Roaches and Half Pass

A few weeks ago, the mares moved to a bigger, grassier, woodsier pasture.  After the first week, I found an enormous tick in Dee's forelock, which made a weepy gross mess in her forelock.  No biggie, I picked it out.  By my next visit, those crusty, weepy spots were ALL up in the rest of her mane.  I spent awhile trying to pick the crust out, but eventually just gave up, grabbed a pair of clippers, and roached her mane.  It will grow back, and she really enjoyed the currying I gave her mane afterwards.  I then applied equip-spot and we haven't had issues since.  I actually think she looks cute with it short.

In other, much more exciting news, Dee did her first few steps of half-pass today!  Very proud of my girl, mostly because she's become so rideable in the last year.

What difference a year makes

I can't believe it's been over a year since I touched this last, but I guess it makes sense, it has been a crazy time in my life.  Between finishing (and graduating) law school and then studying for and taking the bar exam, I didn't see much of Dee from March-July.  At the beginning of August, we moved from Knoxville to Greeneville, TN (well, Dee is in Bulls Gap) so that I could start a new job.  The rest of 2014 was a blur of adjusting to my new job and trying to bring Dee back into work.  The amazing part?  She became a totally different creature at the new place.  Just completely relaxed and happy to work. 
Now, I am gearing up for another move, which will have me in Nashville and Dee in Franklin.  I am incredibly excited for this new adventure, and I think I have managed to find a great trainer to ride with so that Dee and I might FINALLY get our act together and make it to some dressage shows! 

Such a good girl

And domesticated enough to let a 7 year old who has no horse experience lead her!

Here be Dragons

A few days ago, the elastic stirrup fell off of my left half chap.  No big deal, I thought.  Today, the shoelace of my left paddock boot broke in half as I tried to tighten it.  Ok, I'll just wear my field boots today, then, I thought.  The zipper of my right boot is broken, apparently.  Well, at least they are field boots.  Ten minutes later, I had the lace removed from the offending field boot and set about putting it into the paddock boot.  Oh yeah, and my favorite breaches are starting to get worn through.  Needless to say, after all the things that went wrong, I didn't have high hopes for my lesson today. 

When we started, it felt more like I was riding an untamed, vengeful dragon than a mare who is, despite what she would have people believe, actually broke.  

I think this is what she imagines herself as, sometimes.

When, approximately 10 minutes into the lesson, she responded to my "go forward now" demand by belligerently launching herself into the air like the ground was suddenly made of lava, J suggested that the lunge line might be a good idea.  I agreed.  On went the side reins, and Dee proceeded to be a complete turd for the next 15 minutes or so.  Finally, she started to listen and behave, and after probably a half hour (maybe more) on the lunge doing transitions and being reminded that she was not a dragon, I got back on.  Lo and behold, I had a real live horse under me again, and after a few minutes J even commented that she was quite lovely.  So, success! (?)  

On Tension

Dee and I moved to a new barn last week.  It's a great little place with only a few horses and a low-key atmosphere.  The horses basically live outside, only coming in for terrible weather and meals, and get 24/7 access to hay, inside and outside.  It also has a dressage arena to die for, with beautiful footing.  It's also about 20 minutes closer to me, so now I only have to drive 20 minutes each way instead of 40.  I'm thrilled, and I used our move as an excuse to get my butt in gear and start riding again.
Dee has not been ridden in about 3 months.  She has been working pretty consistently on the lunge, but for her that doesn't really count towards good behavior under saddle.  Our first couple of rides, I just walked around, thinking I should give her a chance to get used to having a rider again.

 On Friday, we trotted for the first time.  She was pretty good for the first few minutes, but definitely tense and on the verge of exploding the whole time.  So I gave her a break, then picked up the trot again, which went terribly.  She was 100% distracted, even more tense, and acting like a total jerk, taking every opportunity to spook and balk.  I got a few circles of halfway decent work and quit, because I was frustrated and figured it would keep getting worse.  I told myself that I should have just quit after the first few minutes of trot because she couldn't handle more of a workload yet.

Yesterday she was equally atrocious... wound tighter than a drum, taking every opportunity to spook her way out of working and just generally having no brain between her ears.  I was discouraged.  I felt like I couldn't ride and she was some sort of lost cause for me.  I was feeling pretty sorry for myself.  Why was I suddenly unable to ride her through the naughties?  Have I completely lost my nerve?

