Things that have frustrated or pissed me off today:

* Receiving a meeting request for tomorrow (which also happens to be my birthday) for 4:30 PM.
* Listening to SIMHG pontificate endlessly on hours & hours of back-to-back meetings (starting at 8 AM, going through noon)
* Receiving yet another email from my father dictating the special sell circumstances for some stock or another on the trust account (of course this is not readily apparent or straightforward through the customer interface, so I have to find some time to call someone to help me figure it out. Like I have time for this. And heaven forbid he call just to chat or find out how I am or whatever.)
* Being on meetings endlessly and having to drop the phone to go to the Ladies Room. I don't know how men make it through hours & hours of these things without a bio break. How does that work?
* Meeting that has already been going for 1.5 hours ran over because they decided to hijack the first part of it for another purpose.
* Finally giving up, I put the phone down on the desk, run to the LR, get back to my desk, only to find that the meeting is STILL going on. Curses.
* Meeting goes over by 30 minutes.
* Realizing that this is yet ANOTHER day that I'm not going to be able to make it out to ride.
* Realizing that when the new on-call rotation starts (next week for me) that there are going to be whole weeks where I won't be able to schedule riding at all.
* Realizing that a certain software tool has changed considerably with a new release and I have to completely relearn how to use the damn thing.
* Dribbled coffee on myself.

Another Rant

I know that I’ve written about the guy in my office who I like to call, “SIMHG” (Self-Important Meeting Hijack Guy). I haven’t mentioned him in a while because, well, I guess I don’t want to sound too bitter – or maybe I just don’t want to encourage my own bitterness (not to mention my paranoia) by fueling the flames with endless rants about him. Plus, that gets a little tedious and repetitive. In general I’m trying to keep more of an open mind. But this morning he just irritated me beyond my capability to hold it all in. It was just a small, stupid, unimportant thing, but it had me steaming a bit and it’s a great example of the small ways he tries to exert his supposed authority and superior knowledge everyday.

Here is what happened:

Through a link in an email, I went to a site where an agenda for a meeting I was attending was posted.

I was denied access.

The default “Request for Access” form came up. I wrote in my justification for this access and hit the “Submit” button.

• Our documentation sites all function in a similar way. Users are given access, if you go to a page and are denied access, a form pops up asking for justification to see the page. Upon submission, the page goes off into cyber space to whomever has been set-up as the administrator for that page. As a user you don’t see where it goes, just that you’ve sent off a request. Typically what will then happen is you’ll get a confirmation email that so-and-so has given you access to the page you’ve requested (not sure what happens if you’re denied, probably a similar email with the information).

The next thing I know, I get an email confirmation from SIMHG that I have been given access to the page, but with a personal note that says, “I’ve given you access, but S or A should be the administrators for this page.” In other words, why in the Hell are you bothering me with this request? You should have contacted these other people.

First of all, I have no control over who the form gets submitted to. Once the button is hit, it goes off to the person who has been set up as responsible for the page, but as the requestor, you don’t see who that person is. Secondly, if it went to him, then he must be the default administrator for the page (despite his assertion in the email that someone else is), and how would I be able to change the direction the request went in, or even know to do so? Lastly, how is it my responsibility to know who the administrators are of a page I don’t even have access to?

Wouldn’t most people have just given the access and then looked into changing the property settings for the page if you felt you were receiving these requests incorrectly? Or if he wanted to be difficult, he could have forwarded the request to the person who he felt should be handling it, but where was it my responsibility to figure all this out? ARGH!

For what it’s worth, this was my reply to his email:

“Thanks. I just responded as prompted by the document-page, so I think the site must think that you're the admin.”

As I said, it was just a simple, stupid, unimportant thing, but I feel like this is a guy who takes every possible opportunity to assert his overbearing arrogance onto everyone around. An occasional misunderstanding is not a big deal, but there are a myriad of little ways that he does this on a daily basis and it gets extremely tiresome after a while. I feel so defensive all the time around this guy! It’s like I have to decode everything he writes or says for all the hidden slights & slaps. Or maybe I’m just crazy. Gah.

Rant: Benefits Fair

So, my company is having a benefits fair since we’re in the enrollment period for next year. And, because there are significant changes happening for 2010, there is a good line of people before each table waiting to ask important questions about how they will be affected. So there I am, stacked up behind people in front of our HMO table and the woman who is holding up the line is asking the rep repeated questions about whether Lasik eye surgery is covered.

Really? You think that your HMO is going to cover your Lasik?

Not satisfied to take no for an answer, she continues to ask more questions about this procedure that the rep obviously can not answer, thus holding up the line for people who have legitimate questions that need to be answered. You’d think that she would have more pressing concerns about her health coverage, but I guess not so much.

What is wrong with people? SHEESH.

Ads on Facebook

Okay, can someone please explain to me why Facebook thinks that I should date "Seniors"??? I keep getting this ad on the sidebar:

"Date Active Seniors -- Meet senior singles near you at seniorpeoplemeet online dating. Join free!"

I mean, WTF??? I know that I've gotten older, but I didn't think that I was actually in Senior Dating territory. At least not yet anyway. SHEESH!

I Love Fall

I am currently drinking a hot cider with spiced rum and cooking a an acorn squash. I love fall.

Seen on the Coffee Line this Morning

A woman wearing: A horizontal striped shirt. Stone-washed jeans. Ankle-length. Thick, white sport socks. Clogs.

