Groton House Summer Classic 3-Phase (horse) Event: 6.21.2009

On Sunday I was entered in my second 3-phase event since my return to riding (and Ruby’s third since coming north to New Hampshire). The event that I did in May had been a simple re-introduction for me and a way to start to get to know Ruby. The Groton House Summer Classic 3-Phase was to be a step up from that – more competitive, higher jumps for my chosen division, a much more comprehensive cross-country course over diverse terrain. My trainer, Alison, had said recently that she thinks that I’m ready to move up in division and that I can probably soon target a sanctioned event as well. We were going to see how Sunday went and then decide what the next step should be.

Sunday morning dawned gray and chilly. After a completely sleepless night, I was up at 3:15 AM and arrived at the barn by 5 AM, where they were already loading the horses onto the trailer. I believe that it was on the ride to the event when the dreaded rain started. I just couldn’t believe that I was going to yet another event on yet another sopping, miserable day. At some point the odds should play out and we should have a nice day, no? But Sunday was not going to be it, unfortunately. This was the worst weather of the three too – we were smack in the middle of a nor’easter. Great. Anyway, we ended up being the first trailer there! The organizers and volunteers were just setting up when we arrived. One advantage of being there so early was that we got prime trailer parking. We were also the first to walk the stadium and cross-country courses – not sure if that’s an advantage, but it did give us plenty of time so we could really look at everything in detail. There was no rushing through any of the sections on course.

Our first riders were scheduled to go around 9 AM, however my ride times were not scheduled to start until almost noon. So that gave me a lot of time to mill around in the miserable pouring rain watching various dressage tests and trying not to think about how miserable I actually was. I do really like to watch the dressage. A good test will inspire me and a ride that has some difficulties that a rider is able to ride through gives me hope and also helps me to realize that lots of people struggle through this phase, that I’m not alone there. It also helps to remind me of what good (and also of what bad) dressage looks like. It is one thing to strive for it from the back of a horse, but it’s great to be able to see it from the ground sometimes. Of course having such a delayed ride time did not do my nerves any favors. I felt my anxiety growing somewhat, the longer I waited. Oddly, I think that I was more afraid for the dressage than I was for the jumping phases. Not sure if that was because dressage was first and I was only thinking of that, at that stage. Or if it was because I knew that in the jumping I could do what I had to, to get through. If that meant slowing to a trot or even a walk to gain control, or whatever, I could do it (you just can’t really stop). As long as I jumped the prescribed obstacles in the prescribed order and went through the correct flags, I knew that I could do what I needed to do to get around. With dressage since I had to perform specific gaits & figures in specific places in the ring, I think I feel a little more anxiety about pulling that off. Plus Ruby is such an honest & bold jumper, regardless of what happens between the fences, she is pretty game to jump anything she’s pointed at – at least that’s been my experience with her so far. Dressage is rougher for us at the moment.

When it was time to get Ruby and myself ready for our first ride, I realized that I had cut it a little close, not really leaving a lot of time to warm-up. It seemed like everyone was milling around the trailer at the same time, using the cross-ties, needing help with this & that, that the time kind of got away from me. So I tacked up Ruby in a great rush, didn’t even have much time to try and get the fresh stains out of her butt – and had to hustle over to the dressage area to check-in and warm up. I think I had a bit of an inkling of how things were going to go when Ruby spooked at the porta-potties as we passed and then did a huge spook at the wooden show secretary’s booth (with the plastic sheeting flapping over one window). She was completely agitated and keyed up, I could feel her bunched-up energy under my legs. I checked in with the dressage ring stewards and found that there were only a couple of riders ahead of me before I was due to start my test. So I right away started to ride Ruby around the field. She was completely freaked out, for some reason, especially when we came to the far part of the field. Freaked out, spooky, you name it, she did not want any part of that end of the field. I think part of it was she could see some hint of the horses up on top of the hill warming up for the stadium phase, but they were not in full view to her. Anyway, for whatever reason, she was jumpy as hell. Because we had such a truncated window for warm-up, I didn’t waste too much time and tried a canter transition soon after we started (I needed to get a few under our belt as this is one of our current problem areas in dressage). Well. I asked for a canter and my normally quiet, reasonable horse took off bucking and bolting! I quickly pulled her into circle and brought her back, but by then I was a bit freaked out.

There is always one horse in warm-up who is the “Scary Horse”. The one you look at and think, ‘TG that’s not me!’ and then try to steer as clear of as possible. Well, on Sunday, I was the rider of that horse. Every time I tried to ask for a canter there was bucking & bolting. I brought her back each time and did some trotting circles, but I was seriously considering scratching at that stage. I wasn’t sure at what point I was going to reach the limit of my ability to ride through this craziness (I mean, I’ve dealt with this kind of thing before, but mostly it was 20-30 years ago!). Luckily Alison rode up on her way to her stadium phase (she was also riding on Sunday). I told her what was going on and she was able to sit there and talk me through some semblance of a warm-up with Ruby. The bucking & bolting continued, but I was finally able to get two relatively sane canter transitions out of her. By then I didn’t have much more time for warm-up and had to queue for my turn for dressage and Alison had to head up the hill for her stadium round.

In dressage, once the rider ahead of you has finished their test and is on their way to exit the ring, you can enter the dressage area and circle around outside of the actual ring. This is usually a good opportunity to give your horse a closer look at the judge’s booth and other areas that might prove to be spooky, you can also get some last minute impulsion going, it’s a last chance to get your horse listening, responding and bending or whatever. So I took as much advantage of this time before the start whistle as I could. Ruby did some spooking around the area, but nothing terrible, mostly I tried to keep her supple and relaxed and on the bit, we had a good period of time while waiting for the whistle, so I was also able to calm myself a little bit during this interim.

Finally it was time to enter the ring and time to sink or swim. Ruby was actually very nicely round and on the bit, with good energy. I started out trying to keep my posting to the trot slow and keep everything quiet, but still with good energy. I tried not to think too much beyond the element of the test that I was on at any given point, and I think that worked well. For the most part I was pretty pleased with how Ruby went. She was very responsive and kept to a nice frame for the most part. I think our left-lead canter work was not bad (especially considering how we’ve struggled with the canter in general). Those were the good parts. On the bad side was one big spook with a mini-bolt, a couple of minor spooks along the long sides of the ring that caused some very crooked lines. And a rough right-lead canter experience, some resistance, a brief break to trot, back to canter on the wrong lead (but which I was able to correct quickly), but we did have adequate canter transitions, so that pleased me (and there was no bucking). So, overall, I didn’t think it was terrible. There were some very good moments and some ugly moments, but I wasn’t at all horrified by it and I felt it was much better than the dressage test at the event last month. After my salute at the conclusion of the test, I took a deep sigh of relief and was able to smile. The judge very nicely told me that I did “a good job”, which was gratifying to hear (even if she was just being nice).

I had about an hour and a half before I had to get on the horse again, so I used that time to watch a couple of stadium rounds and then to walk a piece of my cross-country course again with Alison, just to look at a couple of the elements that she hadn’t been able to walk with me in the morning. It was great to get some additional insight from her and to compare her recommendations on how each obstacle should be ridden with what I had thought on my own.

Very soon I was on Ruby again and headed towards the stadium warm-up. I stupidly thought that she would be calmer now, having been ridden around a bunch and having already seen some of the area. But as soon as we reached the top of the hill where the jumping ring was, and the grassy area for warm-up, the bucking and bolting and spooking started again, only it happened more randomly (and more often) and not coinciding with canter transition requests. Also, added to her bag of tricks now was this very nasty, half-rear/spin combination every time we came around to a certain section of the area. Every horse that schooled over one of the jumps would cause a bolt and buck combo. Every time we reached a section of the area there was a rear-spin with a buck thrown in. There were random buck and bolts that got thrown in around the whole area for good measure too. It was far worse than the dressage warm-up, once again I seriously considered scratching.

Alison was again able to talk me through it, very calmly reminding me to ride her forward, keep moving forward, circle, circle, circle, keep her focused on me. She had me move out from the regular warm-up area and just make small, figure-8 trotting circles beside the stadium arena and little farther removed from the warm-up section that had her so disturbed. Still, there were some bucks & spins, but it was not nearly as insane there as it had been in the common warm-up area. The ring steward asked if I was going to be ready to go for my turn next (after the current horse finished) so Alison had me pop over the cross-rail once to see if jumping made Ruby even more psycho. She jumped it without bucking, taking off slightly after it, but responding when I asked her to halt, so we determined that we were “ready”. Since I really hadn’t jumped as part of our warm-up, Alison pointed to the first fence on the course and said, “See jump #1? That’s your warm-up jump.” Even then I found it kind of funny. I told her flat out that if I felt freaked out at any point on the course that I was going to stop and retire. Her response was basically, do what you have to do, but at least give it a try. I had been so tempted to scratch during this rodeo, but I also knew that I would be very disappointed with myself if I did, and I was also very worried that doing so would cause a big hit to my confidence. So, knowing that I had the power to back out at any point that I felt uncomfortable, I gave it a try.

Well. Ruby jumped beautifully! Once we actually got going inside of the stadium ring, it’s like she pretty much forgot about everything that was freaking her out. Once she realized that she was jumping, she was able to focus on that, and on me, and enjoy herself. I never once in the entire round felt even slightly worried. There were moments when she got a little strong or slightly fresh, but she responded very nicely to me when I needed to balance or slow her and I never felt that any of it was out of hand. We ended up with a very nice clear round after all that crazy drama. Of course, once we were on our way back down the hill towards the cross-country start, the bucking started again. Just what you want to deal with while riding down a steep hill, a bucking horse. Alison behind me kept calling out, “You’re doing a good job! You’re doing a good job!” I think she was trying to keep me calm, although I don’t think I ever really allowed myself to freak out too much. I was too busy dealing with it all.

Waiting for my cross-country start, I again continued to trot in circles to keep Ruby distracted from the “elements” and focused on me. I internally questioned myself whether it was really a good idea to gallop a psycho, bucking, spooking, spinning horse across fields and hills and through woods and over various obstacles and whatnot. But cross-country was supposed to be the highlight of this day and it would be a shame to miss it. I would have been really disappointed if I hadn’t at least tried. So I decided to ride out this craziness and see what happened.

