I love Fridays and how they stretch ahead like a long stretchy thing full of promise, even if they're never quite as long as stretchy as most of us would like them to be. I planned to do some crap but necessary domestic stuff to give me a head start on the weekend but in fact we got a Chinese takeaway, I had a pint of John Smiths and was ready for bed by 10pm. Typically this is what the working week does to me. It's a sad state of affairs.
There's been a lot of discussion on the stallion list about housing that enables them to talk to each other over barriers and as a result of that I've been thinking of more face to face time for my lads. Back when we were on livery I'd always tie Q outside T's stable, thinking Q was the most possessive of his space. Whether that was the case at the time or not, circumstances now are that I have to tie T outside Q's, and the last couple of sessions have been very productive. Lots of snorting, squealing and striking, but also some sweet things, like Q very delicately sniffing all over T's face. Considering the snorting etc as normal boy stuff without it necessarily meaning murders does put whole different slant on the interaction, and it's nice to see them enjoy it.
I don't know what possessed me to think cramming in a gastronomic extravaganza to an already packed schedule was a good idea for Saturday night - I believe it to be a particularly virulent form or optimism. The menu:
mushroom risotto
roast lamb with potatoes dauphinoise and green beans
strawberries marinated in some orangey brandy thing with meringues and chantilly cream.
Sounds fab doesn't it? Yet it was one of those nights where nothing really turns out as good as it should have, which was a bit of an arse. I may have peaked too early on the not insubstantial quantities of wine that I drunk, possibly, which may have had something to do with it. A good night anyway but am no longer cut out for sitting up until 3am.
Especially when there I was up at 7.30 to see to the boys. Made up for it by going back to bed for a while then making a giant fry up and spending a pleasant couple of hours reading - The Rapture.
Finally decided to take the boys next door today to use the neighbour's arena, on one of the wettest, skankiest days in a wet and skanky winter. Q first and my was I glad I worked him in hand first when I witnessed the acrobatics he had up his sleeve. He felt extremely "up" and buzzy when I got on and there followed a conversation about levels of attention with a series of lateral work in walk, which helped some but I also knew he just wanted to MOVE so off we went. God, so, so, so nice to have a proper arena to ride in and we made the most of it with some big extensions across the diagonal - loved it. So did he. Some very nice canter although a bit sticky right lead depart at times; solved that with milling then ask which produced a better transition. Plies better to the right than the left. Piaffe is coming, and nice to be able to see a bit of tuck with the help of the mirrors. Haven't enjoyed riding so much in ags :)
T next - who thought there was a horse chasing him when he caught sight of himself in the mirrors. Also much energy to expend and he came out with some jaw dropping extensions - in fariness so did I, trying to keep up with him. Did some lateral work in hand; LY, SI, milling and finished with piaffe. Was hoping to use mirrors put am so short, coulddn't see from the ground - dommage.
Very pleased indeed with both of them - a great afternoon.
Sunday 21 February 2010
Saturday 13 February 2010
A week of uppy downyness if ever there was one. Tuesday am, at an hour best described as ungodly, Sid sprains his ankle. Goes to work anyway. Comes back late after marathon epic in a lot of pain with ankle swollen like a balloon's doodad, which calls for an immediate strapping and the application of ice. Concern that it might well require hospital visit. Weds morning, he can't put any weight on it and given ongoing lack of flexion in left ankle, is pretty much immobile. Work from home. Tis also day 1 of an endeavour of his of which I am not permitted to speak but which involves a lot of frantic gum chewing and nail biting.
Wednesday afternoon it starts snowing. Quite a bit. Really, quite badly. Continues throughout the night and next morning, you could bet your favourite relative on it, no trains to London. Work from home. In front of roaring fire - yay! And just as well because the people who do the boys (henceforth TPWDTB) couldn't get to us on account of the snow. The news is full of the usual chaos that is visited upon the region whenever there is snow, even though they said they were prepared for it this time.