I mean, I'm all for business casual, but I think this is stretching things a little far.

UNH Fall Horse Trials – October 3 – 4th, 2009

Day 2: Stadium Jumping & Cross-Country


I think that I managed a little off & on sleep on Saturday night, but still, 2:30-3 AM came around awfully fast on Sunday. Definitely the hardest part about this event was the 2-day element. I think it might be kind of fun to go to something where you stay overnight, but this coming home and starting all over from scratch business was quite brutal. Still, once I was up and moving and on my way, I was able to push aside my exhaustion for most of the day. It came back to me at odd times when I had a moment to sit, but generally I was able to forget about it.

I again was not scheduled to ride until relatively late in the day – 3:04 PM or something. The morning was filled with walking our Stadium & Cross-Country courses, helping the morning riders get ready and watching some of the morning Stadium rounds, which had the added bonus of cementing that jump course in my head (I’m always worried that I’m going to forget the course.) We really lucked out with the weather. If anything, Saturday had been worse than had been predicted, however, Sunday ended up being so much better. I had heard a number of reports that called for rain all morning and then clearing for the afternoon, but it never ended up raining even a drop on us all day. It remained a bit cloudy for part of the morning and then cleared into a lovely sunny and temperate day -- it seemed just the right temperature for me, warm enough so that it was comfortable for hanging out all day, but not at all hot for riding.

It was mostly a leisurely day, certainly much more so than any 1-day event that I’ve experienced so far. Still, all too soon it seemed that it was time for me to get Ruby ready. Again, I decided to follow my policy of giving myself extra time – both for getting ready and for warming up. This took a little bit of the stress out of things for me, at least for the getting ready part. I never once felt in a much of a panic and it helped to hold off my nerves. Again, I have to state how nicely my horse behaved around the trailer, I was able to deal with her and get her ready with no help. My experiences with her and the two-horse trailer at UNH starts to make a good case for considering a two-horse of my own for someday – but I can’t think about that now!

We made our way over to the warm-up and right away I could tell that Ruby was in a keyed-up mood. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, especially on a Stadium and Cross-Country day, but there was also a big horse in the warm-up ring majorly acting up (bucking & rearing & whatever) that really set Ruby off. We started our warm-up with some bucking and big spooking and a mini-bolt or two which, of course, immediately scared me with flashbacks of Groton House! As I’ve mentioned before, the warm-up is far from my favorite part of any event and, for some reason, I seem to be the most nervous for the Stadium phase. So my nerves for UNH seemed to come to a head at this point and I found myself somewhat seriously freaked out. I was not quite paralyzed with nerves, but I definitely was impaired. Luckily Ann was there to talk me off of the ledge, I mean, coach me and I was able to work through it. Ruby settled down reasonably and we jumped a few of the warm-up fences relatively competently, but I was very happy to say good-bye to that warm-up ring.

Very soon I was on deck for my Stadium round. I had watched enough jumping rounds throughout the day so felt that I knew the course well enough, but I spent the last few moments plotting the lines I wanted to take to the various fences and trying to quell my anxious Stadium Jumping nerves. For the first couple of jumps I caught a couple long spots, but soon was able to find the rhythm well enough. I was very conscious of lines to everything and about using the corners of the ring, keeping a forward, but steady & balanced pace and about getting straight to every jump. The only part that got a bit funky was the two-stride in & out combination. I was pretty good about getting deep to the corner before it and our line was reasonable, but I found Ruby trying to run out on the first jump! This is extremely unusual for her and in hindsight I decided that she was most likely spooking at the judge’s platform which was right beside these jumps. Still, even when being squirrely, Ruby is pretty good about broadcasting what she’s feeling about something, there was no dirty stop or last minute bolt around the jump. So I was able to encourage her over by being very clear with my leg about what I wanted her to do and she listened quite nicely. Because of the awkward jump into the combination, I was a little concerned about how we would negotiate the striding, but I made a point of driving her forward and we did end up getting the two strides, even with that funky first jump. After that the rest of the round was pretty perfect, I think. Ruby was responsive and adjustable, she listened nicely to me, was balanced and forward and enthusiastic & happy to jump everything. We finished with a clean round and no time faults, which was good enough to bump us up to 5th place in our division.

One of the nice things about how this event was organized was how they scheduled everyone to go directly to the Cross-Country start, as soon as their Stadium was completed. No need for another warm-up (and thus no opportunity for me to psych myself out again), no need for un-tacking and tacking up again. It was also nice to take my little adrenalin rush from Stadium and bring it with me to my Cross-Country start. Oddly, I was not at all nervous for Cross-Country, nor I had I been worried about it at any point during the weekend. I remember walking my first XC course at this level (at this very venue!) back in July and how it had scared me. Have I really become completely jaded about it over the course of a couple of months? In any case, I started my XC course loose and confident and happy to be out there with Ruby. I think Ruby loves this phase the most so she was forward and excited with ears perked looking eagerly for the first jump.