Very soon I was released on to the cross-country course – we cantered up a hill and over the first jump and Ruby took off after it with a very strong gallop across the field. It was less like the bolting she had been doing earlier and more like a “Oh, THIS is what we’re doing now? WEE!!!” Still, it was a bit of a crazy, out-of-hand gallop, one that I couldn’t allow to continue. Normally I might circle in a circumstance like this, but I felt that the second jump was coming up too soon and I ran the risk of it being counted as a refusal. No way did I want to take a refusal if I didn’t have to, especially as I knew Ruby would jump the jump without issue. Luckily I was able to slow her considerably, even eventually getting down to a trot (I’ll bet the people who had been standing in the field watching us blow past, literally gasping in horror as we raced past didn’t think I was going to be able to pull that off, but I did it somehow). She had a very lovely jump over fence #2 and into the next field.

After the initial crazy galloping thing, she was actually very good on cross-country. Listening to me, willing to slow when I asked, but always eagerly looking for the next jump. I talked to her the whole way around, praising her and telling her, “look, another jump, you can do it!” After coming out of the woods, jumping the fence just outside the wooded path and as we were following the tree line, she gave one big spook before we headed to the next fence, but that was the only time she spooked on course. Headed up the hill in the last field after jumping the wood pile on our way to the final couple of jumps she apparently gave a buck or two – this was told to me by Marilyn, who had moved to the last field to watch the end of our course. I honestly either don’t remember it, or didn’t even notice it when it happened. Perhaps I had been through so much bucking and nonsense at that point that it didn’t even register, who knows? Anyway, it was a jump over a little table and then a final jump over this sod-covered coop-like thing, Ruby didn’t blink at anything at all, just eagerly jumped everything that was asked of her. Finished with another clear round! I was thrilled! I was especially thrilled because we haven’t been cross-country schooling at all. This was my first opportunity to ride a big cross-country course with Ruby and she was just great.

So, overall, even with all the warm-up drama and craziness, I felt that the day was a positive one. Ruby came through the official phases with flying colors, it just took a lot of riding to get through the warm-up insanity to get to the point where we were actually able to get on course. Once she got going in each phase, she was pretty much fine. I’ve been through spooking with her before, but this bucking, bolting, spinning, whatever thing is completely new and I’m at a loss as to what could possibly have caused it. I have to keep reminding myself that she is only five. And also, that she had never even evented before this February or thereabouts. I suspect that she just needs more exposure to more and varied events so this can all become old hat to her. I was so happy with her jumping yesterday that I kind of wish we had been entered in the higher division, I think that she (and I) could have handled it with no problem (the fences are only about 4” higher). She would have had to go through water and over a ditch at some point, so those could have presented a problem, but we’re going to have to deal with them sometime anyway. Oh well, in the end I was happy with everything. I was happy also that I was able to ride through the craziness without freaking out, getting off (or getting thrown) or letting it scare me too much. I was too busy dealing with it all in the moment. And I was proud of myself for following through and not giving in and scratching, no matter how tempted I was to do so. In the end I was proud of us both and happy with the outcome, although still a little alarmed by Ruby’s behavior.

Because I was the last rider in our group and the horses were all were all loaded in the trailer and ready to go. And because I was completely exhausted and drenched from the long, wet, overwhelming day, I decided not to wait around (and make everyone else wait around) for my dressage test and division results. I was able to look everything up online yesterday and it turns out that we were 7th! (Out of a big field of 23 competitors too). Our dressage score was 39, which made me very happy. First time I’ve been able to break 40 on Ruby. Even though I feel like the judge was pretty generous (as they tend to be at these schooling things), I feel that I must have been correct and significant parts of our test must have been quite good to have made up that much for the parts that were quite bad – I wish now that I could get a hold of that test so that I could see what her comments were, oh well. So, sitting on this side of the competition, with it all said and done, I’m very pleased indeed.

Now I don’t know what to do about future events. Are we really ready for a sanctioned? If I was to go merely on the actual phases from Sunday, I would say, “yes”. But when I consider the nutso behavior in the warm-ups, I just don’t know. I mean, I know that I run the risk of this regardless of whether we go to a schooling or a sanctioned event, and not going to anything is not going help us work through the problem either. I’m just not sure how eager I am to put on my rodeo hat again anytime soon though. On the other hand, avoiding the problem will just cause anxiety to grow about it too, which isn’t going to help anything at all. I do, however, think that if we do go to another event soon, that I’ll enter the next division up, unless Alison feels strongly otherwise. I don’t think being in the other division would have made anything worse yesterday. If there is going to be craziness, it will be crazy in whichever division. I haven’t had a chance to discuss anything with Alison yet, so I guess I’ll wait to get her thoughts on it all before trying to make a decision.

What Was I Thinking?

Do you ever get yourself ready in the morning on a sort of autopilot, only to arrive to work and suddenly realize that you're completely mis-matched? Well, it happened to me this morning, I still can't figure out exactly what happened really.

This is what I'm wearing:

* brown suede shoes
* darkish brown pants
* this sort of olive-y, greenish top
* black cardigan

The bottom half would have been okay with a different top, and the top half would have been okay with a different bottom. But together? Not so much. Now I'm going to feel all out of sorts all day.

Owning Your Own Horse Rocks

I’ve had the opportunity to take a couple of lovely trail rides over the last couple of weeks. We’ve had some lovely weather here and now that I have a horse, I’ve been able to enjoy it in the best way possible – from the back of a horse.

A little over a week ago, Marilyn (one of my barn friends) invited me for a trail ride for that Saturday. It turned out to be one of those perfect weather days – sunny and warm, but not hot (and definitely not humid). I don’t even think there were many bugs around, we couldn’t have asked for a better day. We met at the barn and tacked up and right away got out on the trails. I love riding with Marilyn, not only is she great company and a bold rider, she also knows the trails inside and out, so I can always rely on her to find our way around and to also always show me something new that I didn’t know was there. On this day she decided that we were going to ride out to the Hollis town orchard, Woodmont. We rode through our usual trail network and out to Silver Lake (State Park). We then entered another trail network beside the Silver Lake parking lot that I hadn’t been aware of. Like the other trails that we’re familiar with, these are wonderful, well-maintained and well-marked paths that were just a pleasure to ride on. We even passed a branch of trail that had some jumps set up across the path. We didn’t ride down and jump them, but noted it for future reference. We finally reached a branch in the trail and were thrilled to see a sign actually pointing us towards Woodmont. Marilyn said that this was pretty new, in the past you apparently had to ride out the trail in the other direction, and then ride down a busy road for a bit. This trail actually put us right across the street. Along this trail we came to a number of wooden bridges crossing various streams and marshy areas. I was unsure how Ruby would react to these, but she followed Finn (Marilyn’s horse) over each without issue or even the slightest hesitation. What a good girl!

After navigating the trail, it brought us directly across the street from a path into the orchard. Woodmont is a town-owned orchard that is apparently open to the public and, because it’s public, one can apparently ride anywhere on the property! It was just gorgeous. We picked through the bottom on the path where the footing was a little deep and uneven, but then got to this lovely grass path up a hill, on which we were able to do a good, brisk canter / hand-gallop for a good while. Since we were going uphill, we pretty much just let the horses go – since it was unlikely that they were going to be able to get away from us much (they’re both so good anyway, I don’t worry too much about getting run away with anyway). It was just wonderful. We were rewarded from the gallop with this beautiful panoramic view at the top of the hill – just gorgeous. I can only imagine how incredible it must be in the Fall!

After standing at the top of the hill for awhile chatting, enjoying the view and allowing our horses to rest a bit, we made our way down the other side of the hill and through the rest of the orchard. Unfortunately we came to a point where our way was blocked by a bunch of felled trees and branches and so we had to re-route through an adjacent trail that put us inside of the Silver Lake State Park. The park is pretty quiet right now because we’re at the beginning of the season, so it wasn’t a big deal, but in the future I think if I ride back to Woodmont, I’ll just back track so as not to go through it again. I don’t want to push our luck with where they’re allowing access on horseback. Luckily neither horse left a deposit inside of the park, so our presence on that day at least didn’t have much impact. After Silver Lake, we crossed the street and were again back in our original trail network and a meander around the edge of our local orchard and back to the barn. It was a wonderful ride.

Today I took another trail ride with another friend from the barn, Jennifer. I was really glad that Jennifer called, because I was feeling rather lazy after a busy Saturday and late night and, although I was dressed and planning to go to the barn, I might not have made the effort to go out on the trails otherwise.

I was the trail expert today – heh. Jennifer had only been out on one other trail ride from the barn, over a year or so ago and that ride apparently ended in a bit of a disaster with a bee sting and an unexpected allergic reaction. She told me that she was a bit of a nervous trail rider to begin with, so this was kind of a test – dipping her toe in the water, so to speak. Well, for a nervous trail rider, Jennifer did great! Willing to trot and even canter in places, she trusted me to get her around the trail and not get too lost. We rode through the local orchards and into the trail network. For our first time, Jennifer didn’t want a long, long ride, so I took her out to Silver Lake and back. Still, it probably ended up being about an hour and twenty minutes or so. Anyway, it was another delightful ride. Ruby was great. Not too spooky, very responsive, smooth and FUN. Jennifer had a great time and ended up encouraged and excited for future trail rides. Lastly, it was the perfect thing to do on a wonderful late Spring/early Summer day in New Hampshire.

These trail rides are perfect examples of why I was so motivated to have my own horse. I love my lessons and feeling like I am making progress in my riding. I love jumping and I love dressage and even (at least, in theory) competing. But to be able to spend a few hours out on the trails and through fields and orchards on the back of my own horse, well there is just nothing better, in my mind. Life is good.

You Know What Pisses Me Off?

"Regular" commercials on a DVD. WTF is that all about???

Big Brother Really IS Watching!

Received a nasty-gram today from EZ-Pass. Apparently I was clocked going through the EZ-Pass toll too fast one day and I've been warned that repeated offenses could result in the revocation of my EZ-Pass privileges -- GAH!!! Next they'll be monitoring your speed through EZ-Pass on just the general roads & highways. Is nothing sacred?

A Note to All Those Clueless Drivers Out There:

If you're driving along the highway, and you come to a section of the road where the broken white line becomes a solid white line, it means that you are meant to stay in your lane and not just change it at will. This is not merely a suggestion, but an actual LAW. How come so many people don't realize this??? Sheesh!

