me it wasn't the end of the world and I went to ask about going out on XC and they said yes, though the TD was a bit concerned, but I'm not. Arenas aren't something we're in a lot. An XC course is just a fast trail ride and we've schooled most of the jumps, even if they have moved them around. If it does not go well OOTT is going to school us before we head back home.

Why yes, I would jump off a bridge if all my friends did

I should not be going to Watermelon. I should not have yielded to peer pressure. Based on today's ride I may just be doing the dressage and going home. If, indeed, this happens, I am not putting any more effort into turning Banana into an eventer for the time being. I'm tired of having horses that need training. I want something I can just ride, and Banana, I can just ride her down the road, so that's what we're going to do.

Edit: got an email back from OOT (out of town) trainer. She's going to be there this weekend so I'm actually going to pay for coaching. I feel better just getting an email back. I will not be in this alone.

First (and hopefully only) Companion of 2014

Tonight Willie (another of my farrier's horses) arrived to see if he'll be a suitable companion for Banana.

Instant love. Instant heat too on the part of Banana. It was so fast I think she had to have already been in heat.

And for the FoOls (Fans of Oliver)

no :(

The saddle fitter was in town this weekend. Alas, the sidesaddle is too narrow for Naners so now it's for sale :( I got the jumping saddle (which I use for everything) reflocked and I shouldn't be falling to the right anymore :D

On a more shocking note, Naners and I are now going to Watermelon. She was so good for CM, and trotted happily over x-rails and a small vertical on the buckle the other day, that I'm taking the chance. If it goes as badly as St johns did her career as an eventer is over. But, I really do think it was an aberration. We'll see.

Another day in Hunterland

This morning I trailered Naners over to CM, to figure out what the heck happened at St Johns. Result: Naners was her usual self and pulled all the stuff on CM that she pulls on me. Fortunately, now the problems are defined and we have a plan. Naners likes to be crooked, jump from her forehand and falls in on left handed circles while ignoring the leg. Okay, we can deal with these. She didn't do any flat out refusals with CM, but did do her lovely "I'm going to go in so crooked my butt is almost leading so I can't possibly go over the fence" thing. I felt a little relief that she doesn't just do these things to me, though of course I've totally trained her to do them. But, no real stopping, only pulled one rail. Consensus: something was up on Sunday at St Johns and it's looking like an aberration, not the start of a trend. I plan to trailer Naners over once a week until the end of May (and Flagstaff.) Next week CM will ride her for a bit, then I'll get on. I just wasn't feeling it today and my gut has been telling me Naners needed someone else to jump her.

*sob* My Streak of A's is over

My foray into grad school was going well. A's on both of my assignments for the first class, but in UK speak an A is anything over a 70%. With an over 70% average if I kept it up I'd be able to graduate with distinction, which all of a sudden became very important.

Onto the second class... 73% on the first grade. Excellent. But this course wasn't split 50/50, no it's 30/70 and that 73% was the 30% grade.

Then disaster struck, just on the end of that first assignment. Our home internet was down for more than two weeks and I had to drive 30 minutes into town to get work done. We got our new dish and faster internet and then I couldn't access the library. Hard to get a paper done when you can't research. Two weeks of no library access until we discovered a work around. At this point the paper was due in a matter of days... I got a two week extension, pushing my due date to when I was going to be in St Johns. Which really meant I had a week and a half to get research done, paper written and pack for St Johns and leave.

My paper was a piece of crap, I knew this, but I didn't have time to fix it.

40%. D.

Okay, the grade is fair, I can't argue, but oh how I wish it hadn't been as crappy as I was pretty sure it was. However, grades that low? They don't necessarily let you proceed on to the next stage. If you get below a 40 they don't let you go on to the next stage of the program. Fortunately, my average for that class is like 49.9. As far as I can read in the student handbook I'm definitely okay to continue on, but I need to have over a 50% in half the classes for them to allow me to do a thesis. The biggest unfortunate, is that our grades are provisional until the Exam Board reviews them in August. If they read that paper and decide it deserves an even lower grade I am screwed.

The only plus is that now there is no way I can graduate with distinction, so all that pressure has been taken off.

When I'm 64

A friend is turning 40 in a few weeks, something she's feeling anxious and sad about. Something my high school advisor said came to mind, as it often does. He said that we teenagers were so caught up in the fact that we thought life was awesome as teenagers, but it isn't. Life, as far as he was concerned, really got good at 40.

The closer I get to 40 the more I realize he was right. Being a teen sucked on so many levels. The 20s are better, but still not sure I would go back (though I would happily get my early 20s spine back, from before the first rearending and back injuring horse fall.)

Somewhere in my 30s I started to lose track of exactly how old I was, a number so closely monitored in your youth. I now have to do the math every time I'm asked, but maybe that's because my older brain can't remember if I'm turning 37 or if I'm already 37 (the answer is the former.) However, I think losing track is indicative of how not important that number has become, because you're no longer lamenting the loss of your youth or trying desperately to get older. It's a sign of contentment.

I recognize that there is some fear in getting older, and it's probable in a couple of decades I'll be having that stress. But I hope not. Sure, I may wish I'd done more riding and less playing of solitaire/bejeweled/mahjong. But, right now I think I'm doing a pretty decent job at this living life thing.