After our slow time at King Oak last month, I also wanted to make a point of staying at a more forward pace more consistently this time. In other words, I needed to have fewer sections of trotting. We had to be careful about some turns here and there because of all the rain we had had over the last 24 hours, but in general I felt that the footing held up very well, allowing us to move nicely forward. We kept rolling forward through the first two fields, over the first 4 or 5 jumps or so. There was an area where we had to make a turn, cross a dirt road and there was a hodge-podge of jumps from other divisions that we had to navigate around. We had to trot for a few moments here because of this confusion, but then we were forward again, with a nice gallop over the next two jumps, around a squash field and into the woods. As we entered the woods Ruby tried to break into a trot (probably a little uncertainty with the terrain change and moving from light to dark), but I said (outloud) to her, while using my leg, “No, you can canter here, it’s okay.” And so she moved forward as asked and down to the hill to this rather upright, reverse roll-top kind of jump. I remember this one from July where we jumped it going the other direction, in this direction, it was more upright and the side we jumped from was lower than the landing side, making it a bit of a bigger jump going this way. Still, Ruby rolled nicely and confidently forward to it and jumped it with a lovely spot. It was some more down-hill terrain to the next jump, a coop that they were calling “The Dog House” also something we had jumped in July and then it was on to the water. By now I felt that, between the downhill grade and the excitement of the jumps, we were going at a good forward clip, but with the water coming up I felt that it was perhaps a bit too forward. I haven’t done too much water with Ruby, really only once officially (at UNH in July) and I haven’t done any real schooling on this with her otherwise, so I did not feel confidence coming into it at this pace. Mostly I just didn’t feel in enough control of this situation if she decided at the last minute that she wasn’t too thrilled with the obstacle. So, I “woahed” her down, and “woahed” her down some more until I had a nice forward trot from her. She pushed right through the water very nicely and gave me no trouble at all, but I felt a little bit more in control over everything at this trot than I had at the strong canter down the hill.

After the water we had to pick through a little bit of terrain that did not have a clear path and where there were some tree roots and other things that I felt compromised the footing a bit. Mostly I was trying to remember the path through this bunch of trees to the next set of jumps that I had decided on when I walked the course earlier in the day. It was a relatively short portion from the water to the next jump and from there, Ruby jumped in, exploded up this steep bank, jumped out of the series and it was nice gallop around the last couple of jumps on the course. I was exhilarated and so, so happy with Ruby! She was bold and brave and happy, but also listened to me and did everything I wanted her to do at every moment on the course. She is a total thrill to take around cross-country, she really is.

Well, it turns out that we were 7 seconds slow on the course. Those 7 seconds cost me 2.8 points and two finishing places for our division (dropping me from 5th back down to 7th). That’s how close my division was for this event, for 5th-7th places we had all been within 3 points of each other. Oh well. In hindsight, I should have kept that forward pace through the water that would have made up those 7 seconds and more. I’m pretty sure that Ruby would have rolled right through there at a good, strong canter, but in this case I’m the one who was green and unsure, so that was my misjudgment. Still, I would rather err on the side of caution than not, so I can’t really be too upset about it in the end. I do think that we’ve both made a lot of progress. I know that Ruby has, but I feel that I have too. Our first two events in May & June I pretty much trotted everything (both in Stadium and on Cross-Country). In July, I trotted lots of stuff on XC, but made up for it by galloping way too hard on other sections (we had no time faults on that course, however). In September, I trotted in significant sections causing us 7-8 penalty points (I think we were 20-25 seconds over that day). At the October event I feel like we were much more consistent, there were very short pieces were there was a minimal amount of trotting, but far less than at either of the two events. There were areas where I was tempted to trot, or to continue trotting, but where I pushed forward instead. Really, the only thing on that entire course that I feel I would have done differently is the water. I feel that I made the right decisions everywhere else. Most importantly, I came away with a happy & confident horse after the course and I was happy & confident myself. All-in-all, I was extremely happy with it and felt that it had been our most consistently-ridden event yet, for all three phases.

This event closed the competitive year for me, so I was extremely happy to end on what I feel was a very positive note. I feel like I made a lot of progress throughout the season and that Ruby & I grew into a good team. I feel like I moved from merely trying to get through these competitions to actually developing some consistency. On this side of the season I now feel pretty steady at this level that I was pretty freaked out about at the start of the Summer, and am looking forward to working on our weak spots. After UNH-Fall I felt more that I have very specific things that I can focus on, where the other events I participated in over the season I came away with more of a, “Well, thank God THAT is over!” kind of attitude. Overall I feel pretty proud of myself and extremely proud of my horse. It’s hard to believe that we’ve only been together since late April.

UNH Fall Horse Trials – October 3-4th, 2009

Day 1: Dressage

Unlike how I came into my two previous sanctioned events (UNH Sunmmer Horse Trials in July and King Oak in September) I did not do a ton of riding leading up to the day of this event. Between coming down with a bit of a bug the week before that mostly had me feeling exhausted and crappy, and work, I did not have a lot of time leftover to work on my riding. On Thursday I worked something like 15-hours, so there was no riding on that day. Finally, Friday (the day before the event), I managed to get in a good ride. I also managed a run-through of BN Dressage Test-B (the required Dressage test for my division for this event) which was completely new to me. After the ride I had to try and get Ruby clean and get my tack and gear together and cleaned.

3 AM Saturday seemed to come awfully fast after the busy week that I had had. Actually it came at around 2:15 AM, because that is when I ended up waking up (I had planned to get up at 3). It was pouring down rain. A cold, driving, Autumn rain. Got to the barn around 4:30 AM or so and helped with the outdoor feeding in the dark and rain. Then we got all the horses loaded and were on our way. The 6-horse barn trailer had broken down that week, so there had been a mad scramble to come up with enough 2-horse trailers to transport everyone. Ruby (and I) ended up in a trailer that was generously lent to the barn by one of Alison’s students.

