I left work early yesterday feeling rather poo, and spent the afternoon sleeping, pausing only to cast a bleary eye over the quick fencing job Pheel's boys had done to make a corral for Mr T so that he wouldn't have to be confined to his stable for his prescribed rest period, but nor was he going to have room to charge about. Slept for a further 10 hours or so overnight, which seemed to do the trick, but for the second weekend running managed a relaxed morning just in case. I could get used to that, which of course is dangerous. Here at the scrag end of winter, everyone is tired and fed up, and the constant pissing rain does nobody any favours.
Arranged with M a lesson at short notice and wasn't at all sure it would go ahead on account of the aforementioned persistence, but resolved to go and work Q regardless. His opening gambit when I appeared with the head collar was to gallop off with his tail in the air and stand there snorting, then gallop back up the field to wait for me to trudge up to him through the soggy ground. He likes to do this every now and then and we have an unspoken arrangement that he will then stand and wait for me once he's done.The trouble of course with this is that it means his undercarriage is a mud slick and I have to spend ages hosing off his legs - and in this case, his belly. Meh - he wasn't expecting that! The look he gave me was quite splendid.
A quick lunge to warm up on account of not being ridden through the week, and he was about to start throwing some shapes again when he spied that Someone (T) had recently had a roll in the arena and would have got down on his knees there and then had I not been ready for it. He then spotted the mares grazing next to the fence and put on his best trot until I reminded him that he hadn't warmed up yet and proceeded more sedately. He was quite fine after that, producing some nice stretching work through his top line - until I got on at least, at which point he began frisking like a spring lamb (translation from the expression on the back his head: "look girls, look at me! Me!" but the application of laterals helped him regain his sense of decorum and attention to Mother, and we agreed that he could leave his testosterone excesses in a sack at the side of the arena for the duration.
We spent quite a bit of time in walk in various exercises on a circle between milling, shoulder in and straightness, slowly for the carrying effect and looking for him to extend his neck a bit further, or as Mandy put it, to have the brow band an inch further forward. This went well on the right rein but on the left rein not so easy. He kept wanting to swing his bum in or escape through the outside shoulder, so we addressed this by the slightest hint of outside bend and laying the whip against his left hip. When we had a good walk, up to trot, quite a collected one and repeating the exercises. I could feel my legs floating rather disturbingly rather than draping his sides; thinking both legs as outside leg and hugging as though for piaffe did help matters although at ties I felt my hips torque as though asking for travers and again the bum would come in. Arg. He was wriggling like a giant Iberian slug so the solution to this was more forwards and straight, which of course helped hugely and then we were able to collect a bit and get a better effort. At the end we managed collection and SI and a lengthening of the neck for a few strides - bloody tough and the expression on the back of his head was priceless, but we did it. Given fitness levels we finished there, very pleased.
I have noticed that the top line muscle is developing pleasingly in front of and behind the wither, so we must be doing something right.
Next, our much anticipated outing tomorrow, which will involve divesting ourselves of all evidence of what we do at home before we set off. Cryptic huh?
Saturday 26 February 2011
Wednesday 23 February 2011
The daily commute
As a seasoned commuter, I have ample opportunity to ponder the plethora of irritations that present themselves in all their artery-clenching glory on a daily basis and, in an effort to stave off the growing urge to run amok with a range of sharp implements, I've been idly considering an array of measures and counter-measures that might be employed under certain circumstances. For the purposes of this largely theoretical exercise I intend to set aside considerations pertaining to karma and the projected maturity levels one might expect of a professional person nestling on just the wrong side of 40.
For my part, I just want to sit quietly on the train, if sit on it I must, whether it be to read the paper, a book, do some work or just snooze quietly in preparation for the day ahead. Many of my commuting counterparts clearly wish for the same thing, and indeed it is sometimes possible to do those things when fortune smiles down and those of a like mind find themselves nestled together in the same section of a carriage. On those days there is a quiet camaraderie that steals about the carriage, misty tendrils of shared contentment that swirl around our feet, distributing a wave of bonhomie and goodwill to all men. But mostly we are persistently denied this small mercy by an impressive array inconveniences and irritations that range from the mildly annoying to the all out butt-clenching, synapse-frazzling inconsideration perpetrated upon our gentle persons by that signifncant percentage of the commuting population that singularly refuses to give a flying fuck about the effect of their actions upon their neighbours. It's a microcosm of the mores of contemporary society, the entitlement freakery of the modern age that really and truly Boils My Brain.
So let's see, some examples.
The MP3 player
On the one hand a miracle of modern technology and personal freedom; on the other a rage-inducing vehicle of wrongness in the wrong hands. Is there anything worse than that persistent tinny "ch ch ch" that permeates the carriage, scientifically proven to interrupt brain waves that would otherwise be absorbed in reading or quietly snoozing in preparation for the day ahead? Being British is of course an active hindrance in this sort of situation, hard wired as we are to sit and fume in silence rather than piping up to ask the offender if they could just turn it down a bit. I do it myself, my ire fuelled by the knowledge of just what a futile, impotent response this is, but doing it all the same just in case the perp turns out to be a knife-wielding maniac.
Proposed response: calmly walk up to the offender, remove one headphone from their ear and yell "arrrrghhhhhhh" at approximately 80db directly in their ear. Alternatively, pluck the item from their lap and jump up and down on it after the fashion of Basil Fawlty, before calmly returning to one's seat and re-commencing one's business with paper/book/snooze.