I had a nasty suspicion that TPWDTB wouldn't make it up to ours in time for Friday's 9am farrier appointment so was inordinately glad I'd requested a short notice day's leave to cover that probability. Ahhh great, and then a whole day off, stretching ahead like a long stretchy thing. I know, I thought, I'll paint the little room. One easy way to compress a long leisurely day of nothingness into a span of time crammed with activity, tiredness and ultimately satisfaction.
I did learn one thing though and it is this: if you wail away to your nanod while painting, try not to do so when there is a conference call between lots of banking types going on downstairs. It could have been worse though; nobody mentioned anything about the background noise of a pack of rabid hyenas savaging a gaggle of rabbits on the lawn, or why a small baby was being summarily strangled while being simultaneously dipped in a vat of boiling acid. There was a time when I'd have been mortified by this, but imagine my horror to find I am now so old that I no longer care. Am now within spitting distance of old batdom, wandering the streets with a pram full of cat food, smelling overpoweringly of urine.
So to horsey doings. Q is a complete sexpot and I love him unreservedly. He was a bit spooky and silly today and I wasn't in the best of humours for a number of reasons (I was going to indulge in a minor irritation here about it all but I find I simply can't be arsed) so it took some mental railroading to get myself into an appropriate place - which actually worked out well this time as it gave me a no nonsense edge for the spooking and I find I have to develop a zen-like state to get my head away from the sodding barking dogs on the farm across the road. They DO NOT STOP all the time we are in there and I must have a word with the farmer about it. If I let the irritation in I'm doomed.
Anyway. He was feeling really nice through his back and I felt quite decent in terms of seat. I have a pic of Julio Borba on my laptop which serves as the ultimate incentive for correct riding - check him out on Facebook! - so I keep that in mind now when riding. The big thing for the day was SI on circles in walk and trot, milling (much better than last week) and culminating in walk pirs, in which there were some really, really nice feeling steps ad the difference appeared to be in the effort we made in collecting and preparing the walk first.
T in hand today and milling for the first time in ages and lots of stretchy bendy stuff. Didn't do any canter work with either of them today, which may have to do ... oh never mind. It's nearly over. V pleased with T who was his overachieving sensitive self.
Wednesday afternoon it starts snowing. Quite a bit. Really, quite badly. Continues throughout the night and next morning, you could bet your favourite relative on it, no trains to London. Work from home. In front of roaring fire - yay! And just as well because the people who do the boys (henceforth TPWDTB) couldn't get to us on account of the snow. The news is full of the usual chaos that is visited upon the region whenever there is snow, even though they said they were prepared for it this time.
I had a nasty suspicion that TPWDTB wouldn't make it up to ours in time for Friday's 9am farrier appointment so was inordinately glad I'd requested a short notice day's leave to cover that probability. Ahhh great, and then a whole day off, stretching ahead like a long stretchy thing. I know, I thought, I'll paint the little room. One easy way to compress a long leisurely day of nothingness into a span of time crammed with activity, tiredness and ultimately satisfaction.
I did learn one thing though and it is this: if you wail away to your nanod while painting, try not to do so when there is a conference call between lots of banking types going on downstairs. It could have been worse though; nobody mentioned anything about the background noise of a pack of rabid hyenas savaging a gaggle of rabbits on the lawn, or why a small baby was being summarily strangled while being simultaneously dipped in a vat of boiling acid. There was a time when I'd have been mortified by this, but imagine my horror to find I am now so old that I no longer care. Am now within spitting distance of old batdom, wandering the streets with a pram full of cat food, smelling overpoweringly of urine.
So to horsey doings. Q is a complete sexpot and I love him unreservedly. He was a bit spooky and silly today and I wasn't in the best of humours for a number of reasons (I was going to indulge in a minor irritation here about it all but I find I simply can't be arsed) so it took some mental railroading to get myself into an appropriate place - which actually worked out well this time as it gave me a no nonsense edge for the spooking and I find I have to develop a zen-like state to get my head away from the sodding barking dogs on the farm across the road. They DO NOT STOP all the time we are in there and I must have a word with the farmer about it. If I let the irritation in I'm doomed.