It was just one of those miserably horrible days. Unrelenting cold rain that seemed to run the gamut from merely pouring, to torrential, sideways driving rain. Ugh – exactly the kind of day where it would be wonderful to stay in bed with a book and a pile of dogs. We got to the event by around 7 AM, but my ride time wasn’t scheduled until 1:25 PM, so it was a lot of time standing around and waiting in this misery. I distracted myself by walking my cross-country course for the next day, stuffing hay bags, watering horses, picking horse poop out from the trailer from underneath horse hooves and, when all else failed, and once I was good and soaking wet, sitting huddled on a hay bale under the feet of the horses with the hard rain driving on the metal roof and reading my book (thankfully I remembered to bring a book!)

Everyone was off walking jump courses when it was time for me to start getting Ruby ready for our Dressage ride. I learned very quickly that my horse is quite easy to unload (and load) and deal with in and around the trailer and without cross-ties. It’s definitely a plus to know that I actually can do all of this without help.

Our warm-up went surprisingly well. Typically, the various warm-up activities at these events have not been the highlight for me. All of my tension and worry seems to come to a head here, and if Ruby is going to misbehave, this is where it starts to happen. For Dressage, I can usually tell pretty quickly what horse I’m going to have that day and on Saturday what I had was a light, forward, responsive horse. She was quite nice from the very beginning. Canter transitions are our Achilles heel at the moment and worrying about them causes me some anxiety, so I tend to ask for one or two pretty early in a Dressage warm-up, so that I know what I’m dealing with. But Ruby stepped into the canter beautifully each time I asked, no problem there at all. Her canter in general has gotten much, much better, it’s much more balanced, round and obedient and also easier to ride. However, she was a little resistant to the right on Saturday, resisting the bend and tossing her head some, we’ve had much better right lead canters lately, but she was not offering me her best on Saturday. Still, everything else seemed very good. Very responsive to my leg, willing to bend in each direction, offering impulsion over the back and from behind, even Alison said that she looked good. Surprisingly I also was not very nervous. I remember the wreck that I was back in May & June for my first couple of events and I didn’t feel even remotely like that – perhaps that also helped me to relax and warm-up Ruby without too much tension. Being relatively new to all of this, I still haven’t figured out how much warm-up Ruby needs (or how much I need, for that matter), and I suspect that it’s probably going to vary with her anyway. This day because she was so nice and responsive, I decided that less was more and I walked the last 10 minutes or so of our warm-up time, still doing circle and serpentine figures to keep her working and listening, as well as supple, but not pressing for anything more than that.

Very soon I was on deck for my turn in the Dressage ring. I’ve come to the realization that it’s better to get on the horse a little earlier rather than later. The warm-up time seems to really fly and I do also like to walk Ruby around some before I start, so she can look at everything, and I don’t think it hurts to walk her around after I’ve done most of the warm-up. Of course, every horse is different, but I’d rather be a little early and know I’m in the right place than rushing around to get there and get ready.

We had time to trot around the outside of our Dressage ring a few times before they rang the bell, signaling that I could start. Ruby rode nicely forward and round down the centerline, but I could tell we were not exactly straight – this is one of those things we just haven’t gotten quite right yet, but at least I could recognize it and try to adjust. I have to say that at every movement and figure, she really did listen to what I wanted and tried to comply. A better rider might have been able to get more out of her, but I really was quite pleased, I felt (like I did at King Oak) that we were a team in this, that there was some harmonious flow to our effort. I’d say she stayed pretty round for most of the test, straightness wasn’t great, but bending was better than it has been. And she was very nicely forward, I thought, I was particularly pleased with that. I was very happy with both canter transitions, but her right lead canter was a bit stiff and she tossed her head and resisted some on the circle. Still, the impulsion was nice and she did offer the transition eagerly. Overall, I was quite pleased with everything. At the end of it I felt like we were maybe entering “respectable” territory for our Dressage. Later I was thrilled to learn that we earned a “39” score on our test. Not stellar by most riders’ standards, but really a HUGE improvement for us. At the UNH event in July our Dressage earned us a 54.2, that’s a 15.2 point improvement! I was very, very happy with that. It was also good enough to put us in 7th place for our division. I feel like if we can improve from here, that we may truly be able to be competitive someday.

It was a very long and miserable day for just one little Dressage test, but after all was said and done, I felt like it was pretty worth it. I feel very encouraged that Ruby and I are making progress. It was very disconcerting, however, to finally get home, collapse on the couch and realize that I had to just turn around and do it all over again the next day – GAH!

Note to Self:

When you're really, really pissed off about something, be careful how you stomp around the house, because dogs really don't understand that you're actually not upset with them. They will cringe and cower (or look at you like you're insane, if a Pug) as if you are.

A Note to the Woman Whose GINORMOUS SUV was Blocking the Exit from my Complex this Morning

Does your kid really need a ride, personal escort and cushy spot to wait for the school bus when:

* It's 60 degrees outside.
* It's clear and sunny.
* The walk required to the school bus stop is (at the most) 0.1 of a mile on a private driveway.
* There are other kids to walk and wait with.

I mean, your kid does realize that we all used to walk the entire 10+ miles to school, barefoot and through 3 foot drifts of snow, uphill in both directions, right?