The Mobile Phone User
This runs a close second in the irritation stakes. Dear user, I really could not give a rat's ass about your need to arrange or rearrange your meeting, your childcare or your doctor's appointment. I couldn't give a monkey's bum about your meeting with Mike from accounts or your projected sales figures for Q3. Small furry creatures would take wing from my butt before I could bring myself to raise even a modicum of concern for your apparent need to bang on and on ad infinitum about your latest business trip or what your kids did at the weekend. And if I hear the refrain "I'm on the train" one more time, I might just jump up and down on the spot having a fit of the screaming ab dabs more usually associated with Violet Elizabeth Bott than a middle aged, chronically fatigued middle manager from Kent.The thing that really does me in about this is that particular type of self-satisfied "I'm imporant, I am" air that people often have about them while engaging in this sort of behaviour, especially when set against the raging juxtaposition of the fact that everyone else just wants to ram the sodding phone down their throat.
Proposed response: a direct steal from Trigger Happy TV. Simply take out an oversized mobile phone, have it ring and then answer it, yelling expansively into it in a one sided conversation so (a) banal or (b) thoroughly ridiculous as to leave everyone nearby floored with shock, and the perp simply unable to continue. Mostly I like to maintain a low footprint when on the train, but it would be well worth the ignominy associated with such blatant attention grabbing just to make a bloody point.
The Gaggle
This generally falls into one of two types. Either it's a gaggle of the sort of women who seem only to talk about weddings, engagements, babies and shoes, or it's blokes who talk incessantly about football.Actually no, now I consider it, there's a third type which is possibly even more annoying - young people whose conversation seems to consist only of persistent AQI and liberal sprinklings of "like" in every sentence.
Proposed response: simply ape the conversation in a loud, caracatured imitation of the topics and inflections most commonly employed by your selected victims. There's no need for a partner in this endeavour; I posit that talking loudly to oneself in this situation would be just as effective, without the need for an accomplice.
The Elbow Rest Hogger
Invariably it is blokes who usually feel the need to commandeer the elbow rest. Were I to commission a scientific study of the phenomenomenon, the findings would inevitably lead to a clear inverse relationship between this activity and penis size (and possibly dysfunction). This is closely linked to those people (again, invariably blokes) who feel compelled to sit with their legs akimbo in that well know "here are my genitals, please touch" posture. This is irritating at the best of times, but much worse when it means you find yourself squashed up against some bugger's fat hairy thigh because they refuse to keep their legs together.
Proposed response: I have two ideas for this, depending on whether I am in a protagonistic or defensive stance. Protagonist approach: at the flick of a switch, activate your stealth elbow spike which emerges at speed, spinning at a velocity guaranteed to cause maximum damage to the offending forearm. Defensive approach: engage a perspex barrier that shoots up at the precise equidistant boundary between the seats, thus categorising absolutely your space and theirs and putting an immediate and satisfying end to petty personal space contests.
There is plenty, plenty more where this came from, but I fear I must go do lates before someone calls the police.
For my part, I just want to sit quietly on the train, if sit on it I must, whether it be to read the paper, a book, do some work or just snooze quietly in preparation for the day ahead. Many of my commuting counterparts clearly wish for the same thing, and indeed it is sometimes possible to do those things when fortune smiles down and those of a like mind find themselves nestled together in the same section of a carriage. On those days there is a quiet camaraderie that steals about the carriage, misty tendrils of shared contentment that swirl around our feet, distributing a wave of bonhomie and goodwill to all men. But mostly we are persistently denied this small mercy by an impressive array inconveniences and irritations that range from the mildly annoying to the all out butt-clenching, synapse-frazzling inconsideration perpetrated upon our gentle persons by that signifncant percentage of the commuting population that singularly refuses to give a flying fuck about the effect of their actions upon their neighbours. It's a microcosm of the mores of contemporary society, the entitlement freakery of the modern age that really and truly Boils My Brain.
So let's see, some examples.
The MP3 player
On the one hand a miracle of modern technology and personal freedom; on the other a rage-inducing vehicle of wrongness in the wrong hands. Is there anything worse than that persistent tinny "ch ch ch" that permeates the carriage, scientifically proven to interrupt brain waves that would otherwise be absorbed in reading or quietly snoozing in preparation for the day ahead? Being British is of course an active hindrance in this sort of situation, hard wired as we are to sit and fume in silence rather than piping up to ask the offender if they could just turn it down a bit. I do it myself, my ire fuelled by the knowledge of just what a futile, impotent response this is, but doing it all the same just in case the perp turns out to be a knife-wielding maniac.
Proposed response: calmly walk up to the offender, remove one headphone from their ear and yell "arrrrghhhhhhh" at approximately 80db directly in their ear. Alternatively, pluck the item from their lap and jump up and down on it after the fashion of Basil Fawlty, before calmly returning to one's seat and re-commencing one's business with paper/book/snooze.
The Mobile Phone User
This runs a close second in the irritation stakes. Dear user, I really could not give a rat's ass about your need to arrange or rearrange your meeting, your childcare or your doctor's appointment. I couldn't give a monkey's bum about your meeting with Mike from accounts or your projected sales figures for Q3. Small furry creatures would take wing from my butt before I could bring myself to raise even a modicum of concern for your apparent need to bang on and on ad infinitum about your latest business trip or what your kids did at the weekend. And if I hear the refrain "I'm on the train" one more time, I might just jump up and down on the spot having a fit of the screaming ab dabs more usually associated with Violet Elizabeth Bott than a middle aged, chronically fatigued middle manager from Kent.The thing that really does me in about this is that particular type of self-satisfied "I'm imporant, I am" air that people often have about them while engaging in this sort of behaviour, especially when set against the raging juxtaposition of the fact that everyone else just wants to ram the sodding phone down their throat.