Another Competition

Monday was another competition for Ruby and me. This one was a schooling 2-phase (dressage and stadium jumping) that was hosted by my barn. It wasn't at the barn location however, so we still had to trailer over -- although it was in the same town, so there wasn't much traveling involved. It was another early morning (although, not as early as the previous two competitions had been). Luckily, this day from start to finish was gorgeous weather, mid-70s and sunny, with no humidity, so we finally lucked out in that regard.

We got to the show location early enough that I had plenty of time to wait around before I had to tack up. Of course this down time allowed for my nerves to build again, but the show was pretty low-key, so I don't think they ever got quite as bad as they had the week before. Finally it was time to get Ruby ready and tack up. I made my way down to the riding area and saw that they were allowing us to warm-up actually in the dressage ring. So I entered along with two other riders and started walking and trotting and doing figures to get Ruby listening and supple and on the bit. As I worked around the ring, I heard the dressage judge calling out, "turn him, bend him" WTF? After a couple of times around, I finally asked, "are you talking to ME?" LOL. Turns out she was schooling each rider as we came around to her end of the ring. It was a little unexpected, but kind of funny. I came out of the ring to ride around the rest of the area -- around the stadium jumping area, with the idea to work on some cantering as I felt it was too cramped with three riders in the dressage ring to do so. On the far opposite side of the stadium ring Ruby gave a BIG spook in a shady corner, she did not like that area at all. I knew that was going to be a problem later as three of the fences on the course needed to jump into that spooky corner. We came back to the area near the dressage ring and did a few transitions to canter and canter circles in each direction. That seemed to go okay and then Alison said that I could be next, if I wanted to be. I figure I might as well get it over with, so I said "sure".

Well, I felt that this dressage test was SO much better than the one the week before had been. Better also than our schooling had gone that week as well. She was responsive, on the bit and supple. I would lose the frame from time to time, but was able to get it back relatively quickly each time. Our canter transition and circle to the left wasn't too bad, and we made it back down the long side okay and transitioned back to trot in the right place. The canter to the right was rougher (as it always is), but I got the transition, maybe a smidge late, the circle wasn't great and I had a lot of trouble keeping her straight on the long side. BUT I actually got and kept the canter and transitioned back to trot more or less in the right place, so for us, that was a definite improvement. Once the test was done, the judge was very liberal with her comments (as she was with everyone) and told me that apparently I had incorrectly ridden a long diagonal somewhere, instead of a short one (???!!! how on earth I managed that one, I have no idea -- my nerves taking hold again, no doubt). She also said that I need to be more brave (at dressage, who knew?) But she also said that there had been some very good moments. More importantly, I was very happy with the test. We didn't have any of the spooking or hollow back/disobedience issues that I had experienced the week before. For the most part it was 'dressage" and not just riding around a ring willy-nilly. I was very happy with it overall. Alison also commented to me later that she felt that it had been a huge improvement over the week before. Of course, it had been scored more harshly than the test the week before, so the score didn't reflect the improvement. But it was a different judge and I wasn't all that concerned about it, to be honest. Once again I was relieved to be finished with it, but I ended the dressage part much more satisfied than I had last week.

They had decided to run the stadium jumping for each division back to back with the dressage, so I stuck around the ring to wait for my turn to jump (after trading my dressage whip with someone for a jumping bat and shortening my stirrups). The first jump on the course was a jump right into Ruby's spooky corner. As we were approaching it, I could feel Ruby slowing down and trying to evade it -- she did not want to jump towards the scary "monster" corner, no way! But no way was I letting her out of the very first fence! So I put my leg on her and we just trotted in and over it in an awkward way, but at least she went over it! The rest of the course was actually a bit ugly like that. Ruby was either frisky or spooky, we got some awkward spots, I brought her back in between obstacles to gain control, so she didn't get too strong and we just sort of muddled through. She didn't like the fences in her scary corner, but she did them. The rest she was very enthusiastic about, but maybe a little rushy. In the end it wasn't too pretty (I felt our stadium the week before had been much steadier) but we went clear, so it's all good.

Once the results were posted, it turns out that we got second in our division. I can't be too proud of that because the division wasn't really all that competitive. I think we probably should have been in the division above (and we certainly wouldn't have placed as well, had we been), but I had filled out the entry form right after I had gotten Ruby and I think before I had even had had a chance to jump her, so I was being conservative. The nice thing about where I was however, was that I was done relatively early and so could untack my horse and watch the rest of the show, unwind from my nerves and relax some. Of course, since I had trailered over with the barn, it also meant that I had to stick around all day, which made for another incredibly long day, but it was great to be able to watch everyone else compete in the various divisions. And it really was a gorgeous, gorgeous day, so no real hardship to hang out in the beautiful weather.

So another successful outing for Ruby. I figure that the more of this stuff that I can expose her to, the more she'll settle down and develop a "been there, done that" attitude. I had the opportunity to go to yet another competition this weekend (Sunday), Alison suggested it to me earlier in the week (I guess there was still room on the trailer). But I felt that I needed a break from this stuff, they always end up being such long, exhausting days (and there is also the prep work required the day before). Not to mention the toll it seems to take on my nerves! Although the more I go to these things, the more I'll end up with a "been there, done that" attitude myself! Still, I just couldn't face another weekend of it again so soon.

My First Competition on Ruby

I really wanted to write about this before too much time went by, I’ve just been a little busy.

On Sunday, May 17th, I was entered in a local schooling 3-Phase event with Ruby. Our very first competition together and only my second time competing since starting my second riding life. To say that I was nervous is an understatement. I was pretty much a wreck for most of the day, a complete, blathering mess. It wasn’t so much a fear of bodily harm as it was the pressure of competing that had me in such a state. I really have to get over feeling like this, if I’m going to continue going to these things.

So, it was yet another early, early morning after a night of pretty much no sleep. And it dawned yet another rainy and miserable day (even worse than the rain from the previous week). I arrived at the barn by around 6 AM, and tried to work on getting the stains out of Ruby’s rump that she had managed to incur overnight (she had been so sparkly clean when I left her on Saturday!) I helped Megan (one of Alison’s working students/barn staff) finish up the barn chores and then we loaded our two horses up on the trailer -- she was riding “Phoenix”, one of the sale horses in the barn. There were four us going to this event, but Marilyn was bringing her own trailer for herself and her daughter, so Megan and I just used the two-horse trailer that morning, rather than the huge six-horse one.

Megan had a pretty early ride time, but my times we not scheduled to start until much later, so we had to get to the event pretty early and then I had to do a lot of waiting around while freaking out from nerves. Gawd, it was miserable! Pouring down rain that seemed to just get worse & worse, not better. We all started our morning by walking the cross-country and the stadium courses (in the rain, of course, this is getting to be the standard arrangement. I can see that I need to invest in a good raincoat). I didn’t see anything on either of the courses to alarm me, even though I had yet to ride a cross-country course with Ruby. There was a faux ditch that we would have to go over (it’s not really a ditch, just two big ground poles with mulch filled in the middle so that it looks like a ditch). I know that Ruby has given Alison a little bit of trouble with ditches here & there so I knew that I would keep that in mind when I got to that obstacle on course with her. After the course walk, I ended up standing around by the dressage rings with Alison while Megan, Marilyn, Marilyn’s daughter Emily and others warmed up and then performed their individual dressage tests. I always find it very useful and educational to watch and normally I enjoy the dressage very much, but that morning I was absolutely soaked to the skin and shaking with cold. It was not very pleasant at all. After a long time of standing around in the rain, it was time to get Ruby ready to warm up.

Megan kindly helped me tack up and mount, etc. and I made my way over to the slippery, muddy and crowded warm-up area. Ruby was pretty good about getting quickly down to work, it didn’t seem to take me long to get her round and on the bit. I did a lot of small figures to get her supple and listening. Alison then had me come a little closer to the stadium jumping ring to continue my warm-up work as she needed to divide her attention between me and the students who were ready to enter the stadium phase of the competition. I tried a canter circle going to the left and that wasn’t bad, I then tried one to the right and Ruby did this small freak-out / spook / scoot thing that was slightly unsettling. I got her back again quickly and was working her in the trot ready to try a canter again when they were calling my number for dressage – early! Yikes! Oh well, I worked my way over there and around the outside of the ring waiting for the bell.

All too soon the bell rang and it was time for me to make my way into the dressage ring. I just have to say that performing a dressage test (for a judge) scares the crap out of me. I don’t know why, but I was such a bundle of nerves for it that I was practically hearing buzzing in my ears. Anyway, the test started out not too bad. Down the center-line and Ruby was listening, on the bit, etc. Across our first short diagonal and we were fine, still on the bit, bending, etc. Started our first 20-meter circle (trotting) and somewhere in the course of that circle I sort of lost track of where I was, I couldn’t remember if I had already had trotted the full circle and had somehow just gone around again, or what. I just did not know what I had done so far and I felt myself losing it slightly. Oh well, I figured that if I went off the test that they would ring the bell at me, or tell me once I was finished (since it was a schooling show) and so I just continued on. Ruby transitioned okay into the left lead canter and we continued the circle okay. Our canter work still isn’t great at this stage, so I was just happy to get the transition and not to have her break back to trot at any point. However, it was right around this point in the dressage test that Ruby started to give in to all the whinnying and neighing of all the horses in the trailer area just across the track. She started to ignore my aids and started calling back to all of them.

We completed our second short diagonal, started our trot 20-meter circle to the right, all with Ruby’s head in the air, back hollow, calling out to the horses back by the trailers. I tried to get her back to listening to me to no avail. It came time for our canter circle to the right, I managed to get the transition (although, I think I may have chased her into it a little bit, can’t quite remember), but at some point during the canter, she did a kind of big spook and a mini-bolt and so dressage quickly went out the window for me and I was just in horse-handling mode (trying to remain actually on the horse, inside the dressage ring and still performing some semblance of the test). I was proud of myself because I didn’t freak out or get too flustered, I was able to bring her back pretty quickly within a couple of strides and we completed the test by some miracle and without missing any of the elements. At some point though I did give up on the canter and we ended up trotting far before we were supposed to. Also, at some point during the test I had heard a bell ringing, so I wasn’t sure if that had been the judge trying to tell me that I had missed something (turns out that it had been coming from the stadium jumping ring, but at the time it threw me off a bit). So, we finished in one piece, it wasn’t pretty, but we got through it and I was just relieved to have it behind me more than anything. Alison told me directly after that she thought that I handled the spook/bolt thing very well, very professionally by bringing her back quickly, continuing on and not letting it get me rattled, so I was happier about that praise than about anything that had actually happened in my dressage test.