Sheesh.

In a Funk

Have you ever gone through one of those periods where you feel so crappy about yourself, that you feel like you just can’t do anything right? Where you feel so down about yourself that you’re at your happiest when you’re asleep?

I’m kind of going through one of those periods right now. I’m not sure what has caused it, but I sure would like to see the end of it now. In a way, I think I’ve been a bit self-indulgent about it, I think living alone for a long time can do that to a person. When you don’t have anyone to talk to much, someone to stick up for you and to even tell you when you’re being ridiculous, you tend to have a self-dialog that can spiral in the wrong direction fairly easily. I don’t usually mind being single, but it sure can get lonely sometimes, especially as I have little to no close family either.

When I get like this, I also tend to indulge in somewhat self-destructive behavior, like eating a lot of junk food and not exercising. And (of course) the worse my eating habits become, and the longer it’s been since I exercised, the worse I feel about myself and the more I want to eat inappropriately, etc. So that becomes a vicious circle that is very hard to break out of. I feel low, eat some comfort food, hate myself more, need more comfort food, really hate myself -- I’m self-medicating and the worse part of it is, I (obviously) realize what I’m doing, yet I still can’t seem to stop. Crazy. Vicious. Cycle.

Being around Ruby (and horses in general) and riding makes me extremely happy and very often will help me forget about all of this crap, but I haven’t even been out to the barn since last Wednesday! Part of it is that work has interfered a little bit, partially that I’ve had a bug that I’ve been fighting off and have not felt very well, partially because I was so disgusted with how poorly I was riding last week (causing me to hate myself even more) and a good part of it is just this funk that I am in. It is causing me to be in a serious torpor. I have a competition this weekend and there is no way I’m going to be even remotely prepared for it. I almost feel like I should scratch maybe, except that I’ll then hate myself even more if I do, I’m sure. After one unfortunate ride last week, my trainer told me that I’m really too hard on myself, that learning to ride (really ride) is a frustrating, life-long process and that she feels that I’m doing well and am right where I should be (given where I started) and that there are just some things that aren’t going to happen overnight. I know that I should cut myself some slack in this one regard, I know that I’ve only been back to it for a year after a very long absence and, from a distance, I am even a little bit amazed that I’ve been able to compete as I have. But when I come away from an hour on my horse feeling completely incompetent, it’s hard to have some perspective. I can intellectualize that I’ve come along way, that I shouldn’t be so hard on myself, but it’s hard to actually feel that way on an emotional level. I start to feel sorry for the horse too, like I’m not doing her justice at all.

I seem to swing back & forth between confidence and feeling like the most inept person on the planet at work too. Sometimes even over the course of one day. Sometimes I feel plugged in, that I am valuable and contributing significantly and the next moment I can feel like I’m completely clueless and a waste of space. I know that I let these negative thoughts take over my brain too much and that I’m also too easily affected negatively by the overconfidence of some of the people in the office around me. It’s almost like the more that I encounter this overconfidence in some, that my confidence lowers in direct proportion. I know that a lot of this is tied to the economic down-turn of the past year too. Things just feel so uncertain and sketchy and that makes me feel paranoid and unstable and (frankly) scared. Still, the work thing has been a factor for good while now, I don’t know why I suddenly feel worse about it. Probably I’m just in a more vulnerable state of mind and so it’s infiltrating my mind more because of that.

Maybe this is all just a matter of chemistry. I know that when I’m riding consistently (5-6 times a week) that I feel better. If I can manage some other exercise on top of that, even better still, although finding the time is rough. The endorphins and whatever other chemicals produced by the activity seems to keep me on a more even keel. Riding and being around horses also fulfills me beyond that on a more emotional level. I don’t quite know what the answer is, but I have to pull myself out of this funk somehow and hopefully make it a more permanent thing. Cycling endlessly through these periods has become rather old.

King Oak Results Update

They published the final results from the horse trial on Saturday and I see that my time faults on cross-country only ended up pushing me down one place. Either way I would have been out of the ribbons, so I don't feel so bad about it now (not that I really felt that bad about it in the first place!)

King Oak Fall Horse Trials: September 12, 2009

Let me just say, it's a good thing that I have a trainer to push me a bit in this sport. I had had such a great experience at UNH in July, but it was also such an exhausting effort. Worse, I had been jumping out of my skin with nerves for weeks leading up to that day. Once it was all over however, I was on a high about my experience, but also with some amount of relief that I had gotten through it and that I didn't have anything else scheduled just yet. That first week after UNH Alison said that we should talk about what I should do next. I kind of blew it off a bit because I was still a little shell-shocked and slightly overwhelmed (at least mentally) from UNH. So I stalled and didn't make any real decision about any new competitions. And then one day Alison said, "so, I guess you're not really interested in Eventing then." What? Of course I'm interested! So, that pushed me out of my complacency and got me to sign up for the King Oak Fall Horse Trials.


I felt that King Oak was a good choice because Alison had already ridden Ruby in their Spring Horse Trials back in May. So, I knew that she had been fine there and had gotten through everything with no problems. Also, since I had been there as a spectator/groom, I had also seen everything and had even walked the cross-country course at that time myself. I knew that there was nothing on course that would particularly alarm me. Finally, I sent in my entry.