Proposed response: a direct steal from Trigger Happy TV. Simply take out an oversized mobile phone, have it ring and then answer it, yelling expansively into it in a one sided conversation so (a) banal or (b) thoroughly ridiculous as to leave everyone nearby floored with shock, and the perp simply unable to continue. Mostly I like to maintain a low footprint when on the train, but it would be well worth the ignominy associated with such blatant attention grabbing just to make a bloody point.
The Gaggle
This generally falls into one of two types. Either it's a gaggle of the sort of women who seem only to talk about weddings, engagements, babies and shoes, or it's blokes who talk incessantly about football.Actually no, now I consider it, there's a third type which is possibly even more annoying - young people whose conversation seems to consist only of persistent AQI and liberal sprinklings of "like" in every sentence.
Proposed response: simply ape the conversation in a loud, caracatured imitation of the topics and inflections most commonly employed by your selected victims. There's no need for a partner in this endeavour; I posit that talking loudly to oneself in this situation would be just as effective, without the need for an accomplice.
The Elbow Rest Hogger
Invariably it is blokes who usually feel the need to commandeer the elbow rest. Were I to commission a scientific study of the phenomenomenon, the findings would inevitably lead to a clear inverse relationship between this activity and penis size (and possibly dysfunction). This is closely linked to those people (again, invariably blokes) who feel compelled to sit with their legs akimbo in that well know "here are my genitals, please touch" posture. This is irritating at the best of times, but much worse when it means you find yourself squashed up against some bugger's fat hairy thigh because they refuse to keep their legs together.
Proposed response: I have two ideas for this, depending on whether I am in a protagonistic or defensive stance. Protagonist approach: at the flick of a switch, activate your stealth elbow spike which emerges at speed, spinning at a velocity guaranteed to cause maximum damage to the offending forearm. Defensive approach: engage a perspex barrier that shoots up at the precise equidistant boundary between the seats, thus categorising absolutely your space and theirs and putting an immediate and satisfying end to petty personal space contests.
There is plenty, plenty more where this came from, but I fear I must go do lates before someone calls the police.
Sunday 20 February 2011
Horses and food, food and horses
Saturday was a lovely relaxing day, and it's not often I get to say that as you know. Nor is it very often that I get to stay in bed until 10am with a nice cup of tea, or operate a strict policy of avoidance when it comes to the usual Saturday doings involving shopping and the weekly pilgrimage to the local feed merchant. Indeed, even the weekly visit to the local farm shop has been replaced by a home delivery service of the finest local produce. Happy days.
And so it was that Sid and Nik Nak Chunky went off to Waitrose while I tootled around at home, tidying and pimping a suitable percentage of the homestead into a more reasonable state. Even that was quite relaxing when set alongside the fact that there was No Real Need To Go Anywhere. Of course, the weather was shit. Even setting aside the fact that this is England, the weather has been phenomenally shit. Rain, rain, rain, rain. The water table is saturated, the fields are under water and there's persistent cloud and unpleasantness. Argh.
Anyway. Sid had announced his desire to cook and was busy throughout the afternoon making preps while I did the boys. Rode Q, who was on excellent form, although he seems to think that throwing some shapes on the lunge is now an important part of his warm up routine. We went through our lateral work and looked to get a little more bend in the half pass. Very nice effort to the left but couldn't get past the head tilt to the right. Should have either done more warm up or been less crap. Went looking for some more collection and suspension in the trot or alternatively half steps into canter for a nice collected gait. Feeling puckish I did some plie and counter canter, and the most notable thing was that he maintained the counter canter on the right rein, where often he will do a change. Really pleased with the way he worked.
Gave Knickers a lesson on him, during which she did her first sitting trot without stirrups and I enjoyed regaling her with a number of unpleasant analogies to get her to stretch through her body. Meh. Feeling puckish, I decided to give her brief introduction to lateral work on the lunge, asking Q to leg yield on either rein, counting the inside hind for her and getting her to explain what she felt. I was going to demonstrate some shoulder in for her but Q was giving me evils and I decided to leave it there. Really pleased with Nik Nak, she presented quite an elegant picture which was really pleasing. The next thing is to try and get past the bit where the brain kicks in and says "hang on a minute, what the fuck are you doing?" and the balance is lost.
Meanwhile T was feeling very lively and well, putting on a nice passage for Q and generally being full of beans. He looked pretty much 100% aside from the odd moment but then later he wasn't sound again and today he was sound only in walk. So I think it's time for't vitnery.
A friend of ours came round to drop off a sack of feed which she'd borrowed in extremis. Ordinarily this would have been a straightforward task were it not for the fact that the front gate had been locked, I didn't have my phone on me and nobody heard her yelling for attention, so the only thing left to her was to clamber over said gate with a 20Kg sack of feed. Whoops!
The rest of the evening was largely taken up thus:
Food
Home made ravioli of two varieties: walnut & gorgonzola and asparagus, St Agur & bacon, served in a delicate broth
Pan fried duck breast with sauteed potatoes, braised fennel, baked chicory, Japanese mushrooms and a red wine reduction
Pear tarte tatin
I can say Jesus wept, it was a glory to eat. I've never eaten braised fennel before and it set the duck off particularly well. I also must concur with Sid that a pear only tatin is an inferior version; apples do seem to lend a particularly necessary flavour to the proceedings.
Drinks
A nice Amarone
Sounds
Lynard Skynard, the Stones, Rodrigo y Gabriela.