The answer to those questions, I think, is that I was being a wuss.  I think part of me is worried about another freak accident, and it was translating into me anticipating the spook, which in turn created more tension and more spooking.  I could feel myself riding backwards and being stupid, but I wasn't stopping the behavior, I was just quitting.  "Ok, you are being bad, I'll just stop asking."

Then I read this great blog post on tension and it was the wake-up call/pep talk that I think I needed.  Dee doesn't need to be coddled, she needs to be worked.  I knew this deep down, but it was helpful to read it, so that I couldn't talk myself out of it.  Do I think it's fair to ask her to canter around forever until she relaxes?  No.  I don't want her to go lame, and she is not fit enough/strong enough for that, I don't think, and canter seems to be harder for her in general.  Do I think it's fair to make her work her butt off at the trot until she releases some of that tension?  You bet.  So that's what we did today.

We did not achieve total relaxation, but we did achieve some relaxation, and maintained that relaxation continuously for about ten minutes.  Of course at that point she had been trotting for almost a half an hour, and given that neither of us has been riding for awhile, I thought it best to quit.  We actually went for longer than I wanted to, but she took almost 20 minutes to wind down to where she ended up, and I didn't want to quit until she started loosening up and getting down to business.  By 30 minutes, however, my lower back muscles were throwing in the towel and telling me that they were sore and not willing to keep working.  I figured better to quit while she was working pretty well and I was still able to ride really positively.  When we went back to walk, she actually went around on the buckle and gave me a few sighs, then stood with a droopy lip in the cross-ties back at the barn.  Did I finally tire miss thang out?  Maybe a little!  The conclusion I ultimately drew, though, was that I was expecting way too much of her yesterday.  She has no reason to be calm and collected unless I give her a reason to be by riding well and making her work.  She has been out of work for 3 months!  I'd be a little bonkers, too, if I was her!  I think we will get back to where we were i the fall as long as I stop being stupid.

She says "Why you gotta make me do things?"

My Fuzzy Valentine

Happy Valentine's Day, From Dee

My four-legged valentine got half of an organic apple, and she was thrilled.  I wish all gift-giving was that easy!

She looks like she's cuddling, but she's really trying to eat my jacket.

Losing the next few days...

Dee's thoughts on the upcoming stow storm:

She says that now, but when she [hopefully] gets chucked outside in it, I imagine she will dramatically be like:

and then..

How the B/O and other owners react:

Why I won't be driving anywhere for the next few days... It would go something like this:

So, stay warm, Dee!

Southern Snow!

Found on Facebook... This is roughly one block from my apartment.  Total driving fail.  This seems to happen a lot when it snows in Knoxville, which is why I stay off the roads.

Needless to say, I did not make it out to the barn today.  Luckily, the lovely E, who is a fellow law-student and boarder, was up at the barn with her truck at 9AM to meet the vet, who was going to give Dee and her boy Patrone their spring shots.  I was going to have to go up this afternoon, and after looking at the weather, I texted and asked her if she would be kind enough to check Dee's rugs and give her some lovin' from me.

I did get to go up yesterday, though.  It was pretty cold, so Dee just toodled around on the lunge a little bit, trotting poles and stretching her legs.  All in all a good day for her.  Love my girl.

"OMNOMNOMNOM These leaves are delicious!"

Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Poor Dee.  I don't have body clippers, but she is such a fuzz-monster that she sweats like a pig every time I work her and I couldn't stand it anymore... So, I gave her a little haircut.  With regular handheld clippers.  And it looks... ehm... not great.  First of all, I can't do lines to save my life.  That said, I saw this picture on Tamarack's Facebook page and thought "Hey, I can maybe do that!":

I liked it because it wouldn't involve TOO much in the way of making straight lines, and heck, if I messed up the lines on her withers, they would be covered with the saddle pad or her blanket.  Unfortunately even with good body clippers my skills are only so-so.  I did a nice job on Sitka when we went to Florida, but it's been years, and that was with heavy-duty high-end clippers.  The ones I used on Dee are meant for dogs.

I figure the lines will be less noticeable in a week or so:

"What have you done?  I hate you."

Serrrrrious hack job.

But it was a success in terms of her not being a sweat-monster!