Surprisingly, I didn't have the immediate issue with nerves that I had experienced before UNH. I was kind of able to keep the knowledge of the coming event to the back of my mind and not obsess too much. The last two weeks before the event I stepped up my riding, taking (I think) only one day off. I was in a Dressage lesson last week and very, very frustrated over my inability to accomplish an effective bend with Ruby (especially to the right). She has been out of training board for a while now and I probably have not been insistent enough with my riding to force the issue, which has probably allowed her to become somewhat stiff and more resistant to bending. Alison decided to have a couple of her working students (who are all excellent riders) ride Ruby during the week which seemed to loosen her up quite a bit so that I was able to accomplish bending with her when I rode her in the evenings. This also suppled her up and made getting her on the bit much easier. I feel pretty humbled with how easily the barn girls are able to accomplish this where I cannot. It just really highlights how much work my riding really needs, how much I still need to learn, how much I still need to improve to just be merely adequate. That one lesson early in the week was the low-point, but after that, things started to improve and I started to feel a little more encouraged for the event on Saturday. I was nervous, but I didn't feel wracked with nerves like I did before UNH.

King Oak is in Western Massachusetts, so it's a bit of a haul for us from Southern NH. We left the barn somewhere around 4 AM after doing the barn feeding in the pitch dark and pouring rain (now, that was an interesting experience). I don't really want to think too hard about how little sleep I had had over the last couple of days leading up to the competition. Work has been pretty busy, I've been getting to the office early most days, riding every evening after work, not sleeping well in general. It's enough to say that I was pretty much an exhausted wreck by that morning. However, once we got there, I kind of forgot about all of that. It was pretty wet on the grounds, but the rain we were experiencing in NH was only a cool, gray drizzle or mist in Western MA, so really not that bad at all (bad weather for the event was something that I had been dreading).

Again, I had a long wait for my first scheduled riding time (1:05 PM). I always seem to be the last from our barn scheduled to ride, what's up with that? Anyway, the time really flew with walking of the Stadium and Cross-Country jump courses, helping everyone else, watching some of the Dressage tests and a Stadium course round or two and walking Ruby around to give her a look around the grounds and some grazing time. The walk around the Dressage and Stadium areas worried me a bit because the set-up was reminiscent of the set-up at the Groton House Summer Classic event that had thrown Ruby into such a lather. At that event, she seemed to be particularly spooky and cranky about being able to see glimpses (but not a clear view) of horses in an adjacent area. The Stadium area on Saturday was set up just through a small tree stand on a hill beside the Dressage arenas and warm-up, so I had some misgivings about that, it caused a bit of anxiety for me, but still, I have to say that my nerves never really got too bad.

(Note: the Stadium phase was held in a different location than it had been in the Spring. It was the new set-up on the other side of the trees from Dressage that concerned me for spooking opportunities.)

I should not have worried, because Ruby was fine, I don't think she even gave one spook, maybe just a bit of looking around, but she was otherwise very willing to get to work. After about twenty minutes or so of warm-up, we went in for our dressage test. Our past tests seem to have varied from disastrous to fairly mediocre, this is definitely our weakest phase. But on Saturday it felt to me ... not horrible. It wasn't brilliant by any stretch of the imagination. The score was (again) mediocre. But the difference is, it felt different to me. Ruby was more consistently supple, more consistently on the bit than I've ever felt that she has been before for me. As in the past, I would have some good moments, then lose the frame, have some bad moments, and then have some good moments. But on Saturday I felt that the good moments were far more plentiful this time. She also felt much more balanced to me -- the canter particularly felt like an enormous improvement. She actually cantered around each circle quite round and balanced, stepping under herself and carrying herself together, not heavy on the forehand and strung out and not hollow with the llama-horse neck that she can do, no tossing of her head and resisting contact. I feel that this is huge progress. HUGE! Of course, compared to the pool of competitors on Saturday, we were apparently not wonderful, but I was personally quite thrilled with the test once we were through. I was literally gushing about it. Alison was even very pleased with it and felt that it showed a lot of progress for us. Lastly and most importantly, I felt that Ruby and I worked together as a true team. I usually feel this way about jumping, but Dressage has been more a struggle, more of a fight to eek out some resemblance of something that looks something kind of like "Dressage". This test on Saturday felt far more harmonious than our previous efforts. The judge's comments on the test at the end of the day more-or-less supported how I felt about it. The bottom line basically came down to "needs more consistency", "needs to be more consistent". Well, okay, THIS I can work with. Needing more consistency just means that it needs more work, more practice. It means that we're headed in the right direction. This is encouraging.

For some reason, I was the most nervous about the Stadium Jumping phase. Dressage makes me nervous from a performance stand-point, but I know that I'll at least (most likely) get through it, no matter how ugly it ends up being. Cross-country didn't worry me much because none of the jumps on the course seemed particularly intimidating to me. Plus, I feel like, in a way, it's just my horse and me out there, almost like we're out for a hack in the woods. I can trot if I need to, I can slow down and speed up as I want or feel I need to. I can almost convince myself that we're out there alone and that it's no big deal. SJ, well, I don't know, it freaks me out a little bit. The course can have a lot of twists & turns, the jumps always look bigger to me (I think they're more likely to be the max height than the XC jumps). You know there is always a crowd of people watching. This SJ course was in a field, so there was bit of a terrain element (you definitely were headed up and down hill in places) and it was on grass so you had to worry about footing, especially since there had been a bunch of rain. Also, I felt like I had not done a full stadium course like this in a while. I'm trying to remember, but it seems like my last few jumping lessons have been more of, jump a few SJ jumps in the ring, then jump out of the ring and jumps some stuff out in the field. And I had had some recent jumping lessons where I had jumped very poorly too. So I was worried about it.