Sunday
Today has been rather less relaxing. I decided that the time had come to sort out the giant mound of wood chips in the middle of the picadeiro. By sort out, I mean transfer to wheelbarrow and distribute about the place then rake it out to a state of relative evenness. Like many other farm jobs, it sounds easy but is in fact hours of back breaking work. The dogs saw fit to gambol and play on and around the pile throughout, pausing only to run around like a mad thing (Willow) or sit and catch a breather on account of being persistently harassed by an exuberant young puppy (Dora).
Broke for lunch, whereupon it was decided that a fry up would be just the thing. As in all things, there are some fundamental religious differences between members of Luso Towers on the matter of fry ups. Sid, for example, is adamant that toast is the way forward and that you can't have a fry up without beans, whereas I am quite happy to have fried tomatoes instead and would rather have fried bread. Sid thinks this is wrong on two fronts: first, that tomatoes should only be eaten "as God intended" and second, that fried bread is the work of Satan. My contention however is that there's nothing like a bit of fried bread under the right circumstances, provided that it is cooked correctly, which few people do. I'd never order it at a greasy spoon, for example, but cooked properly it needn't be a dripping oily mass of rancid cholesterol on a plate. I did wonder if this preference was a result of my working class roots, but Sid's contention was that fry ups generally are inherently working class, and that posh people tend to eat Alpen :)
This afternoon I brought the mares with me into the picadeiro, what with their field being a mud bath. Let it be said that they are just as capable of throwing a wide and impressive array of moves as the boys, and delighted in a spree of bucking, spinning and charging about, or at least as much as letting off steam in a 20x20 space allows. Awesone girlies with their lovely big bellies. Meanwhile I carried on about my toil, occasionally stopping to enjoy the show. Some while later I became dimly aware that something was not quite as it should be, and I realised it was because there was a quality to Q's neigh that I hadn't heard before, so I looked up and bugger me, the girls had let themselves out of the picadeiro and were mooching about the yard! Bastards. So I gathered them up and returned them to the picadeiro, and tied a leadrope around the gate. Ha. The expression on their faces was priceless. The equine version of "what, me?".
And so to the conclusion of another weekend which has once again proven itself not to be nearly long or stretchy enough. To wrap up, another Sid special Chinese noodle soup with duck, pak choi and Chinese mushrooms. Nom.
And so it was that Sid and Nik Nak Chunky went off to Waitrose while I tootled around at home, tidying and pimping a suitable percentage of the homestead into a more reasonable state. Even that was quite relaxing when set alongside the fact that there was No Real Need To Go Anywhere. Of course, the weather was shit. Even setting aside the fact that this is England, the weather has been phenomenally shit. Rain, rain, rain, rain. The water table is saturated, the fields are under water and there's persistent cloud and unpleasantness. Argh.
Anyway. Sid had announced his desire to cook and was busy throughout the afternoon making preps while I did the boys. Rode Q, who was on excellent form, although he seems to think that throwing some shapes on the lunge is now an important part of his warm up routine. We went through our lateral work and looked to get a little more bend in the half pass. Very nice effort to the left but couldn't get past the head tilt to the right. Should have either done more warm up or been less crap. Went looking for some more collection and suspension in the trot or alternatively half steps into canter for a nice collected gait. Feeling puckish I did some plie and counter canter, and the most notable thing was that he maintained the counter canter on the right rein, where often he will do a change. Really pleased with the way he worked.
Gave Knickers a lesson on him, during which she did her first sitting trot without stirrups and I enjoyed regaling her with a number of unpleasant analogies to get her to stretch through her body. Meh. Feeling puckish, I decided to give her brief introduction to lateral work on the lunge, asking Q to leg yield on either rein, counting the inside hind for her and getting her to explain what she felt. I was going to demonstrate some shoulder in for her but Q was giving me evils and I decided to leave it there. Really pleased with Nik Nak, she presented quite an elegant picture which was really pleasing. The next thing is to try and get past the bit where the brain kicks in and says "hang on a minute, what the fuck are you doing?" and the balance is lost.
Meanwhile T was feeling very lively and well, putting on a nice passage for Q and generally being full of beans. He looked pretty much 100% aside from the odd moment but then later he wasn't sound again and today he was sound only in walk. So I think it's time for't vitnery.
A friend of ours came round to drop off a sack of feed which she'd borrowed in extremis. Ordinarily this would have been a straightforward task were it not for the fact that the front gate had been locked, I didn't have my phone on me and nobody heard her yelling for attention, so the only thing left to her was to clamber over said gate with a 20Kg sack of feed. Whoops!
The rest of the evening was largely taken up thus:
Food
Home made ravioli of two varieties: walnut & gorgonzola and asparagus, St Agur & bacon, served in a delicate broth
Pan fried duck breast with sauteed potatoes, braised fennel, baked chicory, Japanese mushrooms and a red wine reduction
Pear tarte tatin
I can say Jesus wept, it was a glory to eat. I've never eaten braised fennel before and it set the duck off particularly well. I also must concur with Sid that a pear only tatin is an inferior version; apples do seem to lend a particularly necessary flavour to the proceedings.
Drinks
A nice Amarone
Sounds
Lynard Skynard, the Stones, Rodrigo y Gabriela.
Sunday
Today has been rather less relaxing. I decided that the time had come to sort out the giant mound of wood chips in the middle of the picadeiro. By sort out, I mean transfer to wheelbarrow and distribute about the place then rake it out to a state of relative evenness. Like many other farm jobs, it sounds easy but is in fact hours of back breaking work. The dogs saw fit to gambol and play on and around the pile throughout, pausing only to run around like a mad thing (Willow) or sit and catch a breather on account of being persistently harassed by an exuberant young puppy (Dora).