So, now it was time to focus on the stadium jumping phase. I was milling around for a bit and ready to go check in with the event stewards at the warm-up ring when Alison looked at me oddly and asked me what time I had been scheduled for the stadium. When I told her, she said that I was, uh, an hour early – doh! That’s how nervous I was, I had actually forgotten what division I was competing in. Sheesh. Anyway, so I went back to trailer, untacked Ruby and put her back on the trailer. The unexpected break did give me another chance to walk my cross-country course, and I was glad of it too because they had changed the markers for the bank. The first time that I had walked it, they had it going one direction, they then, at some point, had apparently changed it to going the other direction (which actually made more sense with the rest of the course), but if I hadn’t seen the change on foot, I would have gotten out there on course and been confused and possibly could have ended up off-course.

Very soon it was time to tack up Ruby again and go back to the stadium warm-up. I could feel my nerves heating up again, so I was anxious to get through the next phases so I could relax and wind down from everything. We entered the warm-up ring and Alison had me school over the cross-rail and then the vertical fence a couple of times. Ruby felt great, our jumps felt great and I could feel myself start to relax a tiny bit. Alison said that I was ready, so we went to stand and wait for our turn beside the stadium ring. Somehow I managed to get on the list to be more or less the next person to go, so I didn’t have to wait too long, luckily. This stadium had proved to be pretty troublesome to many on this day, I had seen a lot of stops and even some falls, so I didn’t really know what to expect with Ruby. Still, Ruby is a pretty honest and enthusiastic jumper and I can usually ride out a horse that gets squirrely jumping, so I wasn’t too worried. I think I was the most worried about actually remembering my course.

We entered the ring and they rang the bell (which meant that I could start the course whenever I was ready). I rode to the first fence and Ruby popped over it and right away became very frisky and excited about where she was. I just took it slowly and quietly and brought her back to me after every fence. The only squirrely bit was this one fence that we had to ride a broken line to, I think because we didn’t have a straight approach, she was a bit unsure at first whether I wanted her to jump it. But I drove her to it calmly with my legs so she relaxed and jumped easily over it without a fuss. So 10 fences and she jumped clear! I was so happy with her and very happy with our round. Even the parts where she got a bit strong, she never stopped listening to me and each time came easily back to me. I was very satisfied with how she went.

One of the very nice things about this event was that once you completed your stadium round, you could pretty much move directly on to your cross-country. So there was no going back and untacking again and waiting around allowing my nerves to over-take me again. I went over to the cross-country steward and put my name in queue and just had to wait a few minutes for two other horses to go ahead of me. At this point, I was only slightly nervous. I think once I started my stadium round that I had relaxed. This is usually the way it is for me, once I actually start jumping, I’m usually okay. It’s the waiting around that gets to me. Well, that and the dressage (odd that dressage would scare me more than jumping). Anyway, I didn’t have to wait too long before I was released onto the cross-country course. Since this was my first time taking Ruby cross-country (as well as my first competition on her), I wanted to be conservative and take it easy so I planned to bring her back to a trot between elements. Since this was a schooling event, nothing was being timed and there were no speed penalties, so it didn’t matter how long it took to complete any of the jumping phases (as long as you were moving forward and didn’t stop before a jump). So Ruby popped gamely over everything, she would have a nice strong, rocking canter going away from each obstacle which I would allow for a bit and then I would bring her back to trot for more control. She didn’t give me trouble with anything at all, not even the faux ditch that Alison had warned might be a problem (although, I think I was ready for it, had there been one). There was one corner that we came around where Ruby did a big spook, but I was even prepared for that, I had seen the big pile of deadfall on my course walk and thought it might be a spook opportunity and since it was also coming around a corner and beside the stadium and warm-up rings, I thought that might be another element for possible acting up. So I was able to ride through it without much trouble and quickly brought back Ruby’s attention and onto the next fence that came up quickly after the spook. She just locked on and popped nicely over it with no fuss at all. So, we went clean over cross-country, with just a little bit of drama. My first CC with Ruby and it was just fine. She was bold and enthusiastic and forward, without being too strong. A great horse for cross-country!

It had been fun, but it was also a relief to be finished, especially after all of my nerve attacks. It had also ended up turning into a pretty nice day, after all the horrible rain had finally stopped (sometime during or just after my dressage test). It felt so, so good know that Ruby & I had finished our part in the competition and that our performance was relatively good, despite a somewhat disastrous dressage test. We had redeemed ourselves with the jumping and didn’t get eliminated! Nor did we (hopefully) embarrass Alison either. After untacking Ruby and putting her back on the trailer, I was able to mill around and watch some stuff without my nerves interfering and I was finally able to eat something as well. I went to the posted results and saw that somehow I had managed to pull off a 41.1 dressage score – now that was a gift! Nowhere in life should our performance in the dressage ring that day have been scored that generously. But I figured that because it was a schooling show, they were trying to keep things positive and encouraging. After all the jumping scores came in, we managed to move up to third place in our division! So we made up for our unimpressive dressage phase with our “brilliant” jumping phases – excellent. I was very, very pleased with Ruby and very happy with the results for our first competition together.

Ruby's New England Debut Competition

On Saturday (May 9th) Ruby was entered in her first horse trial in New England. This was her first event since I bought her and since her name had been changed from “BeBe”. Alison (my trainer) had suggested that it might be a good idea to have her ride Ruby in few sanctioned events over the Spring & Summer (perhaps also the Fall) to give her some mileage and confidence so that she’ll be ready once I’m ready to take over. In the meantime, the plan is for me to try some schooling events with her at a lower division. This will allow me to get my feet wet with competing, build some confidence at an easy level, and get to know Ruby without a huge amount of pressure.

So, with all this in mind, I entered Ruby in the King Oak Spring Horse Trials on May 9th. King Oak is kind of a rough event for us logistically because it is in South Western Massachusetts, over two hours away. Because of this and because our first ride times started in the morning and because we had to leave enough time to walk the stadium and cross-country courses, we had to leave the barn no later than 5 AM. Which also meant that I had to be at the barn no later than 4:30 AM -- I got up at 3 AM that morning, I think I’m still knackered from that, days later. That was pretty brutal. Anyway, after the looooong drive to the event location we arrived to miserable cold rain. Yuck. It really was not a very nice day, but what are you going to do? So we walked the stadium jumping course and I felt a sense of relief that I was not going to be riding. The course was pretty tight and twisty and didn’t seem too simple, even at this lower level. Then the rain picked up and we walked the cross-country course. We were all soaked, drowned rats and yet, I couldn’t help but get a little excited as I walked the course and went over everything, obstacle by obstacle. Where I had been feeling happy not to be riding while viewing the stadium course, walking the cross-country made me really wish that I was going to be riding that day. I felt that old thrill of adrenalin at the thought of galloping over hill & dale and jumping over stuff. I just love the cross-country phase.

Very soon it was time to start getting ready for dressage. Ruby was the first ride of our group, so we put her together in rain that kept starting and stopping. I walked down to the dressage area with Alison on her and stood by while she warmed up. This was my first opportunity to really start checking out all the variety of horses at the event, and boy were there some gorgeous ones. Huge fancy warmbloods, big rangy athletic thoroughbreds, a few fancy-looking horses of color (like Ruby), all the way down to various ponies of different types. It was a lot of fun to just goggle at all wonderful horses doing their warming up for dressage -- I just love this part about horse shows and events, and since I was not competing I could relax and look around all the more. I thought Ruby looked pretty good in comparison to most. Nice and round and on the bit. Not at all bothered by the tight warm-up area, by all the horses (some of whom were misbehaving), or by being in a strange place, nothing seemed to really phase her much. I saw one girl on a chestnut thoroughbred type that was having a terrible time. Horse spinning, refusing to go forward, the girl seemed to be having a lot of trouble handling her and seemed to perhaps be somewhat over-horsed. You usually see one or two of these at a show or event warm-ups and it’s one of those, “there but for the grace of God … “ (TG that’s not me) moments. Anyway, I thought Ruby was going very nicely and very soon it was time for her dressage test.

The trot bits I thought looked very, very good. Ruby remained very round and on the bit, bending nicely. Good impulsion through her back and hind-end. Her canter work was rougher, she still needs work here, and she even broke a little bit early on one of the long sides. But still, over all, considering how green she is, I thought it was a nice, steady test. I think it also probably gave Alison a sense of what she needs to work on with Ruby in training. The dressage judge apparently thought less of the test than I did as the score was less than stellar. Still, Alison’s comments after the ride were that she feels that Ruby is very obedient and willing, so it’s really a very good starting point for a green horse.

On our way up the hill after the dressage test I ran into Kelly, one of my riding trainers from this Winter while Alison was down in Aiken. It was really great to see her, so I stopped and chatted and caught up with her for a short while. She was there competing one of her school horses as her greenie baby who had originally been entered had ended up with a last minute injury. Anyway, I didn’t have much time to stand around as I was responsible for grooming and helping out, so I had to run back to the trailer.

After too short of a break, it was time to get Ruby ready for the Stadium Jumping phase. Finally, the rain had stopped and the sun had even came out (of course by then I forgot all about the sunblock). What had started out miserable had actually turned into a beautiful day. Anyway, the stadium warm-up was a bit nuts! Very small, too many horse vying for the three warm-up fences, everyone going every which way. I sure was glad that I didn’t have to navigate it! Ruby remained pretty un-phased by it all and I’m sure Alison has seen it all at this stage, so their warm-up remained relatively uneventful. The Stadium rounds started for our division and I got to watch some of the rounds while waiting for Ruby’s turn. Wow, not one horse that I watched got around clear. The course was pretty tight and most of these were big thoroughbreds who wanted to fly around, it just wasn’t the ideal layout for them, so there were stops and rails and horses running around with their heads in the air, it just was not very pretty. Then it was Ruby’s turn. Well, she just went around so neatly and handily, the first horse to go clean in the division! I do think her “type” of horse had an advantage on this one though, in a jumping field those thoroughbreds would probably have been more in their element. Anyway, it was announced later that there were only three clears rounds in our division (and Ruby was one of them!) Her wonderful jumping round made up for the less than wonderful dressage score and she moved up in ranking quite a few places as a result. It was also on her start of her stadium round that I got to hear her new name announced for the first time, “Ruby Slippers”. It gave me a little bit of a thrill.