Anyway. He was feeling really nice through his back and I felt quite decent in terms of seat. I have a pic of Julio Borba on my laptop which serves as the ultimate incentive for correct riding - check him out on Facebook! - so I keep that in mind now when riding. The big thing for the day was SI on circles in walk and trot, milling (much better than last week) and culminating in walk pirs, in which there were some really, really nice feeling steps ad the difference appeared to be in the effort we made in collecting and preparing the walk first.
T in hand today and milling for the first time in ages and lots of stretchy bendy stuff. Didn't do any canter work with either of them today, which may have to do ... oh never mind. It's nearly over. V pleased with T who was his overachieving sensitive self.
Saturday 6 February 2010
A bit of a day
Christ, well, it's been an action-packed 24 hours. Went to put the boys' jim jams on as usual when I got home from work last night and checked the charge on the electric fence, also as usual. Less usual was the significantly depleted charge, a telltale indication that Something's Up. Arses. On the coldest night of year too.
Grabbed torch and went off down the field, getting more bamboozled with every step on the basis that the fence seemed intact. The current on T's side was fine, then nothing on Q's. Clearly something was awry.
There followed what turned out to be the pleasant interlude of the evening, taking the pooch for a walk in the dark and collecting Sid from the station at about 7.30, then back to the troubleshooting. Soon enough the inescapable conclusion arrived that all the work I had so proudly done on Sunday in replacing knots with proper metal joiners, was completely wrong. ARSES! It's one thing to be out all night on the coldest sodding night of the year, so cold that only two woolly hats will do, so cold that my thumb actually came within a hair's breadth of dropping off, so cold that we could no longer feel our feet and so damn cold that it took approximately six hours to defrost afterwards, and quite another to do all that knowing that it's All Your Fault. What a twat! What blondeness! What pointless fuckwittery! I must say that good humour was maintained throughout, which must constitute some sort of miracle. There's only one thing to do in that sort of situation and that is to completely give oneself over to the piss taking that follows. And giggle a lot.
And so it was that we clustered around the woodburner to defrost, we ate some food and watched a programme about downhill skiers and then went to bed rather later than usual. This morning I felt like I'd been battered comprehensively with a big stick, and Sid felt much the same. Then he twisted his ankle very badly walking to the station this morning and a kind resident came out to offer assistance - bless her. I think it was the resonant "Fuck! Oh fuck! Arrgggghhhhh" that drew her from the warmth of her house, although I can't be certain. The ankle quickly swelled and I wanted to get him home but not, he had to get to work, and is still there as I write.
And the final ramification of these nocturnal noodlings was that I managed to fall asleep at a station two steps along the line from where I ordinarily like to get off, slept through the penultimate station without realising an unbeknownst to me jolted awake at my station but convinced myself it was the one before. However, there's no escaping the message from that pit one gets in one's stomach at times like this and reality hit when we pulled in at the next stop and I saw that I had missed my station completely. On then, to the next main station from where I could get a return train, and back home, eventually.
Some days are best left behind as soon as is humanly possible.
Grabbed torch and went off down the field, getting more bamboozled with every step on the basis that the fence seemed intact. The current on T's side was fine, then nothing on Q's. Clearly something was awry.
There followed what turned out to be the pleasant interlude of the evening, taking the pooch for a walk in the dark and collecting Sid from the station at about 7.30, then back to the troubleshooting. Soon enough the inescapable conclusion arrived that all the work I had so proudly done on Sunday in replacing knots with proper metal joiners, was completely wrong. ARSES! It's one thing to be out all night on the coldest sodding night of the year, so cold that only two woolly hats will do, so cold that my thumb actually came within a hair's breadth of dropping off, so cold that we could no longer feel our feet and so damn cold that it took approximately six hours to defrost afterwards, and quite another to do all that knowing that it's All Your Fault. What a twat! What blondeness! What pointless fuckwittery! I must say that good humour was maintained throughout, which must constitute some sort of miracle. There's only one thing to do in that sort of situation and that is to completely give oneself over to the piss taking that follows. And giggle a lot.