Broke for lunch, whereupon it was decided that a fry up would be just the thing. As in all things, there are some fundamental religious differences between members of Luso Towers on the matter of fry ups. Sid, for example, is adamant that toast is the way forward and that you can't have a fry up without beans, whereas I am quite happy to have fried tomatoes instead and would rather have fried bread. Sid thinks this is wrong on two fronts: first, that tomatoes should only be eaten "as God intended" and second, that fried bread is the work of Satan. My contention however is that there's nothing like a bit of fried bread under the right circumstances, provided that it is cooked correctly, which few people do. I'd never order it at a greasy spoon, for example, but cooked properly it needn't be a dripping oily mass of rancid cholesterol on a plate. I did wonder if this preference was a result of my working class roots, but Sid's contention was that fry ups generally are inherently working class, and that posh people tend to eat Alpen :)
This afternoon I brought the mares with me into the picadeiro, what with their field being a mud bath. Let it be said that they are just as capable of throwing a wide and impressive array of moves as the boys, and delighted in a spree of bucking, spinning and charging about, or at least as much as letting off steam in a 20x20 space allows. Awesone girlies with their lovely big bellies. Meanwhile I carried on about my toil, occasionally stopping to enjoy the show. Some while later I became dimly aware that something was not quite as it should be, and I realised it was because there was a quality to Q's neigh that I hadn't heard before, so I looked up and bugger me, the girls had let themselves out of the picadeiro and were mooching about the yard! Bastards. So I gathered them up and returned them to the picadeiro, and tied a leadrope around the gate. Ha. The expression on their faces was priceless. The equine version of "what, me?".
And so to the conclusion of another weekend which has once again proven itself not to be nearly long or stretchy enough. To wrap up, another Sid special Chinese noodle soup with duck, pak choi and Chinese mushrooms. Nom.
Tuesday 15 February 2011
A middle manager abroad
The working week this week began even earlier than usual on account of the requirement to be at Gatwick for a 6.50am flight to Dusseldorf for a two day event in the Netherlands centred around the weighty matter of managed print services and industrial printers. 3:30am is no time to be getting up at the best of times, least of all a Monday morning. The saving graces were twofold: (a) that it was all free, and (b) that it was all laid on with transfers from the airport and so on, requiring only the need to present oneself at Gatwick at the required hour (ungodly). Actually threefold, taking into account the online check in which negated the requirement for an even earlier start.
What a great thing it is, travelling only with hand luggage; a liberating experience marred only by the apparent need to have one's bag searched for cosmetics of the explosive variety and the related requirement to stand behind a young Russian or perhaps Eastern European woman who had also had her bag searched moments earlier and was proceeding to re-pack it with great deliberation and the almost unbelievable lethargy of the young and rebellious, while time ticked by on my honed-to-the-wire schedule. I had to do something to offset my growing agitation, so in a moment of resolute non-Englishness I felt obliged to ask her if she could just hurry it up a bit to allow the security dude to inspect my toothpaste at close quarters and thus facilitate my passage through to the nominally titled departure lounge with just enough time left to snaffle a double espresso and a nice little pastry stuffed with tomatoes and mozzarella before hastening to the gate. I don't know why it is; one of the finest traditions of air travel (certainly my air travel anyway) always seems to involve that last minute rush for the gate. At least it wasn't the sort of outright, sweaty, wine-and Iberian tack-laden gallop that characterised a lot of the trips Posh Bird and I did to Portugal, back in the day.
Safely ensconced on the plane and situated right at the back after the fashion of two sacks of ballast (or what is known in the trade as "trim"), my colleague and I proceeded without further ado to blast through the European airspace in a pressurised metal tube, concerned only with the size of our craft (small) and its method of propulsion (propellors). This was not entirely unwarranted given the way the sodding thing fishtailed alarmingly upon landing and thus giving us the sensation of rapidly approaching death.
Transfer by coach across Germany to the Netherlands ensued to deposit us at the hotel, giving us pause only to reflect upon (a) the phenomenal, psychedelic nature of the carpeting, and (b) the fact that such an early start was not great preparation for a busy couple of days at a business event, before we were whisked off to the company's offices in Venlo to be greeted by a large room full of giant balls, a stage and a sound system playing, rather incongruously I felt, Prodigy tunes while a gaggle of the sort of people found only in Higher Education milled about drinking crap Dutch coffee and catching up about the state of the sector. Hmmm.
In amongst demos and discussions on managed print services and related topics there followed a rather unexpected slot during which two guys presented their interpretation of a company acquisition through the medium of juggling (random, I know, but they were in fact very good). I started to become a bit twitchy, sitting there near the front on my big orange ball, when they started calling for volunteers while 30 odd people looked on. First they picked a red-faced irascible Scot, and then they picked me. WHY. And why do they call it volunteering when you clearly have no real option but to submit to whatever foul thing they want to use you for? Of all the things that might have happened to me on a business trip to the Netherlands, the thing I really didn't see coming was the requirement to stand in front of the assembled throng, holding hands with a sweaty Scot while two madmen juggled a set of skittles back and forth to one another and made us take a step forward right into the middle of it all as they juggled said skittles in front of and behind us, so closely that the skittles were moving my hair as they whooshed past, millimetres from my nose. You just couldn't make it up could you.
On the plus side, the food was good. I wondered if we were to sample some typical Dutch fare, so as we queued for our rations and I spotted a large pan frying equally large quantities of mushrooms that were being added to little trays of salad and dressing, I said to the guy serving, "ooh, what's this?" thinking, you know, that it might be some Dutch thing he'd be pleased to enlighten me about. He gave me the sort of level look usually reserved for complete fuckwits or the very young, and replied, simply yet crushingly, "mushrooms".