On the bright side, she was a VERY good girl for her hack job clip.

To The Fruit Wizards Of Donnington

Dee got a massage today.  She spent most of the hour making faces, trying to put anything within reach in her mouth, and just generally being a busy-body.  When I threw her on the lunge after, though, she seemed much more relaxed throughout her body than she has been.  

Reunited and it feels so good.

I'm finally back in Knoxville after a [way too long] visit to CT for the holidays.  So of course, I rushed up to the barn to see Dee.  I waited until about 10:30 to leave, figuring that would give her a few hours with her friends before I disturbed her.  Unfortunately, when I got to the barn at 11, the horses were JUST being turned out.  Luckily (or, from Dee's perspective, unluckily), she was not out yet, so I didn't have to deal with the fact that she would be incredibly angry at me for grabbing her right after she got turned out (and let's be real, she probably wouldn't have let me catch her).
Since she's been on vacation for awhile thanks to me school schedule, the plan is to get her legged back up for a week or two before I really start riding again.  That means lots of in-hand walk work and trotting on the lunge.  She was... marginally well-behaved yesterday.  It took awhile to get her listening and settled in the trot work, because what she wanted to do was fall into the circle, get on two wheels, and bolt in a fit of bucks and leaps.  I was able to keep that to a minimum though, and by the time we changed directions she was mostly listening to me--with some eye-rolling and giraffe-impersonating thrown in for good measure.

Looking very proud of herself.

Back in the barn, she promptly started throwing a pawing tantrum whenever I walked away from her (she knows better when I'm working on her), because she wanted to go out.  If she could talk, I'm pretty sure the dialogue would have been something like "You are the worst mother ever and I hate you and I want to see my friends."  I imagine there would have been some expletives thrown in, too.

Notice the wide-open mouth... Very classy.

On the way out to the pasture we had to have a bit of discussion about not being a disrespectful cow, since she suddenly decided that she didn't need manners and could just barge ahead to the gate.  False.  Once she was back to acting like a lady, I released her back into the "wild" and she never looked back. I could really feel the love.

To the New Year

I found this post by Neil Gaiman, and it is absolutely perfect in every way to reflect my wishes for everyone in the new year:

"A decade ago, I wrote:

May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you're wonderful, and don't forget to make some art -- write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself.

And almost half a decade ago I said,

...I hope you will have a wonderful year, that you'll dream dangerously and outrageously, that you'll make something that didn't exist before you made it, that you will be loved and that you will be liked, and that you will have people to love and to like in return. And, most importantly (because I think there should be more kindness and more wisdom in the world right now), that you will, when you need to be, be wise, and that you will always be kind.

And for this year, my wish for each of us is small and very simple.

And it's this.

I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes.

Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You're doing things you've never done before, and more importantly, you're Doing Something.

So that's my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make New Mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody's ever made before. Don't freeze, don't stop, don't worry that it isn't good enough, or it isn't perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life.

Whatever it is you're scared of doing, Do it.

Make your mistakes, next year and forever."

Happy 4 year Mare-iversary!

I'm a bad mother.  This is almost 2 weeks late.  BUT, happy 4 year mare-iversary, Deedles!  It's hard to believe that I've owned the little hellion for 4 years now, but it's true!  We've definitely had our ups and downs along the way, but I wouldn't trade her for the world.

This year in review:

Apparently, according to the picture, this year, Dee ate a lot, got a message, put me in the hospital, posed for lots of pictures on the lunge, moved, and made amends with me.  Love ya, pony!  Here's to many many many more years!

Hermit the Frog

"Ah, finals period, that wonderful time when all law students are crushed under pressure, and some of them turn into diamonds. Others just crumble."

Others, apparently, come up with genius poems about how horrible exams are:

Twas the night before exams, and all through the library;
not a person was happy, no one was merry.
The outlines were written and printed with care;
In hopes that the answers would be in there.
It had been more than a week since the 1Ls had seen their beds;
While visions of Starbucks danced through their heads;
The 3Ls were drunk, the 2Ls, taking a nap,
I was wondering how I was going to learn all this crap.

When from down the hall, I heard such a clatter,
I sprang from my seat to see what was the matter.
Away to the group study rooms I sprang with a flash,
Tore open the door, and threw up the sash.
The florescent light on the practice exam hypo,
Gave the lustre of mid-day to the questions below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
but strange fact pattern involving issues unclear,
With an extra large staple, it must be 20 pages thick,
I knew in a moment, their professor was sick.