And so it was that we clustered around the woodburner to defrost, we ate some food and watched a programme about downhill skiers and then went to bed rather later than usual. This morning I felt like I'd been battered comprehensively with a big stick, and Sid felt much the same. Then he twisted his ankle very badly walking to the station this morning and a kind resident came out to offer assistance - bless her. I think it was the resonant "Fuck! Oh fuck! Arrgggghhhhh" that drew her from the warmth of her house, although I can't be certain. The ankle quickly swelled and I wanted to get him home but not, he had to get to work, and is still there as I write.
And the final ramification of these nocturnal noodlings was that I managed to fall asleep at a station two steps along the line from where I ordinarily like to get off, slept through the penultimate station without realising an unbeknownst to me jolted awake at my station but convinced myself it was the one before. However, there's no escaping the message from that pit one gets in one's stomach at times like this and reality hit when we pulled in at the next stop and I saw that I had missed my station completely. On then, to the next main station from where I could get a return train, and back home, eventually.
Some days are best left behind as soon as is humanly possible.
Well there's no end to the amount of stuff there is to do. Sid's had a couple of days off (meaning I have to get up on my own at 5.40am on school days, a complete hairy set of testicles of a task) and has been sanding down the bathroom, then emerging covered in bits and looking like a zombie.
We've been up and at it since before 8am this morning which on the one hand is very wrong for a Saturday, but also makes for getting lots of stuff done on the other. Always a juggle, that one. Nevertheless I'm not going to start writing about DIY, I'm just not.
Q was full of it today but it was good to have more energy to work with. More and more the piaffe steps float up to the surface when I prepare my own posture; love that. We played with reinback to canter for the first time in ages and some 6m voltes. He nearly shat himself when a horse went past on the road, but bend is your friend and he got some milling in trot for his trouble. Very good lad and lots of fun - the good thing about only being able to ride at the weekend is that you really, really enjoy it.
I decided to work T at liberty and was pleased I had because he was a wild man :O it's ages since he's been quite that nuts and it all kicked off because some people had the temerity to be walking along the road, TALKING. I know, it's an outrage. For my part I stood in the middle and watched the show which comprised but was not restricted to caprioles, big trots and a very interesting spin-buck-airborne change direction manouevre that I never, ever want to try to ride through. Put him through loads of changes of transition when there was some degree of attention but he still wasn't in a place to come and engage in any meaningful way, so threw in some directional changes and keeping him in corners for a time of my choosing, then slowly he was there and we were able to do some close work on either rein at liberty, which was all I wanted to achieve.
Finally got to sit down about 8.30 or so with what I hoped would be nice but turned out to be quite disappointing fillet steak and a pint of John Smiths.
We've been up and at it since before 8am this morning which on the one hand is very wrong for a Saturday, but also makes for getting lots of stuff done on the other. Always a juggle, that one. Nevertheless I'm not going to start writing about DIY, I'm just not.
Q was full of it today but it was good to have more energy to work with. More and more the piaffe steps float up to the surface when I prepare my own posture; love that. We played with reinback to canter for the first time in ages and some 6m voltes. He nearly shat himself when a horse went past on the road, but bend is your friend and he got some milling in trot for his trouble. Very good lad and lots of fun - the good thing about only being able to ride at the weekend is that you really, really enjoy it.
I decided to work T at liberty and was pleased I had because he was a wild man :O it's ages since he's been quite that nuts and it all kicked off because some people had the temerity to be walking along the road, TALKING. I know, it's an outrage. For my part I stood in the middle and watched the show which comprised but was not restricted to caprioles, big trots and a very interesting spin-buck-airborne change direction manouevre that I never, ever want to try to ride through. Put him through loads of changes of transition when there was some degree of attention but he still wasn't in a place to come and engage in any meaningful way, so threw in some directional changes and keeping him in corners for a time of my choosing, then slowly he was there and we were able to do some close work on either rein at liberty, which was all I wanted to achieve.
Finally got to sit down about 8.30 or so with what I hoped would be nice but turned out to be quite disappointing fillet steak and a pint of John Smiths.