A bit later it was time to start getting Ruby ready for the Cross-Country phase. During this warm-up (in a much bigger area than the Stadium warm-up had been, thankfully). Ruby seemed to be getting a little excited about the jumping and made a few big leaps over the test fences and seemed to be a little bit rushy with excitement. Very soon she was off on her cross-country round. The course was big, it started in a field and then went up a hill and through the woods, so I was only able to see the first two jumps and the last jump from where I stood. But what I saw of her round looked very good. She was not spooky at all (some of the horses had been spooking at the fence judges), she seemed to want to jump everything and seemed extremely happy overall to be out and on the course. Horses seem to either love cross-country, or hate it. The ones who hate it usually feel anxiety about being alone out there and may never get over it. The ones who love it are usually happy and brave and in their element. I would say that Ruby seems to fall into the “loves it” category. Probably all of that foxhunting in her previous life helped her attitude some. In any case, Alison came in and said that Ruby had another clear round and that she had gone very, very well. There were some moments where she would break to a trot while Alison balanced her, but this doesn’t count against you, well, unless you manage to incur time faults along the way.

All-in-all, I have to say that I was very pleased with Ruby with her first New England HT. When it was all said and done, she placed fourth in her division! I think Alison was pretty happy with her too. Most importantly, she was happy and enthusiastic and confident during it all, exactly the experience we wanted for her. In addition to the competing bits, she was very good about trailering, hanging out in the trailer during the day, walking around with me while I hand-grazed her beside the competition areas (so that I could watch some of it). Not too spooky or fussy. Just a wonderful horse to deal with all day.

It was an exhausting day though. Up around 3 AM, at the barn by 4:30 AM. We got back to the barn after it all and then of course had to care for the horses and muck out the trailer. When I finally left the barn a terrible storm was starting (we were lucky not to be driving the horse trailer through it), lightning directly overhead, sheets of torrential rain so heavy and bad that I actually decided to get off the highway, I was that freaked out. I finally made it home at around 8:30 PM. A long, long exhausting day. But a very productive and satisfying one too. In some ways it got me a little excited for competing myself, in others, it was a nice way to be a part of the event without that stress and pressure. Overall I was very happy with the outcome for Ruby!

Ruby at a Horse Trial

Some proofs of Ruby (when she was "BeBe") at a horse trial in Georgia in March. The pictures can be seen HERE (there are 21 in all).

Hopefully, I'll have some more after this Saturday where she is competing at King Oak. Alison is riding her and I will merely be a spectator/helper, so no pressure on me! (Well, no pressure except to try and get her clean!)

Ruby's Baby Pictures

Ruby's former owner was kind enough to send me a couple of baby pictures!








How freaking cute!

Seen walking into work this morning:

A man wearing a suit. Now that's something you don't see everyday (nowadays anyway).

Ruby's Sire

Reference link and pedigree.

Another Weekend with Ruby

Now that I've gotten a chance to ride Ruby for a couple of weeks, I am getting to know her better and am really enjoying her. And I just love her personality!

On Friday I went to the barn in the late afternoon after work with the thought that I'd do a little ring work, however, one of the barn girls said that Alison had planned to ride her (the first training ride of May). She was running a little behind, so it was perfect for me because I could watch the training ride and then ride Ruby directly after Alison. I helped the barn girl tack her up and then we brought her down to the ring. Alison rode her for about a half an hour and stated that she definitely was in need of a bit of a tune-up. She got her going nicely and on the bit and then I was able to get on. Alison was riding another horse after Ruby but took the time to coach me a bit while she did so on how I was handling the contact with Ruby. There was something about this informal, but one-on-one coaching that helped this click for me -- and I'm not sure what it was, but I started to get it. Ruby accepted the contact, stopped the head-tossing and the head-in-the-air / hollow-back thing and became round for me. When I trotted and I lost the roundness, I would bring her back to a walk and regain it before trotting again. After a while I was able to retain it pretty consistently at both gaits. I would lose it, but could get it back quickly enough. When Alison was finishing her training ride on the other horse, she made a comment that she would now leave me alone so I wouldn't feel scrutinized, but really, I had actually enjoyed it and had gotten a lot out of it. I can't say that I want to be coached like this for every ride, but I did appreciate it on Friday. Anyway, at the end of the ride I worked on some canter transitions in each direction and then called it a day.

On Saturday I made arrangements to meet a barn friend and go for a trail ride. Despite all dire weather predictions of rain, the day was glorious! Sunny, blue skies, warm, but not hot. Just perfect for riding. There weren't even any bugs around! Just a wonderful day to take a long trail ride. I've been riding with Steve and his wife Jennifer in various lessons since I started at the barn, so it was nice to do something a little less formal for a change. Steve and I were both a bit clueless about the trails. I knew how to get to them from my experiences last week and knew some of them, but not enough to know with 100% accuracy where they all lead or which branch is ideal, but that was fine -- we spent a lot of time exploring and figuring out where everything went. We rode for about two hours and ended the outing with a trot through the apple orchards where the apple trees are starting to bloom, it was really lovely! Ruby was even better on the trails than last week, completely solid, no spooking at all. Happy to walk or trot or canter on with just a little nudge. She also went up and down steep hills willingly and was hardy enough to pick her way through rough footing without hesitation. It was just a wonderful way to spend a Saturday.

Today, after a crappy night of sleep, I lacked much motivation to get going for most of the day. I went back to bed in the mid-morning and milled around for the most of the day looking at the gloomy sky and wondering if the rain was going to come. Finally in the late afternoon I decided to go down to the barn. On the drive there it started to rain and I almost changed my mind, but it remained only a drizzle and had actually stopped by the time I got there. I started again with Ruby with the same work we were doing on Friday. I had her walk for a good long time doing various figures, 10-15 meter circles, serpentines, figure-8s, until I was satisfied that she was bending, round and consistently on the bit. Then we moved on to the trot. When I felt that I was losing the roundness, I would go back to the walk and re-establish it. This seemed to work very nicely with Ruby and I felt really encouraged with how nicely she went for me with our work. I also kept in mind what Alison had mentioned to me about my hand & arm positioning and made a point to be conscious and aware of what I was doing. One of my bigger sins is not keeping my fingers closed around the reins and not keeping my thumbs on top, so I tried to be very particular about this today. All-in-all she was very, very good for me. The head tossing was minimal, the more we worked, the more I was able to get her round and on the bit, I was very, very encouraged and happy with her! I kept the canter work to a minimum, just throwing in a few transitions in each direction towards the end. Her canter is definitely better to the left than to the right, but we have plenty of time to work on this in the future. Lastly, at the very end of the ride, I worked on some lateral work, mostly just some leg yielding at the walk, and she responded very nicely to my aids.

So after a couple of weeks of being with Ruby and riding her, I have to say that I am very happy. She is so sweet on the ground (and quickly becoming a barn favorite) and she is very, very agreeable under saddle, even though she is green. I feel very encouraged so far and happy with my decision to buy her.

Self-Importance Abounds

At a lunch hosted by a vendor today, I end up sitting near someone who also happens to work for my company, someone I had never met before. We introduce ourselves and say where we work.

Self-Important Company Guy: "I'm in charge of this product!"
Colleague and myself: "Really? What group do you work for?"
(in the meantime our group handles hosting for this product for our company, one would think we would have heard of him, if he was "in charge of it")
SICG: "I work for XYZ (business group)."
Me: "Oh! Do you work with BC?"
(someone from XYZ group who I've worked with previously)
SICG: "BC works FOR me."

Our branch rep sits down at our table and introduces himself to SICG (obviously didn't know who he was either).

Branch Rep: "Which business unit are you with?"
SICG: "XYZ Group"
Branch Rep: "Oh, I know BC from that group, I've spoken with him quite a bit."
SICG: "BC works FOR me."

Alrighty then. We get it. You're extremely important being in charge of the product and managing BC and all.

Do you ever get the feeling that some people have an extremely inflated idea of their own importance? I mean, that's fine and all, but why do they always have to drag everyone else into it? Sheesh.

Louie, Louie

In an odd twist, I had an email from the owner of the thoroughbred that had I tried a few weeks before buying Ruby. The owner at that time was going to give me a trial with him and then at the last minute backed out, claiming that she had decided to sell him to someone else. Well, it turns out that the sale fell through and she wants to know if I'm still interested. She admits in her note that the other buyer was offering her more money, but the vetting wasn't very clean which scared the buyer off. I'm not sure if I wouldn't have walked with the vetting issues too, but that ship sailed anyway when I bought Ruby (and I'm very happy with my decision!) Still, it's funny how things work out. I was pretty disappointed at the time when the trial with Louie fell through. I think I'll forward her email to Alison & Ann anyway, perhaps there is someone else in the barn for whom Louie is suitable. Maybe the owner would consider a lease.

More Jumping with Ruby

Just a quick post to note that I had another successful jumping night with Ruby. We were off to a bit of a bad start in the lesson when she took a big spook at some kids running around across the street -- although, I was proud of myself for sticking with her pretty well and not falling off! But we ended on a high note by doing a whole jump course (at the canter) which included an oxer and a two-stride line (jump in, two strides, jump out). She did great and I think I rode her well for our first real jump course, and second time jumping together. So, we're making progress!