More rapid than eagles, the cases they came,
And I whistled and shouted, and called them by name.
"Now Palsgraff! now Pennoyer! now Dredd Scott and Ashwander!
On Marbury! on Miranda! on, Youngstown and Lochner!
I've read all these cases, back in the fall!
Now write away! Write away! Write away all!"
As children at bed time, they began to cry,
and they begged and they pleaded and wished to die.
So back to their laptops, the students they flew,
to update their outlines and their class notes, too.
And then, in a twinkling, I heard such a sigh,
the sound of exhaustion from a gunner 1L guy.

As I drew in my breath, and was turning around,
I knew his sprit had been chrushed without even a sound.
Though he'd dress all in suits, from his head to his toes,
he'd not have a chance at good grades to show.
The bundle of books he had carried on his back
had not translated to learning, understanding he lacked.
His eyes- how they had twinkled, his face had been merry!
His cheeks had been like roses, his nose like a cherry! 
Now his drawl little mouth was drawn down like a bow,
His unshaven beard was just starting to show.
The stump of a pencil he held tight in his teeth,
And the gloom, it encircled his face like a wreath.

He had a broad face and a little round belly
that shook when he cried, like a bowl full of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a sorry shell of his old self,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself.
A blink of my eyes and a turn of his head,
Soon gave me to know, he had plenty to dread.
He spoke not a word, but went back to work,
and rewrote his outline, then turned with a jerk,

And laying a finger aside of his nose,
Slowly out of his chair, slowly he rose.
He sprang to his book bag, and let out a whistle,
he still had time to get a Venti Chia Soy Double.
But I heard him exclaim, as he walked out of sight,
"I'm goind to go read Gilbert's for the rest of the night."

Yeah, that's basically been my life since Thanksgiving.  It's over on Monday, thank goodness.  Finally got out to the barn today, though, and gave Dee's mane a much-needed pulling:

I'm stealing the towels.

Today was generally a gross day... raining, temperature hovering just below 60.  Naturally, I thought that by the time I went to the barn at 3:15 this afternoon, the horses would have been inside.  I mean, while it wasn't raining too badly earlier in the day, the weather had gone downhill since noon.  Imagine my surprise when I showed up to find this:

All of the ponies outside, soaked.  Now, I will admit, I generally don't mind throwing my horse out in the rain, but when the temperature is hovering just above blanketing temperatures, and will probably fall to blanketing temperatures once the sun goes down, forgive me for thinking that the horses should be brought in well before the sun goes down to make sure that they are all dry and toasty in time for bed.  I got Dee inside and spent the next hour and a half cleaning her leg and drying her off, so she would be dry when it came time for bed and a blanket.  I get the feeling the other horses were just going to be left wet, since they were all brought in at around 4, and no one who was working seemed concerned about it.  Kind of drives me nuts / makes me nervous.

Don’t Eat Stuff Off The Sidewalk

Today in random pictures...

Nomnomnom

Apple-eating Fail

Fat leg :(  Luckily the scrapes looked good today, and seemed to be healing

"Bye Mom, Thanks for the Apples!  Come back... never!"

The Terrible Patient

My horse is a very very very bad patient.  If anything ever goes seriously wrong with her, I have no idea how I will ever administer to her... well, I guess it would involve lots of drugs.

As you've probably guessed, Dee managed to bang herself up somehow.  When I brought her in today she had a big fat right front, seemingly caused by several scrapes on the inside and outside of the leg.  Not entirely sure how she managed it, but luckily it doesn't look serious.  I got to cleaning it, and she got to doing everything possible to avoid having it cleaned.... pulling it away, squealing, striking, stomping, and even attempting to lay on top of me at one point.  Eventually, after much cursing and threatening, I got her to let me finish cleaning and putting antibacterial cream on it, but man, she can throw a tantrum.

Imaginary Dragons...

No... not the band.  I am 99% sure Dee was seeing imaginary dragons yesterday.