Tuesday 2 February 2010
Jesus. You know you've spent far too long on the yard when you can do lates on your way back from your first visit after work. Yes, Q had tap danced on the electric fence and broken a number of insulators, necessitating a pleasant, frosty evening spent replacing said insulators and re-running the fence, while he munched haylage in a despicably contented fashion throughout. He might as well have had "what, me?" tattooed on the back of his head, the swine! Back indoors to find it was after 9pm.
Stallions *sigh*
Stallions *sigh*
Monday 1 February 2010
New Year slackness
Christ! I can't believe it's about six WEEKS since I last wrote anything here. Me bad/crap/slack/busy as buggery.
Christmas came and went, two whole weeks off work which began unpromisingly with some Satan's lurgy and which culminated in me losing (a) my voice and (b) any ability to leave the house unaided for any Christmas-related doings. Dommage. We'd already decided not to "do" Christmas in terms of presents and actually that was fab. Much better than that whole barnyard dance of wondering whether you're going to get anything good this year, and equally wondering if any of the things you bought are actually any good. Far better to just get up and start eating.
Also to remember for next year: no relatives allowed for more than 4 days at a time. Evah.
Relatives notwithstanding we did have a rare old time and really enjoyed the new house with lots of drinking, dancing and merriment. New resolution to grab with both hands opportunities to cut loose for a bit, for they are much needed, and they are fun.
With due praise for all that is holy, the picadeiro is finished and it has been in regular use, not only for work but also as a safe turnout area when the fields are frozen into peaks and troughs. A real life saver, especially throughout the snow and blizzards and quite ridiculous wintry weather that we have experienced. Notwithstanding that, it surprises me just how much time the boys spend indoors of their own volition. As long as they're happy, it's cool with me.
What a drag getting back to work in Jan but that's passed now and am back in that productive mode that really enjoys being busy and getting stuff done.
The big thing is just how much we are enjoying being in our new home; it's just amazing. It's taken a while for it to sink in and now that it has I keep walking into bubbles of complete, unadulterated joy, often completely unexpectedly. Found myself capering about the fields with the pooch in a state of what might almost be described as gay abandon the other day, and I can say with some authority that I can't remember the last time I did that.
The boys look happy too; Q is still a spookmeister when allowed to get in my head with it and T is developing into Mr Serene. The picadeiro is the ideal spot for me to get back into riding him with confidence.
And that's me really, all catchy uppyed.
Christmas came and went, two whole weeks off work which began unpromisingly with some Satan's lurgy and which culminated in me losing (a) my voice and (b) any ability to leave the house unaided for any Christmas-related doings. Dommage. We'd already decided not to "do" Christmas in terms of presents and actually that was fab. Much better than that whole barnyard dance of wondering whether you're going to get anything good this year, and equally wondering if any of the things you bought are actually any good. Far better to just get up and start eating.
Also to remember for next year: no relatives allowed for more than 4 days at a time. Evah.
Relatives notwithstanding we did have a rare old time and really enjoyed the new house with lots of drinking, dancing and merriment. New resolution to grab with both hands opportunities to cut loose for a bit, for they are much needed, and they are fun.
With due praise for all that is holy, the picadeiro is finished and it has been in regular use, not only for work but also as a safe turnout area when the fields are frozen into peaks and troughs. A real life saver, especially throughout the snow and blizzards and quite ridiculous wintry weather that we have experienced. Notwithstanding that, it surprises me just how much time the boys spend indoors of their own volition. As long as they're happy, it's cool with me.
What a drag getting back to work in Jan but that's passed now and am back in that productive mode that really enjoys being busy and getting stuff done.
The big thing is just how much we are enjoying being in our new home; it's just amazing. It's taken a while for it to sink in and now that it has I keep walking into bubbles of complete, unadulterated joy, often completely unexpectedly. Found myself capering about the fields with the pooch in a state of what might almost be described as gay abandon the other day, and I can say with some authority that I can't remember the last time I did that.
The boys look happy too; Q is still a spookmeister when allowed to get in my head with it and T is developing into Mr Serene. The picadeiro is the ideal spot for me to get back into riding him with confidence.
And that's me really, all catchy uppyed.
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