First Time Jumping Ruby

Tonight was kind of a combination flat and jumping lesson. I was a little nervous because I hadn't jumped Ruby yet and it was the last "test" left. Not that any of this has been a true test, but every first time for something has been an opportunity to see potential for our future partnership in each area. Everything so far has worked out pretty well, not that everything is perfect, but I haven't expected perfection, just a good mind, good personality and the potential for our future partnership. The jumping was the last piece of the puzzle I needed to complete my first impressions of Ruby,

We started on the flat and I had a lot of trouble with Ruby tossing her head. I had noticed this on my trail ride the other day and it wasn't a problem I remember having with her the first time I rode her last week. It's definitely a problem with me, I need to somehow find a happy medium between too much / too stiff contact and too loose / too little contact. I'm not quite there yet with her, but at least I'm aware of it and can work on it. Tonight it was also very windy and Ruby was a bit of a looky-loo for a good part of the hour. Had her head up, ears pricked and wanted to look around a lot, with also affected her general head & frame carriage. Towards the end of the flat part of the lesson, it had already gotten much better, although I think my contact was probably a bit too loose still, but it was better than the head tossing. I found that I was able to transition to canter much better tonight than I did last week with my first ride or two with her. The transition is still a little rough, but it was much better -- and I really had only worked on this a little bit over the past week, so that makes me feel like this will improve quickly with consistent work. Our pace at every gait was also much more consistent & steady, although there were a couple of breaks at the canter, towards the end of each canter session I seemed to be able to ride her through this issue too. On the right lead she seems more unbalanced and tends to lean in heavily on the turn. I tried to counter-balance that by leaning myself towards the outside, but I had to concentrate on doing that. This is something that I also think will improve with training and with regular work.

Finally it was time to jump. I was really very nervous. Not nervous in an, "OMG, I'm afraid I'm going to die!" kind of way. But more in a, I'm riding a new horse, I don't know what to expect, I want to do her justice, I don't want to screw up, I don't want find that there is some weird, unexpected jumping style or something that I can't deal with, with my own short-comings. I want to continue to love Ruby and feel enthusiasm for our future partnership, etc. etc. etc. There were a lot of thoughts and emotions running through my system so, bottom-line, I was a bit of a bundle of nerves. The first couple of jumps with her were slightly frisky, but mostly because of my own nervous interference. But even with her burst of enthusiasm, she didn't make a huge rush for the jumps, or take some huge spot (taking off far too early) in front of them -- something that some horses will do if you ramp them up too much. Once I had jumped a couple of times, I felt myself physically, mentally and emotionally relax and the last few jumps we did were much better. Overall, my impression is that she is very steady jumping. Dependable, enthusiastic, steady pace and honest. Of course we only did a few very small jumps, but it was enough to allow me to draw a huge sigh of relief and feel that this is GOOD. She's great, we're going to be FINE.

Observation: Automatic Faucets

I mean. With the Swine Flu apparently sweeping the nation, it might be a nice option to be able to control the water temperature when washing one's hands in a public restroom. You know, because hot water might be a bit more effective against killer germs than say, cool to tepid water. Just a thought.

You Know that You're Having an Aggravating and Frustrating Day When:

You're sitting in your cube already muttering & cursing to yourself and it's not even 10 AM yet.

Sheesh.

Knackered

I'm surprisingly tired for a Monday night. Odd. I didn't even go riding.

Another Nice Trail Ride

I decided to take another trail ride today, however this time I was on my own. I got to the barn around noonish and things were very quiet. I was surprised that there weren't more people around as it was another beautiful, summer-like day. Anyway, I am no stranger to trail riding on my own, but I had been thinking that I might want to ride with others for a few times until Ruby and I were a little more settled in with each other. But since no one else was around and riding today and I didn't feel like another ride in the ring (did that yesterday) I decided to brave the trails alone.

On Friday with Marilyn, we had accessed the trails by riding through some of the apple orchards down the road. I decided to just go up the road and catch the trail from a different spot. Ruby was just great, not spooky at all, she didn't mind being out on the trail alone, just the two of us. We did a lot of trotting and some short bits of cantering here and there. Walked where is was rocky or there were lots of tree roots, or we were going steeply down-hill, but tried to trot a lot otherwise. I took one trail out to the end and then turned around and picked back up the trail that Marilyn and I had been on, on Friday. Well, at one point I must have made a wrong turn because I ended up a little lost. I knew it once I came to a wooden foot bridge -- I know that we hadn't come across that on our ride on Friday. I directed Ruby around it and through the stream beneath it. She hesitated a bit at first because the water was moving (the water we had been through on Friday had been more of the standing variety), but with some encouragement from me she went through it without too much fuss.

We ended up coming out of the trail way down the road from the barn. So it was a bit of a long ride along the road to get back, but I didn't really mind much. It was actually a really nice way to see the neighborhood. Very enjoyable. All through everything, the trails and the road and whatever, Ruby continued to be a star. We were even passed by a loud motorcycle and also passed some loud wood-chipper or some kind of machinery making very "scary" noises and she was just fine. Like I keep saying, a steady, sensible girl.

Once I got home, is was a good rinse off on the wash station for her and lots of carrots and some apple pieces as a reward. Okay, and maybe it was also as a bit of a bribe so that she'll be as in love with me as I am with her -- heh.

So, I've ridden Ruby five days in a row now and feel like we're well on the way to getting to know each other. I really am enjoying her so far and feel very lucky to have her. I've heard far too many stories of people who end up with horses that just aren't right for them, so I'm feeling very grateful right about now. Of course, now I have to really get down to the hard work with Alison in the lessons, starting this week. The hard work has yet to begin.

On my way home I stopped in at the farm stand down the road from the barn to buy a soda. This guy in line behind me noticed that I was wearing riding clothes (and probably also noticed how dirty and sweaty I was) and asked me, "did you ride your horse here???" At first I wasn't sure what he meant and said, "oh I ride at a barn down the road, I keep a horse there. OH! Do you mean, did I ride my horse to the store and have her tied outside somewhere?" and he said, "yes!" -- his eyes all lighted up with excitement. Too funny.

Ruby's First Trail Ride (in New Hampshire)

Because it was supposed to be beautiful, and because I have a new horse to ride, I scheduled a vacation day for today. I just love these Spring days where you just start to get a taste of Summer, I love to take advantage of them if I can. And what better way to enjoy a sunny, lovely 70-degree day than to go on a long trail ride with my new horse?

Marilyn (one of my friends from horse camp, who also boards at the barn) kindly agreed to go with me today. This is especially good because, besides for the company, she also knows the trail system really well! One of the ways to hook into the nearby trails is to ride through some of the apple orchards down the road (which is very generous of the local farmers). There were some people working on the trees as we passed by that the horses took a few spooky looks at, but there were no major freak outs. We also managed to pass a tractor underway that both horses passed by without any major issue and then we were into the woods on the trails. I was very pleased to see that the trail network seems pretty extensive. We took a loop that is about an hour and a half long. It wound through the woods, over and through water, up and down hills (even down some steep banks). There were sections for trotting and some good canter opportunities. Through it all Ruby was a star, I was thrilled with her, really thrilled. There were a couple of minor spooks, but other than that she was steady and sensible, went through water without issue, up and down the steep sections with no problem, on trails and banks over water, without a blink. She didn't mind when Marilyn's horse led and didn't mind if she led. Even during the canter bits she was quiet and responsive and stayed in the position I asked of her -- she didn't try to run away with me or think of it as an opportunity for a horse race. And all of this in a very mild, loose-ring snaffle bit too. So all-in-all a very fun and successful riding day.

After the ride I put Ruby up on the wash stall and hosed her off. She was also very good about that, stood calmly and let me spray the water as I wanted. She really is a very sensible girl.

What a wonderful way to spend an impromptu vacation day!

Another Ruby Ride

Another nice ride on Ruby today. I'm still keeping it loose and easy. We're not working too hard, just some trot work, some canter work with a lot of walking in between. Trying to get more consistent with everything, but more importantly, we're getting to know each other. Even though we didn't really work very hard, I rode Ruby for a long time. About an hour and a half, I think. I also did a bunch of socializing with other people from the barn while sitting on her and watched a couple of lessons (I love to watch lessons, I usually end up learning something). I definitely felt much more comfortable and relaxed today and completely happy to be hanging out at the barn while sitting on her.

I sent in an application for Ruby to compete in a sanctioned HT in a couple of weeks. Alison is going to ride her. It will help give her some mileage so that once I'm ready to ride in HTs myself, at least one of us will know what we're doing!

Finally Ruby

Well, I finally rode Ruby and she is just as lovely as I had hoped that she would be. It was not very nice out today, it seemed to alternate from drizzling to pouring rain, and I wasn't too ambitious either. I just wanted to start to get to know her. I was a little nervous to start, but she made me feel very comfortable pretty quickly. I was very encouraged to see how nicely she frames up and comes onto the bit. It is my own shortcoming that I can't keep her there for every beat, but now I know that she does it and does it nicely and relatively easily, so it gives me something to strive for. It's good to know that I will get good results from her when I do everything correctly. I just have to work on being steadier and more consistent. I also had trouble keeping her pace consistent, but her gaits were very nice and very comfortable. Not too bouncy, nor too flat. So I think I have a lot to work with and am very happy about that. Best of all, she didn't seem at all spooky, seems to have a good, sensible mind. Even though she looked around a bit at her new surroundings, She didn't freak over anything and never took a step wrong. I am very, very happy.

I don't plan on jumping her until my lesson next Tuesday, so we'll see how that goes then. However it is, it's going to be a work in progress. Ruby is young, so we have years to work together and become wonderful partners.

I was also very happy that my new (well, new to me) saddle fits her and seems to fit me as well. I was a bit worried about that, since I bought it on eBay and before I even had a horse! The saddle fitter is coming tomorrow, so I'll get official feedback from them then, but so far so good.

So, all-in-all a good first session and very positive overall. I'm very happy!

Curses

I finally received my necessary tack in the mail today and it's pouring rain out. So, no riding tonight!

Things I Hate about the Gym

* Locker rooms. No matter how old I get, nor how many years I continue to have a gym membership, I don't think I'll ever feel truly comfortable using a locker room. I really, really hate changing in "public". I know there are some out there who think that this is some flaw in my personality and that I should just get over it. But I don't like it, I feel incredibly self-conscious. Always have, always will. Everyone has their thing. This is one of mine. I also hate the constant running of blow dryers and the way some women feel that they have to spread their crap all over the place.
* LOUD and BAD music. I mean, comeon. I am at the gym at work. I work for a conservative financial company. Do you REALLY think most people want to listen to horrible disco or (worse) mind-numbing techno music? Besides, most people have iPods at this point anyway. Now, because of the loud pounding horrible music, we all just have to crank them up and risk permanent deafness. The alternative is to run screaming from the gym -- that's what this music makes me want to do.
* People who invade personal space. Like the guy who absolutely MUST use that the treadmill next to me, when all the other remaining 8 are free. Or the woman who decides that the locker right next to mine is ideal, even though the rest of the room is empty. WTF???
* Self-congratulatory pompous asses who want to make sure everyone in the room knows great they run, or how much they work out. I listened to this guy today tell three different, completely unrelated, people (at different times) that he ran 10 miles yesterday and that "Heineken" he had afterwards was the best he's ever had. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're all so freaking impressed.

blah.