Well. Let me say that I shouldn't have worried. Ruby truly is a jumping star. And I think that we're actually quite a nice jumping team, we seem to really understand each other. I was pretty good about remembering to rate her, to bring her back after every jump (she was a bit fresh in that field and wanted to GO). I remembered to constantly balance her and I trusted her to do her job and she listened attentively to my input throughout. I have ridden horses before who want to get very fresh and strong and fast while jumping, and this can very often become a bit of fight to keep them at the pace where you want them, but I never feel this way with Ruby. She will also get fresh and strong and fast, but she listens. I find it very easy to adjust her, to check her slightly here and there and change the pace to what is needed.

Of course, this doesn't mean that I didn't screw up a couple of times. She had gotten a bit speedy downhill towards one jump headed back to the in-gate. She had adjusted very well to my rebalancing efforts and jumped it beautifully. Then it was a hook around the back of the field over a rustic-rail oxer which she jumped nicely, but after that it was a turn back towards the center of the course and we lost some forward momentum. I realized too late that we weren't as forward here as we needed to be and that screwed up our next three fences a little bit. She jumped them fine, touched a rail on fence #6 (but it didn't fall), didn't jump as forward into the combination as she needed to, so she chipped in a third stride to the "out" fence, rather than getting the expected two strides. But she got over them all okay, and I have to say, even with the less-than-perfect distances, my body position did not get in her way (or jump me out of the tack). I think I've made some improvements there as I was able to stick with her nicely, whether the fence was perfect or not so much. Finally, it was over some jump that was stuffed with corn stalks and husks and a turn and then over an oxer and we were over the finish line -- CLEAR! That was a relief. Alison told me that she thought I did a good job with the course and that our round and been "quite respectable". I was frankly thrilled with it. Even Ann (who had been watching from the hill) said that she thought it was very well done.

The last phase was Cross-Country. Because it was only about half an hour after our Stadium phase, I didn't feel that Ruby needed a lot of warm-up. We walked, trotted and cantered around the warm-up field a little bit, but I didn't bother to jump her over any of the practice jumps. I felt that she had jumped enough (and recently enough) and that additional jumps would just tire her out unnecessarily. I also tend to really dislike these warm-ups and sometimes start to psych myself out with bad distances and some ugly efforts, so I felt that keeping our good SJ in round in my head was the best thing for maintaing the right positive frame of mind.

Happily, we did not have to wait too long in the warm-up before they let us over to the starting box for the count-down. We started in this open field over a small stacked log jump and then a turn over this scary-looking jump that was stuffed with corn stalks. Ruby didn't seem to mind and just cantered over everything blithely with an attitude that almost seemed to say, "what's next". From there, we entered the woods and it was another smallish log jump and then down the path a bit was some kind of bench thing all the way over to the side of the trail. The jump wasn't very big or scary, but the position was a little off-putting, still she jumped it with no problem. Down the wooded trail some more and then it was over this narrow wood wall, that had these big hedges growing up on either side (so the available spot to jump was pretty small) and then into another field. Here, as expected, Ruby wanted to get a little fresh and strong (as I imagine most horses do there). Big, wide, open field, what horse doesn't react to that? So I was careful to try and slow her and bring her back to me here. But I think I misjudged a bit and she was probably a little bit strung out because she took the next jump long and flat, taking an early spot, which kind of left me behind. That was our ugly jump on the course, she gamely jumped it and didn't hold a grudge that I caught her in the mouth (although, I did manage to slip the reins some, it was not enough).

From there it was another log and then another bench and then a turn across the field to a combination two-stride. Well, what was supposed to be two strides anyway. Ruby unfortunately broke to a trot a few strides before the first jump (not sure at this point if I had over-adjusted to cause this) and I felt that we were too close at that point for me try and change the pace and gait so I let it go. We jumped into the combination, but she had to chip in a very short third stride to jump out. Still, we got over it okay with minimal drama, so it was fine. From here we were back into the woods and uphill, over an up-bank, uphill some more, around a turn and a red coop (which I suspect was the only max height jump on the course) and then a bit of an uphill gallop to a stack of birch rails, around a turn to another log and down a very steep hill and out of the woods. At this point I realized that our time was not good. We were slow and I didn't feel there was much I could do to catch it back up enough, without flat-out galloping hell-for-leather and I wasn't willing to do that, it's just not safe and not worth the risk. So we picked it up to an appropriate speed and I tried to forget about the time. The second-to-last jump was another bench with a big flower pot in the middle of it. Ruby gave that a very good look, but a little leg squeeze from me and she was over it (nice big bascule over it as she wanted to give that horse-eating flower pot a lot of space), a turn across the field and a last log jump and over the finish line. A quick glance at my watch and I estimated that we were probably about 15-20 seconds over the optimum time. Oh well, we're still learning this stuff. Anyway, we were clean! Clean with time faults, but clean. I will always be very happy about a clean round.