Setting aside the rancid carpets, the hotel was quite splendid. There was the extra-thrust jacuzzi, the soft mattress and the extra-fluffy pillows, and the white robe that might have been fluffy had someone remembered to add some fabric softener to the water when it was last washed, but the experience was only moderately marred by the fact that its texture had more in common with sandpaper than towelling. The evening meal was of an Oriental bent, with sake and sushi to start - my first experience of sushi, Luddite that I am, which was surprisingly lovely - and an array of rice and noodle creations all washed down with a decent Tuscan red and the inevitable conversations about how everyone's IT is organised, whose gone with AD, who has cross-platform environments and so on.
Much the same today, except I learned from previous errors and refused to allow myself to be volunteered for anything else, even if it was just setting off a print run, and certainly did not ask any Dutch people about their food. I drank industrial quantities of crap Dutch coffee and the sort of tea you only ever find in Europe, ate for practically an hour at lunch time and managed to avoid holding hands with any sweaty Scots. The couple of hours left at Dusseldorf airport passed in a blur of peering drowsily into a procession of shop windows purveying goods of no real interest, and drinking the world's worst cup of cappucino. At least the flight back was uneventful, notwithstanding the now expected toothpaste-related interrogation before being allowed on my way, bearing a giant slab of Kinder, a big bar of chocolate with hazelnuts, a nice bottle of Limoncello and - a set of juggling balls.
What a great thing it is, travelling only with hand luggage; a liberating experience marred only by the apparent need to have one's bag searched for cosmetics of the explosive variety and the related requirement to stand behind a young Russian or perhaps Eastern European woman who had also had her bag searched moments earlier and was proceeding to re-pack it with great deliberation and the almost unbelievable lethargy of the young and rebellious, while time ticked by on my honed-to-the-wire schedule. I had to do something to offset my growing agitation, so in a moment of resolute non-Englishness I felt obliged to ask her if she could just hurry it up a bit to allow the security dude to inspect my toothpaste at close quarters and thus facilitate my passage through to the nominally titled departure lounge with just enough time left to snaffle a double espresso and a nice little pastry stuffed with tomatoes and mozzarella before hastening to the gate. I don't know why it is; one of the finest traditions of air travel (certainly my air travel anyway) always seems to involve that last minute rush for the gate. At least it wasn't the sort of outright, sweaty, wine-and Iberian tack-laden gallop that characterised a lot of the trips Posh Bird and I did to Portugal, back in the day.
Safely ensconced on the plane and situated right at the back after the fashion of two sacks of ballast (or what is known in the trade as "trim"), my colleague and I proceeded without further ado to blast through the European airspace in a pressurised metal tube, concerned only with the size of our craft (small) and its method of propulsion (propellors). This was not entirely unwarranted given the way the sodding thing fishtailed alarmingly upon landing and thus giving us the sensation of rapidly approaching death.
Transfer by coach across Germany to the Netherlands ensued to deposit us at the hotel, giving us pause only to reflect upon (a) the phenomenal, psychedelic nature of the carpeting, and (b) the fact that such an early start was not great preparation for a busy couple of days at a business event, before we were whisked off to the company's offices in Venlo to be greeted by a large room full of giant balls, a stage and a sound system playing, rather incongruously I felt, Prodigy tunes while a gaggle of the sort of people found only in Higher Education milled about drinking crap Dutch coffee and catching up about the state of the sector. Hmmm.
In amongst demos and discussions on managed print services and related topics there followed a rather unexpected slot during which two guys presented their interpretation of a company acquisition through the medium of juggling (random, I know, but they were in fact very good). I started to become a bit twitchy, sitting there near the front on my big orange ball, when they started calling for volunteers while 30 odd people looked on. First they picked a red-faced irascible Scot, and then they picked me. WHY. And why do they call it volunteering when you clearly have no real option but to submit to whatever foul thing they want to use you for? Of all the things that might have happened to me on a business trip to the Netherlands, the thing I really didn't see coming was the requirement to stand in front of the assembled throng, holding hands with a sweaty Scot while two madmen juggled a set of skittles back and forth to one another and made us take a step forward right into the middle of it all as they juggled said skittles in front of and behind us, so closely that the skittles were moving my hair as they whooshed past, millimetres from my nose. You just couldn't make it up could you.
On the plus side, the food was good. I wondered if we were to sample some typical Dutch fare, so as we queued for our rations and I spotted a large pan frying equally large quantities of mushrooms that were being added to little trays of salad and dressing, I said to the guy serving, "ooh, what's this?" thinking, you know, that it might be some Dutch thing he'd be pleased to enlighten me about. He gave me the sort of level look usually reserved for complete fuckwits or the very young, and replied, simply yet crushingly, "mushrooms".
Setting aside the rancid carpets, the hotel was quite splendid. There was the extra-thrust jacuzzi, the soft mattress and the extra-fluffy pillows, and the white robe that might have been fluffy had someone remembered to add some fabric softener to the water when it was last washed, but the experience was only moderately marred by the fact that its texture had more in common with sandpaper than towelling. The evening meal was of an Oriental bent, with sake and sushi to start - my first experience of sushi, Luddite that I am, which was surprisingly lovely - and an array of rice and noodle creations all washed down with a decent Tuscan red and the inevitable conversations about how everyone's IT is organised, whose gone with AD, who has cross-platform environments and so on.