Boston Marathon Monday

Good luck to all the runners! Looks like it's a wonderful day for running.

Horse Tack

I think I'm addicted to horse tack. I keep looking at stuff online and shopping for it and buying bits & pieces of it. So far I have bought or ordered:

* A saddle (on eBay a couple of weeks ago -- I hope it works for both Ruby and for me).
* A bridle (on order, hopefully will be here by tomorrow).
* A bit.
* A girth (hopefully arriving with the bridle & bit).
* A breast plate.
* Galloping boots.
* Various saddle & wither pads.
* A pair of reins (nicer than the ones that come with the bridle), purchased on my way home from Boston today.

In addition to the above are also sundry items like fly spray, turnout sheet and other stuff.

Oddly, I have not purchased one article of clothing for myself (either for work or for play) for the new season. That's extremely unusual.

Wireless Internet and the Screened Porch

I worked from home today, as I usually do on Fridays and I was very lucky to be able to enjoy this fabulous day by spending part of it out on the screened porch with the work laptop. First time I've used the porch this year -- it was about 72 degrees! It was lovely and such a nice change from the claustrophobic cube. I'm so lucky to have this flexibility.

Ahhhhh Spring!

I think the dogs have Spring fever, particularly Tig. I've never seen dogs want to constantly go in & out out like this! They come in and want to go out again. They ask to come back in once more, and they want out again twenty minutes later. Sheesh! I would be annoyed, but it was a rather long Winter, so I can't say as I blame them all that much.

Lulu & Ruby

So, last night was technically my last ride on Lulu and I’m actually incredibly sad about it.

Tuesday night I had a great jumping lesson with Ann – she called it “Graduation Night”. We did a few jumping courses, cantering everything. I know that this doesn’t sound too impressive, but with Lulu’s habit of rushing fences and taking big distances, it’s been great to be able to trot into jumps to keep better control of pace and to better allow me to ride her to the base of everything. On Tuesday I had to bring everything that I had learned about riding Lulu together and ride steady, cantering jump rounds and I have to say that it came off beautifully. I was able to keep her steady and balanced and at a perfect pace. She came back to me after every fence, listened to everything I asked her to do, didn’t take any huge distances – she was a total star, I was so proud of her.

Last night we had a more mellow lesson with Kelly. Everyone was feeling rather lazy and not too ambitious. We did a little jumping, but we were all pretty satisfied pretty early on. I, personally, felt that I had proved whatever I had to prove the night before and was happy to leave well enough alone at that stage. We spent the last ten minutes of the session chatting with Kelly, which is always fun – she always has great stories about the Eventing world.

Now that I’ve bought a horse and will be ending my half-lease of Lulu, I won’t be riding her regularly any more. I’m very sad, I’ve really come to love her. She’s not the easiest horse to ride, but I have learned so much with her and am now feeling like I’ve reached a place where I know how to ride her to bring the best out of her. I finally know how to ride Lulu and it’s time to say “goodbye” and start all over with a new horse. This is pretty much a new experience for me, never having owned a horse before, in my former riding life, I was very used to always riding different horses. It’s a rare thing for me to be able to build a partnership with one particular horse, and after six months, that’s what I feel like I have with Lulu, a partnership. I can only hope that my relationship with the new horse will be as happy and successful.

Speaking of the new horse … she arrived yesterday! I had had “Mackie” as a barn name in my head for her, but I wasn’t completely sold on it. I also couldn’t seem to come up with a good show name that would tie that in (not that the show name really needs to relate to the barn name, but I kind of wanted it to). I also came up with “Ruby” and waffled back and forth between the two names all morning. Finally they were here and so I ran down to the barn to meet her. There she was calmly hanging out in her paddock, not at all fussed by being in a new place (after being on a 24 hour trailer ride or whatever), nor by all the activity around her. Right away “Ruby” seemed to suit her – she kind of looks like a Ruby, so Ruby it is. I’m thinking that her show name might be “Ruby Slippers”, I think it’s kind of cute. Anyway, I ran back to the barn last night on the way to my lesson to bring her the turnout blanket that I had ordered for her (which had conveniently arrived in the mail that afternoon). I put her on cross-ties and fussed around her a bit as I fitted the sheet to her. She was a little nervous on the ties with all the barn activity, being in a new place and with everyone settling back into the Summer barn, but she calmed down nicely as I worked around her.

I’m not sure when I’m actually going to end up riding her for the first time. I have a saddle, but no bridle or girth (I’ve ordered both). I also wonder if I should ride her for the first time in a lesson. On the other hand, I’m dying to start to get to know her! I think I’m going to take a vacation day next Friday, if the weather looks like it’s going to be nice. I should have the rest of my stuff by then (I hope) and so can hack around with her. Marilyn (one of my friends from adult riding camp) said that she would trail ride with me – sounds like the perfect day.

So, I am both very excited and a little nervous for this next, new phase in my riding life. Ruby is super sweet on the ground, I just hope that we really hit it off under saddle. I also hope that I can do her justice.

What happens when Dressage & Reining faces off?

I just love this!

She should be here sometime tomorrow!

04.15.2009 10:25 AM Update: Alison expects to be here with her around 11 AM. I'm going to run out between meetings and meet her -- work clothes and all.

I may be a bit of a freak

But, sometimes I rather like Mondays. In fact, very often this is so.

Buying a Horse

I posted last week about my frustrations with horse shopping. After the trial with “Louie” fell through, I started seriously looking at horse ads through various resources. I answered a bunch and Ann (one of the trainers at my barn) also sent me a bunch. I followed up on quite a few of them and in pretty much all cases, all of the horses I had found in my price range had something wrong with them. In particular were the horses that actually had a record with the US Eventing Association -- horses that never cleared cross-country and were thus eliminated from every competition (not a very good sign, you want a horse that you can trust on cross-country). The horses that didn’t have any kind of USEA record were even more concerning because then that really becomes a crap shoot. Might be a nice horse, but you just don’t know how they’re going to be. Plenty of perfectly nice & reasonable horses suddenly freak out when faced with being out on a cross-country course alone, or asked to ride through water or up / down a bank or to jump a ditch. Or maybe a horse who has performed well in hunters but will never achieve a respectable dressage frame. You just don’t know. But I was looking quite a bit and responding to ads, corresponding via email with people, Ann and I both were looking up USEA records (and both being scared senseless by what we found!)

And then on Monday Alison forwarded me an ad for a horse down in Aiken. Between my & Ann’s searching (and maybe some searching online by Alison as well) she had determined that there wasn’t much for sale up here in my price range -- at least there didn’t seem to be any suitable eventing horses in my price range. So she had been looking around down there at the same time. She found this reasonably-priced Irish Sport Horse mare who is relatively young (five), she had been doing some fox hunting and then had been introduced to eventing this Winter. She’s competed in a few horse trials (at Beginner Novice level) in the South over the past few months, always going clean jumping and even coming in fourth at one sanctioned event. I liked the price and the look of the horse and I liked how she seemed on the video they had of her, so Alison went off to see her.

The sellers trailered her over to a neutral location that the horse had never been to before, the seller’s rider rode her around a bit and then Alison tried her. She ended up liking her quite a bit, found her reasonably easy to get on the bit (especially given that this is still somewhat new to the horse), a willing jumper, and a quiet and sensible ride. She then called me and spoke to me at length. Alison knows how I ride, knows what my goals are and knows what my strengths & weakness are and therefore has a pretty good feel for what I need in a horse. As a professional, she also knows Eventing very well and what is needed in an adult amateur horse to event -- for me, at least, at the lower levels for now. We discussed the horse and what I want. We both came to the conclusion that she is a lot of horse for the money and I was particularly attracted to the fact that she’s young (like Gambler was). I like the feeling that I could have the horse for many years, that we’re both just starting out our riding careers and could potentially have a great partnership in many different things for a very long time.

The sellers were extremely agreeable and arranged with Alison to have the horse out to her farm in Aiken for a couple of days. This was so that Alison could test her out some more, and also hack her around some, to make sure the horse wasn’t stupid or crazy or reacts horribly to new circumstances, etc. The big question that remained was whether I was going to run down to Aiken for a day to also try her out. I went back & forth about it for a few days and then finally decided not to, but to trust what Alison felt about the horse after trying her some more. I’m still a little conflicted about the decision not to go, but I felt that it was going to cost me a lot of money and time for just one ride, where it was very unlikely that we would completely click on that first ride anyway. In my experience, it takes months to even start to click with a horse, certainly with Lulu I didn’t start really to do so until recently -- and I’ve been riding her for 6 months! It’s also very rare for me to get on a horse and just hate him/her. I can’t remember the last time that happened (it would have been over 22 years ago) so really the point of the one test ride would be a matter of, did I feel like the horse had the potential to be a good partner for me? If Alison seems to think so, I’m actually inclined to trust her judgement more than my own! Anyway, Alison also said that the mare is so nice that, even if I don’t click with her and I realize down the line that it’s not going to work out for us, that I really would have no problem selling her for at least what I paid, if not more (and given that she will have more training and some more competition under her belt, it would be reasonable to assume that I could get more). Given what little I’ve seen for sale in the area, I have to agree. But, like I said, it’s pretty unlikely that I wouldn’t like the horse anyway.

Alison took possession of the mare on Friday and spent a lot of time with her, on the ground and riding her. Rode her around the farm, introduced her to some spooky stuff, tried her over some jumps that she hadn’t seen before. Apparently the only jump she gave her a hard time about was the ditch, but after schooling her over it, she was able to bring her back to it much later and the horse popped over it nicely, she didn’t stubbornly hold on to her original objection to it (a good sign). She also hacked her down the road and she seemed fine to hack out alone and didn’t mind leaving the farm behind. Her spooking consisted of slowing or stopping to take a second look at scary stuff, but not the crow hopping, leaping sideways or fleeing-type of spooking that is hard to deal with (and might make me think twice about wanting to trail ride a horse). She said that she had a little trouble balancing her before some of the jumps when cantering to them, that she would sometimes break to a trot. But she feels that this is an experience issue, in fox hunting she was probably just used to being able to gallop at everything and just doesn’t understand that a balancing half-halt is not a request for a downward transition -- she just needs a little more training and mileage. The horse was also very nice on the ground, cross-tied, hung out quietly in a stall (without cribbing or weaving or showing any anxiety) while other horses were out in the paddocks. So Alison came to the conclusion that the mare was sane, sensible, sweet on the ground, has some nice eventing potential, is green, but not “hot” green (in other words, she still needs some training and experience, but is not the explosive type of green that would be dangerous for an amateur) and will therefore be a nice match for me. We spoke about this all at length on Friday morning so I said, “Let’s go ahead with the vetting”.