When I caught her, she seemed quiet enough.  Then, as soon as we started up the path to the barn, her eyes started bugging out of her head and she managed to do some fairly impressive pretend-piaffe as she debated between bolting and behaving the whole way up to the barn.  Luckily her ground manners won out and she kept a lid on it (mostly).
I decided to just get on and see what happened, since I try to avoid lunging unless a) that's our only plan for the day or b) I think it would be unsafe to get on otherwise.  In retrospect I just should have started at b, but luckily she didn't do anything too terrible.  She did, however, feel as though she was half a second away from completely losing her shit when I got on, and when I asked her to trot, she had a mini meltdown in which she sort of bolted while shaking her head around and also traveling sideways.  I managed to get her back into a sort of normal trot, but we were very clearly not going to accomplish anything, so I hopped off once she was behaving, and put on the lunge line.  Very contrary to her usual good behavior on the lunge, she tore away from me squealing and running as soon as she was hooked up.  Absolute bedlam.  I eventually got her back under control and eventually went the other way (at which point we had bedlam ensue again).  By the time she finished, she was dripping sweat and still prancing around with saucer-eyes.  So, I climbed back on to let her cool out and maybe do some quiet trotting since, I thought, she must be exhausted.  false.  She was not exhausted.
I had her on the buckle because I wanted her to chill out and cool down.  She proceeded to try to bolt about 5 times in a row (there was some really impressive cantering in place as she debated between behaving and bolting).  Eventually I did get some flat-footed walking and some sort of well-behaved trotting and then I quit.  The ride was clearly not going to get any better as we went.  She was 100% checked-out.
Luckily it was a warm day, so I was able to hose her sweat-soaked self off and get her rubbed down with liniment, and then brought her back into the arena to hand-walk until she was dry.  Amazingly, she was still trying to bolt at every opportunity.  Darn those imaginary dragons!  Hopefully they will be gone or the hallucinogenics will have worn off by the time I get up there again.

Success!

Sweaty Fuzz-Monster!

I finally got to ride my fuzzy beast today.  I hesitate to call her a horse because she looks more like a yak these days.  I tossed her on the lunge for a few minutes before I rode, and she was pretty darn good.  We had one slightly squirrelly moment after she set off on the right lead, but then she settled and cantered along nicely.  All in all I was proud of her for keeping it together.

Where the Wild Mares Are

I haven't ridden in almost a month, thanks to a combination of spending 80% of my weeks in the law school from 9-9, the the other 20% either desperately trying to catch up on work or desperately trying to convince my renegade horse to stop being an asshole and just come close enough for me to catch.  Daytime turnout sucks.

"Stupid human... I am feral now."

Finally, after a solid month of not being able to catch her, she actually let me grab her on Saturday.  Of course, she immediately started acting like she hadn't been handled in years and didn't understand simple things such as: going through gates without trying to bolt and run over the tiny human, respecting the human's space while walking, not spooking at trees and other innocuous objects, and standing to be groomed.  I had, before even going up to the barn, decided that I would just lightly lunge and do groundwork.  I mean, it's been a month, I would have felt bad just getting on and expecting her to work.  I figured a groundwork refresher would be in order.  Well, the minute we got into the ring and I asked her to walk off on the lunge, she took off like a rocket.  A rocket that had apparently forgotten how to not yank my arms out on the lunge line and be polite.  After she careened around for awhile, I got fed up, made her stop, unhooked her, and decided to free-lunge.  Go figure, the minute I decided to free lunge, she decided she could stay on a perfect circle around me.  She zoomed around for awhile longer, but eventually settled and trotted around like a semi-adult individual.  She even did some halfway decent in-hand work.  It was not great by any means -- she was distracted and still pretending that she had forgotten 90% of the things she's learned -- but by the end she was at least being polite and responding correctly to the questions I was asking.

Dare I think that I might actually get to ride this weekend!?

Insert Lawyer Joke Here...

Ok, well, I've been a bad horse mom lately.  School has been out of control and it looks like it will be awhile before miss thang and I can hang out.  That said, I got a few texts from my bestest friend (of 15 years) today about a show she was working, where lawyers were playing live music (I think she said battle of the bands).  Here are the relevant highlights:

"Your world and mine should never mix."

"I understand its charity and these people paid way too much to rent our club, but when professional people can't make you sound better it's awful."

"You may all have money, but lawyers are a sloppy drunk."

Thanks, friend.  haha.

Apparently I have all that to look forward to.