Much the same today, except I learned from previous errors and refused to allow myself to be volunteered for anything else, even if it was just setting off a print run, and certainly did not ask any Dutch people about their food. I drank industrial quantities of crap Dutch coffee and the sort of tea you only ever find in Europe, ate for practically an hour at lunch time and managed to avoid holding hands with any sweaty Scots. The couple of hours left at Dusseldorf airport passed in a blur of peering drowsily into a procession of shop windows purveying goods of no real interest, and drinking the world's worst cup of cappucino. At least the flight back was uneventful, notwithstanding the now expected toothpaste-related interrogation before being allowed on my way, bearing a giant slab of Kinder, a big bar of chocolate with hazelnuts, a nice bottle of Limoncello and - a set of juggling balls.
Saturday 12 February 2011
Emotional ups and downs
The thing about creatures is that it's all very well when they're healthy and happy, and not so much when there's something wrong. The law of averages (or perhaps some other law) states that the more creatures you have, the more likely something is wrong with one or more of them at any one time. T has been lame for a couple of weeks now, footy if anything. Robin the farrier popped in with his hoof testers and found nothing to indicate anything like laminitis, which is good, but general reactivity in his soles. This weekend though he seems much better so I'll try him again tomorrow and see how he is after a little light work today. Tessa is coming next week to check him over. So a tentative relief there.
The other thing that's been worrying me silly is that Slim Jim started walking very strangely and lying down a lot. No obvious signs of pain but it became increasingly clear that something wasn't quite right and he was almost plaiting his back legs as he walked. Note to self: looking symptoms online is not a good idea. I took him to the vet on Wednesday evening, who diagnosed some sort of spinal trauma affecting his nervous system. This was most likely to be either Willow being rough with him or a recent incident in which one of the dining chairs in the meehoo room crashed to the floor and Jim galloping into the kitchen looking very perturbed. The good thing was that he still had sensation in his feet and reasonable proprioception, though not much at all in his tail.
The treatment is rest and an anti-inflammatory, so I brought back home a big crate for him to stay in, and he had an NSAID injection. Took him back next day but I could already see an improvement, so was quietly hopeful. The vet concurred so it was decided not to proceed with x-rays and continue the treatment. I think my prayers to the universe have been acknowledged as he has continued to improve since then and is being a model patient as far as the crate is concerned. Fingers continue to be crossed, nevertheless.
Meanwhile, today was a better day. For one thing, it was a nice mild and sunny day. Knickers and I went to our local chicken emporium to acquire some more birds, only to find that they didn't have any. However, all is not lost as a new batch are due in next week and we have our names down for some of them. Excellent.
As mentioned, T seemed to be quite level so that cheered me up no end, and it was a nice afternoon to work Mr Q afterwards. It was one of those days when the sun is shining and everyone is on good form, and we had a blast. Q really is one of the foremost stallions of our time when in that sort of mood and we had an excellent ride, the sort which is accompanied by a massive grin and frequent whoops of delight. Bless him - just what the doctor might have ordered, had I made an appointment and explained about my creature-related concerns throughout the working week.
Also, we did our first goat maintenance session, featuring Angie as victim. Definitely a two person job at this stage but really pleased - we trimmed her feet and made some progress with her allowing us to get near her udder - not before she reared up and broke a lead rope though :O. The importance of finishing on a good note foremost in our minds, we left it with her allowing us to touch her belly without her reacting and finished there, as the last thing that's needed is for her to think that general bucking and plunging results in us backing off. I don't think she's accustomed to having her feet done but was very good, all told. We'll tackle Gwen and Gerry tomorrow.
Meanwhile work is in progress to accustom the mares to allowing us to touch their under-bellies in preparation for parturition-related udder cleaning. Oh God - it's drawing closer :wibble:. Knickers has been making good progress with Alfama and they are much more amenable as we go along. Good stuff.
Finally, we took the dogs for a walk and Willow is turning out to be something of a crowd pleaser. She met Other Dogs today and charmed the pants off everyone who came across her, which was nice.
The other thing that's been worrying me silly is that Slim Jim started walking very strangely and lying down a lot. No obvious signs of pain but it became increasingly clear that something wasn't quite right and he was almost plaiting his back legs as he walked. Note to self: looking symptoms online is not a good idea. I took him to the vet on Wednesday evening, who diagnosed some sort of spinal trauma affecting his nervous system. This was most likely to be either Willow being rough with him or a recent incident in which one of the dining chairs in the meehoo room crashed to the floor and Jim galloping into the kitchen looking very perturbed. The good thing was that he still had sensation in his feet and reasonable proprioception, though not much at all in his tail.
The treatment is rest and an anti-inflammatory, so I brought back home a big crate for him to stay in, and he had an NSAID injection. Took him back next day but I could already see an improvement, so was quietly hopeful. The vet concurred so it was decided not to proceed with x-rays and continue the treatment. I think my prayers to the universe have been acknowledged as he has continued to improve since then and is being a model patient as far as the crate is concerned. Fingers continue to be crossed, nevertheless.
Meanwhile, today was a better day. For one thing, it was a nice mild and sunny day. Knickers and I went to our local chicken emporium to acquire some more birds, only to find that they didn't have any. However, all is not lost as a new batch are due in next week and we have our names down for some of them. Excellent.
As mentioned, T seemed to be quite level so that cheered me up no end, and it was a nice afternoon to work Mr Q afterwards. It was one of those days when the sun is shining and everyone is on good form, and we had a blast. Q really is one of the foremost stallions of our time when in that sort of mood and we had an excellent ride, the sort which is accompanied by a massive grin and frequent whoops of delight. Bless him - just what the doctor might have ordered, had I made an appointment and explained about my creature-related concerns throughout the working week.