The results came back very favorable from the vet on Friday night. Alison was actually a bit amazed as her vet down there has a tendency to be very conservative, she says that she’s never been able to buy a horse down there before because he nixes everything! So the fact that he was extremely positive about the results of everything in his exam of this horse (including x-rays) is remarkable.

So, I’m going forward with the purchase! I know it seems a bit strange that I haven’t even met the horse yet, but I felt like I could make a reasonable leap of faith here. I just hope I love her as much as I’ve loved Lulu, and as much as I felt that I was going to love Gambler. I sure am looking forward to having a horse that I can compete with as well as a horse I can take trail riding, to hunter paces, do conditioning work with, etc.

The mare’s current name is “BeBe”, which I don’t like, so I’m going to be changing it. She is a pinto-colored Irish Sport Horse, so I was thinking of names with an Irish theme. I am kind of playing with a barn name of “Mackie”, with an official (“show”) name of something like, “The Colors of MacDuff”, but I’m not sure (any opinions or ideas are welcome!)

The plan at the moment is to have her on training board for the first couple of months to give her a bit of a finishing. Training board means that Alison (or perhaps Ann) will ride the horse in training 5-6 days a week (in addition to the riding I’m doing). This should polish up her dressage and jumping skills. Alison will also ride her in a few sanctioned events in New England this Spring & Summer to give her some mileage and I will do some schooling events on her. By the end of the Summer or early Fall, hopefully I will be ready to start taking her to some sanctioned events myself.

Here is a short video of her -- isn’t she cute?



She is coming North with Alison this week. I'm not sure what day they're arriving, probably Thursday or Friday. I need so much stuff!

Ambien = Miracle Drug!

I’ve written here repeatedly, and with increasing frequency, about my on-going battle with insomnia. It’s gotten to the point where my sleepless nights are out-numbering the nights where I actually manage to string together a few hours of sleep (and I can’t even call those restful nights).

I had an appointment with my doctor last week for an actual physical – that may actually have been a first, I tend to go the doctor if something is wrong, or for a fifteen minute consult about whether my thyroid levels are correct, but an actual, real physical, I can’t remember the last time I had one of those. Well, the results were that I’m pretty healthy. My cholesterol has actually come down quite a bit over the last year or so (was somewhat high, but is now normal). My BP was something like 100/60. Everything else was great, but I brought up the insomnia and how it is affecting my ongoing quality of life. The doctor seems to think that it is hormones (I’ve been thinking that too). Fine, but do I really have to live like this? She mentioned that it was okay to continue to take Advil PM or Unisom or some other OTC stuff. Great. But then I asked, “Well, could you prescribe Ambien to me?” She looked at me for a beat and then said, “Sure. I could do that.”

So with an official prescription in my greedy little hand, I trundled off to the pharmacy and got it filled. I decided to take it for the first time on Friday night since I didn’t know how it was going to affect me and I preferred to sort that out on a weekend, rather than struggling to be at work or something while under the influence. Well. Let me say that I had just about the best nights sleep that I can remember ever. I took the pill right before I was to climb into bed (I had visions of otherwise falling asleep and drooling on my couch with all the lights and TV on, etc.). I remember turning off the light and then nothing at all else until about 5 AM when I very naturally and gradually woke up. No repeated trips to the bathroom (which even happens when I’ve taken Advil PM), no waking up to see the clock and going back to sleep (ditto), no repeatedly changing positions in the bed. Just deep, blissful sleep. Once 5 AM hit, I was able to sleep lightly for another couple of hours, it just wasn’t the deep sleep that I had for the rest of the night. When I was up for the day I felt no residual tiredness or sleepiness. No sleep hangover. I felt awake and refreshed and was not looking for a nap suddenly later in the day.

So, for me, I conclude that Ambien is BRILLIANT! I can’t believe I’ve lived in this misery and that I’ve waited this long to ask about it. Now I am in dire fear that my doctor and/or insurance company will someday become stingy with the prescription! ACCCCCCKKKKK!

Horse Shopping

I ended up having to pass on Gambler because of the vet findings. The vet in Aiken brought the x-rays around for a few opinions and everything came back pretty dire. The results were particularly concerning considering the young age of the horse. Alison told me that she wouldn’t want to take that chance, so I had to push emotions aside and listen to the professional. It hurt my heart a bit, but I have to believe that I made the right decision, but there is going to be a very big part of myself that’s going to always wonder if he was “The One”. I still carry the memory of my huge shit-eating grin while riding him cross-country that day -- I felt like I could do anything with that horse.

Fast-forward a few days and Alison emailed me about another horse she knew of for sale locally a few towns away. “Louie” is a 12 year-old thoroughbred who is owned by a former student of Alison’s, actually a girl who was a working student with Alison a few years ago. Louie and his owner spent some time down in Aiken at that time, so Alison knows him pretty well. So, I went off last Sunday to give him a try. Ann graciously went with me. Immediately it occurred to me that Louie is pretty big! About 16 hands, but built big for a thoroughbred, more like a warmblood almost. Anyway, Ann rode him first and got some very nice movement out of him. Then I got on. I found him reasonably easy to get on the bit and to track up to a nice frame, even though he was really out of shape. I found his gaits very big and bouncy, however, I was a little bit all over the place. Ann and the seller (the owner’s mother) then set up a couple of jumps that we popped over nicely. We noticed that the rain had stopped, so we then went out to the outdoor ring to try a few of the jumps out there. We had a couple of rushy-rushy jumps and a few where I had to try and sort out my body position after the fence (since I’m used to horses that you need to gather right back again and I guess Louie is used to a very neutral position), but we sorted it out after a few fences. Afterwards we spent a lot of time talking to the seller about Louie, his history, his training, what he’s like, etc. And I came to realize that he’s also a very sweet boy on the ground. He was a bit like a big puppydog. So the seller suggested that, since she knows and trusts Alison, I could perhaps take him on trial for a month.

I followed the tryout immediately by talking to both Alison and Ann and everyone seemed to think that Louie could be a nice match for me. So we spent part of the week trying to make arrangements for the trial. Alison had a stall opening up and so we were going to start the trial for this Sunday. The seller threw a last minute wrench in the works however, as we were making the final arrangements that she suddenly had another buyer coming out to see him yesterday and that she would get back to me today. It seemed a little bit odd since the horse had apparently been for sale for a long time, was out of condition and hadn’t been in any kind of consistent work, but whatever. Anyway, the seller followed up today to say that she’s decided to sell him someone else, but hey, thanks!

I’m surprisingly disappointed. I mean, I didn’t spend enough time with Louie to get very attached, but still, I was looking forward to exploring whether we were going to be right for each other. Part of me is also beating myself up a bit too. I wonder if I did something wrong, did the woman not like me, did she hate the way I rode her horse, or that my butt was too big? I don’t know, and I guess I’ll never know, but I’m finding myself somewhat down on myself nonetheless.

So, I’m back to square one in the horse shopping arena. This is something that I’ve been waiting for my whole life and I have to say that so far I sure am NOT having fun. I’m not sure now if I should be reading and responding to horse ads, or if I should wait more for the “word-of-mouth” type of leads -- Alison knows pretty much everyone in Eventing in the area after all, she is bound to hear about some nice horses here or there. So I’m feeling a little lost and depressed and overwhelmed about it all and not sure what direction to go in next.

Things I'll Never Understand

Why some people even bother paying for an E-Z Pass thing when they're just going to come to a complete stop at the toll anyway. I mean, what's the point then? Sheesh.

Sick & Miserable

Ugh, I am so not used to being sick. Traveling and no sleep and whatever really allowed this bug to take hold though and I've just been miserable ever since I got home. Coughing and sniffling, fever, chills, headache, body aches, sore throat, you name it, I seem to have it. Add to that that my upper-back/shoulder area is a bit injured from my fall last week, so now every time I cough (and I'm coughing a LOT, seems to come in fits) it jars the injury, causing even more pain. I went to the grocery store before work this morning to buy orange juice and cough medicine and I just walked around the aisles literally crying because I was so miserable. I'm a freaking baby. I rarely get very sick, so I guess I just can't handle it when illness does strike. I just want to feel normal again! ARGH!

Gambler

So the vet findings on Gambler during the pre-purchase exam were not totally promising. Apparently everything was absolutely okay until near the end he discovered "significant navicular changes" in one foot. I am not an expert, but I believe that navicular changes suggest some cartilage breakdown between bones in the foot. I guess it is common to see some degeneration, but the question is, how much is too much? And in a young horse too. The answer is, I don't really know. The tests show that there could be soundness issues in the future. Or it could be that things never get worse and he will be fine, it's kind of a crap shoot -- but the potential for a problem is there. I should say that it is apparently very rare for a horse to vet completely clean, but it is still a situation that gives me pause, nonetheless. Alison says she had a horse once that showed similar changes that never ended up having a soundness issue, but that it's a risk. You just don't know. Anyway, in the meantime, the vet down in Aiken was going to take the xrays to a couple of other vets he knows for some other opinions and Alison was going to speak with Linda (the owner) and see if some other purchasing options might be worked out -- such as a reduced price, or maybe a lease to buy thing where the horse would be re-xrayed in a year, if there were no further changes, sale would be finalized. But it would give me an out if things didn't look good (of course by then I'd be incredibly attached).

So, I really don't know what I'm going to do yet. I really, really, REALLY like this horse. Jumping was just so effortless with him, he has such a kind heart and a great mind, especially for his age. Everyone who watched me ride him that day said that I was going around with this huge smile on my face. Usually while jumping, I have some kind of grim grimace pasted there -- Ha! In the meantime, I'm still gathering the money together. I haven't said "no" yet, but hopefully will have some additional information later today.