Sidesaddle!

I was waiting for all my spare saddles to sell until I seriously started sidesaddle shopping. Then I got an email from a friend of a friend that she was selling her sidesaddle: a saddle made in the 1890's for a school teacher in Raton, NM to ride her mule to school. She quite honestly had me at Raton, as hubby's dad grew up there and aunt and grandma still live there. When I saw the saddle I knew this story was entirely probable and bought it off her, no idea if it would fit Naners and I.

Upon posting it to the sidesaddle group on facebook the consensus was that it is indeed a 1890's Goodnight type saddle. There is no maker's mark so it was likely apprentice work. Raton is not terribly far from Pueblo, CO where they were making the actual Goodnights. There was some envy such a thing had fallen into my lap. I was warned to make sure the rigging is okay (had already thought of that) and our saddle fitter who does sidesaddles was already scheduled for a trip to our area (which has now been delayed, but oh well.)

Initial photographic saddle fitting is that it isn't too long for her. Tree size I'm going to wait till my fitter gets here and not get my hopes too far up, but I think it might be okay. I, quite obviously, need a longer cinch. The horse who wore this previously was an Icelandic. The iron on the saddle can't be original, as they were built with a standard western stirrup with a tapadero that was cut long on the inside to protect the ladies' shoe. If the saddle does fit us I will get a proper stirrup made as well as bridle to match the tooling on the seat. There's a breastplate around somewhere in the sellers garage that matches the saddle but wasn't made to go with it.

I really didn't imagine my foray into sidesaddle being from the western perspective, all my research has been on english. But, Naners does go western and this saddle is so cool I don't mind. So, if this works we will be rocking Western dressage sidesaddle at the local shows. I have the full intention of making a historically accurate outfit, to the point that Raton aunt will be going to the historical society to see if there might actually be some pictures of said school teacher. I figure crazier things have happened.

We got to St Johns!

With the vet coming up twice a day to sedate Naners to get the medication in her eye it improved by leaps and bounds very quickly and I was able to take her to St Johns!

I was freaking out on Thursday, wondering what the heck I was doing there, holy crap we weren't going to get over any jumps, why was I doing this, etc, etc. Friday morning we did our stadium schooling round and we had maybe our nicest course to date. Fast, but nice. After that round all my anxiety just melted away and I was okay.

I'm pretty sure I got my best at an event WTC dressage test score: 37. Almost my best event dressage score. Judges comments were "hurried." Seriously. Almost every movement had that comment. I laughed because Banana was, indeed, hurried. She had her fire powered rockets on. When we were trotting in warmup all she wanted to do was canter. So, afterwards we went out to the track and trotted half of it, then walked around it another 1.5 times. She just needed the exercise. I've made a mental note that from now on I'm going on a hack before my dressage test, not after :D

Sunday did not go as well. We went into stadium warmup and her rockets were back on and I had a handful. We did a couple of warmup jumps and they weren't pretty. We went into the arena and went to the first jump... and she stopped. We jumped that one from a standstill. Onwards to #2... she stopped. Circle, went over it the second time. I rode her hard to #3 and she got over it. #4 she stopped dead about 15 feet out, staring at the pile of poles and jump standards on the side of the arena. At that point we retired. I cried as we left the arena of course. There's no way to not be disappointed when she was so good on Friday.

I can't help but wonder if I'm trying to put a square peg in a round hole. My plan is to get her some jumping training rides with a pro and go from there.

Damn you dust

Shockingly, dust storms and an uncooperative horse do not help eye injuries heal. Banana would not let me get the medicine in her eye. I tried my best, but it was just not happening. The vet came on Monday and Banana's eye was worse. The cloudiness had decreased but the actual hole in her eye was bigger. There was talk of sewing the lids shut to keep crap out of it, a lavage, etc. We've had so many dust storms lately.

There should be mountains in that view.

First step was trying to keep the crap out of her eye. Duct tape does not stick to fly mask mesh very well.

 Fortunately, a friend had a horrible eye issue with her horse so had some masks we could borrow. I can now add "horsie eye patch construction" to my skills list.

Do I look like my racehorse ancestors?

I was going to buy her a Guardian Mask but her head is oddly proportioned: the 11 inches I measured between her pupils is bigger than any size they have so I'd have to get a custom made one or something. Haven't decided if I really need to go that route yet. I'll probably go measure again to double check first.




My vet, who I already loved, I now owe my first born child to or something. Since she lives next door she's been coming up twice a day to sedate the beast and get the medicine in her eye. With that, and my awesome horsie eye patch construction skills, Banana's eye is now healing. She's not out of the woods yet, but things aren't looking so bad.

Of course, St Johns is no longer a go for us. I emailed to scratch but then yesterday was reminded there is a horse I can borrow. Now it's dependent upon whether I need to be around to medicate the eye that weekend or not. And, if I have time to go ride this horse in the next week and get my paper done.

Oh yeah, the paper. The damn paper. My library access didn't work for two weeks, so I couldn't get any research done. I was able to get an extension, so now I'm sitting here working on something I should already have turned in. Very annoying. Like dust storms.