Also, we did our first goat maintenance session, featuring Angie as victim. Definitely a two person job at this stage but really pleased - we trimmed her feet and made some progress with her allowing us to get near her udder - not before she reared up and broke a lead rope though :O. The importance of finishing on a good note foremost in our minds, we left it with her allowing us to touch her belly without her reacting and finished there, as the last thing that's needed is for her to think that general bucking and plunging results in us backing off. I don't think she's accustomed to having her feet done but was very good, all told. We'll tackle Gwen and Gerry tomorrow.
Meanwhile work is in progress to accustom the mares to allowing us to touch their under-bellies in preparation for parturition-related udder cleaning. Oh God - it's drawing closer :wibble:. Knickers has been making good progress with Alfama and they are much more amenable as we go along. Good stuff.
Finally, we took the dogs for a walk and Willow is turning out to be something of a crowd pleaser. She met Other Dogs today and charmed the pants off everyone who came across her, which was nice.
Sunday 6 February 2011
Leavetakings
On Friday evening we all said goodbye to our inestimable colleague Dave, helping him celebrate the conclusion of a particularly lengthy stretch at Goldies of some 19 years. A splendid gathering, marked as such by a great crowd including a generous sprinkling of previous escapees (all of whom seem to look rather smoother and rosier of cheek than they were when they occupied a nearby office) as well as current incumbents, heart-warming servings of bonhomie and the liberal application of Guinness. A fab night and an emotional farewell - take care Dave and do keep in touch! We'll miss you.
Up early on Saturday to get the yard done before going off to the local goat sanctuary for a husbandry course - ir at least, I had it in my head that it was Saturday, but in fact it turned out to be Sunday. This small but significant fact would have completely passed me by had I not enquired of Sid if he was also coming, when he pointed out "but Rach, it's tomorrow". Ah. Right. So instead I did what any right thinking person would do and went shopping.
General levels of tiredness and a very high wind inclined me towards a lunge session with Q, who was surprisingly calm and obliging of a good, productive session. Was then forced to beat a path indoors and enjoy a lazy couple of hours watching a film. Bliss. A quick in hand session with T showed that he was not lame but still not right :( Tessa's coming on the 18th, which seems an eon away. Will draft in Robin the farrier asap.
So today dawns and again I have to get up early. Bugrit. Knickers and I went off to the goat sanctuary for our husbandry course, which involved everything you ever wanted to know about goats from feeding to foot trimming, drenching, common ailments etc etc. It was an excellent course marred only by cold and windy conditions.
Had to dash back for a lesson with Mandy on Q and then back indoors to cook and collapse.
And so endeth the weekend. Pffft.
Up early on Saturday to get the yard done before going off to the local goat sanctuary for a husbandry course - ir at least, I had it in my head that it was Saturday, but in fact it turned out to be Sunday. This small but significant fact would have completely passed me by had I not enquired of Sid if he was also coming, when he pointed out "but Rach, it's tomorrow". Ah. Right. So instead I did what any right thinking person would do and went shopping.
General levels of tiredness and a very high wind inclined me towards a lunge session with Q, who was surprisingly calm and obliging of a good, productive session. Was then forced to beat a path indoors and enjoy a lazy couple of hours watching a film. Bliss. A quick in hand session with T showed that he was not lame but still not right :( Tessa's coming on the 18th, which seems an eon away. Will draft in Robin the farrier asap.
So today dawns and again I have to get up early. Bugrit. Knickers and I went off to the goat sanctuary for our husbandry course, which involved everything you ever wanted to know about goats from feeding to foot trimming, drenching, common ailments etc etc. It was an excellent course marred only by cold and windy conditions.
Had to dash back for a lesson with Mandy on Q and then back indoors to cook and collapse.
And so endeth the weekend. Pffft.
Wednesday 2 February 2011
Random observations
There is a time and a place to be in close proximity to a lively and mischief-prone puppy, but not while undertaking sysadmin duties.
There is a significant amusement quotient to be had in the following activities:
- witnessing the testing of a streaming feed from one room to another and watching a colleague mumbling to themselves in the other room while the mic is on
- undertaking an emergency cab run to the feed merchant, emerging with a large sack of goat mix and paying particular attention to the expression on the cab driver's face (with thanks to Knickers for this entry)
- watching a large and quite remarkably stupid dog repeatedly trying to curl up in a bed that is much too small
There are pros and cons to living in a mad house; mostly pros.
Beans: there's a lot to be said for them.
You might think that stone tiles are a suitable flooring arrangement when there's a young puppy about the place. The downside is that any bladder-related issuings cause little rivulets of urine to develop around the kitchen, which are a bugger to mop up.
Why is it that stallions have to have a breathing contest every single day?
The average French person is capable of consuming more cheese and saucisson in a day than most normal people would in a month.
There is a significant amusement quotient to be had in the following activities:
- witnessing the testing of a streaming feed from one room to another and watching a colleague mumbling to themselves in the other room while the mic is on
- undertaking an emergency cab run to the feed merchant, emerging with a large sack of goat mix and paying particular attention to the expression on the cab driver's face (with thanks to Knickers for this entry)
- watching a large and quite remarkably stupid dog repeatedly trying to curl up in a bed that is much too small
There are pros and cons to living in a mad house; mostly pros.
Beans: there's a lot to be said for them.
You might think that stone tiles are a suitable flooring arrangement when there's a young puppy about the place. The downside is that any bladder-related issuings cause little rivulets of urine to develop around the kitchen, which are a bugger to mop up.
Why is it that stallions have to have a breathing contest every single day?
The average French person is capable of consuming more cheese and saucisson in a day than most normal people would in a month.
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