Again, the XC mistakes are a matter of consistency. Ruby is very bold and willing. I have a little bit of bravery and am willing to do "forward". It's just a matter of figuring out the consistency of pacing. When you do have to slow down for obstacles on course, or for turning, or for footing (or for a heart that's racing out of control with adrenalin), how do you make it up. Learning to keep the pace stable and more consistent over most of the course so that you have the leeway to slow down for pieces of it. Anyway, it's all a matter of more practice, more experience, more exposure. I feel confident that I'll get it eventually.

So, overall it was a great day! I feel really good about how we did. Dressage was almost a complete revelation, SJ was close to perfect (well, some negatives, but nothing disastrous) and cross-country was no problem at all, just the pacing that I screwed up, but Ruby was almost perfect. XC is especially amazing considering that our last XC course was at the UNH event in July! Now that I have two sanctioned events under my belt, I feel much more solid about it, and about the division level. I feel a bit more confident and a bit more capable. I feel like the things that went wrong are pretty fixable with some work and practice. It's funny, but even though our overall score was (I think) better than it was at UNH, we placed far more poorly, pulling in at 12th place. That's okay, I feel like overall we've made progress and I was happy with the day. Even the weather managed to hold, never actually flat-out raining. All-in-all it ended up being a great day.

Most. Awesome. Dressage. Ever.

NOTE: When I talk about the Dressage that I do, it does not resemble anything even remotely like this. Just to be clear.

Wow

Today I quite unexpectedly received a certificate of appreciation from a customer for being a team player and helping them out with certain needs. Included with the award was $50 in AMEX gift certificates! Well, color me completely amazed! How sweet of them.

(of course I was so surprised and stunned that I proceeded to turn into some strange person's cubicle while reading the award, instead of making the turn down the aisle that I was supposed to be aiming for. doh!)

Nicolas Sparks Sucks

This post contains spoilers for a couple of sucky movies, so if you care about that, you might not want to read on.

I've read only one Nicolas Sparks book, "Message in a Bottle" -- that was more than enough for me. Sentimental, trite, maudlin crap! And I occasionally like sentimental stuff, but this was too much, even for me. Since then, I've now seen three movies made from his books, "Message in a Bottle", "The Notebook" and (just last night), "Nights in Rodanthe". In every. single. movie. we are treated to a melodramatic death of one (or more!) of the main characters, always in a way that is exploited for maximum emotional impact. As soon as I realized this was a Nicolas Sparks movie, I should have known better and refused to watch. Did I follow my instincts? Not on your life. I thought to myself, 'surely, ALL of his stories can't end the same way?' But no, predictably again, main character: DEAD. Just when the movie has reached it's romantic crescendo too. Whatever. Nicolas Sparks, I am done with you. Done! What amazes me also is that all these relatively good and popular actors continue to agree to be in these crappy movies. I mean, "Nights in Rodanthe" had Diane Lane, Richard Gere and Scott Glenn for chrissakes. What were they thinking???

Things I Will Never Understand

Why I always feel immediately guilty whenever I see a police car, even though I'm not doing anything wrong. (Well, I'm almost never doing anything wrong anyway.)

Note to Self:

When you're browsing around the company cafeteria and nothing really appeals, and you look at something in particular and think to yourself, 'I'll bet that's not very good.' Do yourself a favor and trust your instincts and get a simple salad, or a chicken sandwich, or a yogurt. Because otherwise you might end up throwing that lunch away and end up with something inappropriate like, oh I don't know, a brownie and a Diet Coke, or something. Not that I would know anything about this from experience or anything.

Observations from a Week

You wonder what the grocery clerk REALLY thinks when all that you are buying are a bag of giant carrots, greek yogurt and beer.

It’s shocking what some people consider appropriate work wear on a Friday.

Self-Important-Meeting-Hijack-Guy (SIMHG) being out on vacation = good mood.

SIMHG back in the office = bad mood.

Being stuck on endless meetings with SIMHG = foul mood.

Arriving to work at 7:50 AM on an otherwise quiet Friday to find SIMHG already there = despair.

How many forced security patch install/reboots in a week are necessary and prudent and how many are approaching ridiculous?

Who knew horse chiropractors / vets could be so cute?

You have to question your skills as an equestrian when you jump, not once, but three times into the jump standards in the course of one hour.

Your social life has reached an all-time low, when the high-point of your week is the “special extended” episode of the “Real Housewives of Atlanta”.

You refer to a colleague on a meeting that you are running for a customer by the wrong last name. (You know for a FACT that you did this once, but suspect and fear that it may have actually been twice).

Dogs are very forgiving.

Being able to go to bed early one night and read for a solid hour = complete luxury.

Realizing as you walk around the office one day that your eyes have not stopped rolling once.

Wondering why some women wear so much perfume.

Laughing at how some people love to charge down the hallway to the cafeteria, like there is a prize involved for getting there first or something.

With a hurricane bearing down on New England, the biggest concern on all the news channels is how this will effect the Red Sox schedule.

When a building in Boston needs to be evacuated, it makes the local news. This never happened in NYC. Well, except for on 9/11/2001.

After a week of muttering to your laptop, you expect it to answer.

You’ve spent so much time during the week muttering and cursing under your breath. In. Your. Cubicle. That the intern who sits across the aisle is seriously afraid of you (and finally admits on Friday that he next expects your laptop to come flying his way).

UNH HT Photo

(used with permission)

If I remember correctly, this was the one of the jumps that I was worried about on the first course walk (I think it was fence #7). As you can see, it was really no problem at all.