How it could have been, today

We miss you, Reiner. You left us too soon.

Sorry, CNJ, let's see if this works!


I liked Steffen's ride. Nobody's asking me, though:) I think Toto is losing his enthusiasm behind.

OH, and CNJ, floppy legs are part and parcel with sitting deep and soft. It's one thing to have a still leg when posting. Sitting a huge movin' harse? Not quite so easy, and obviously, because Reiner is a man, he has limitations;) Just kiddin'. I never did understand how guys can do it, though. Horse's tail was a bit agitated, too. Probably early in the warm-up, a few kinks to get out..

To softer hands, and free-flowing horses.

Built To Stand

Time to get a little annoyed, don't you think?.

Building/Breeding Stances
I was thinking abit about the conformation discussion on the FuglyReview, and then thought about old buckskin, Raven. Remember him? I took a couple lessons with him? He bucked off his rich guy owner? No? Me either, as in I'm not going to go back and find that old post right now...
He was built to stand, not to move, and I'd never ridden a horse like that before. Lazy, yes. But immoveable?? Physics, heck even gravity didn't work on this horse. He was ground glued.

That seems to be the way of breeding them, isn't it. Find a trait, like placidity, and bingo. You have horses that move slower than plants. Another trait like fairly straight joint angles just adds to the fun.

Another trait, like a dished face, bingo, sea-horse heads, and wry noses, and malformed tracheas. But oh, no, that isn't what's happening! Uh, huh.

Another trait, giant warmbloods with explosive, almost unrideable to the normal human being movements, and Bingo, we develop new methods to tie them back down. (coughRollKur?cough) Break their nuchals, instead of making sure they are ridden by the best. You DO impede wind, it slows them down, heLLo. (It also can enrage them, or terrify them, but it always messes their minds for a long while, bad riding.)

RollCuring was developed by devolution in riding. Better horses, worser riders. We have only ourselves to blame.

I won't even mention the horses that look like cows. Double muscling, and low heads for easier.. ahem. Does NoT happen. Yeah, right.

More Horse Rants, to do with riding.
I was watching a big Spruce Meadows Grand prix class. In rode a beautiful blonde youngster, on a gigantic, magnificent chestnut. She had this chair seat going, right from the start, that made me think, girl, you ain't staying on for this round. Sure enough, horse jumped her right out of the tack. You can't ride big fences that way! You can sit as pretty as you want, but over the big try jumps, you better be ready to hang on and stay with him, not push your butt out the back seat, and point your toes down, legs jammed forward! Sayonara, rider! Gah, these riders that try to emulate the greats.. You can't just LOOK like a great, you have to ride like a great! It ain't easy!

Kudos to Eric Lamaze, but that was a half million dollar stirrup loss in the CN BIG jumper time class.. Ouch. I lost a stirrup at a show with GoLightly, but it just cost me a red face. $450,000.00 bonus down the drain, because Eric lost his stirrup to the last line of fences. Eric's riding with a broken foot, of course, that may have had something to do with it;)

Hickstead was incredible, as usual. I sure hope Eric heals up QUICK/well. Canada needs him on the team, at full-strength!

I watched Beezie Madden, after pretty blonde's ignominious departure from the ring. And admired again, a perfectly balanced leg over hip over shoulder. Why must we try to emulate the faults in riders? Eric can sometimes be "accused" of having a heel up over a big fence. But he also is perfectly balanced. Makes a difference!
Pretty blonde, no stirrups, starting now! Stay in two-point until you shriek. You were bobbing around up there like a peanut on an elephant. It wasn't good. Not at all. Your horse was bad in the big class the next day, he's trying not to jump you off again. Maybe admit you need a horse with less power, or maybe admit you need more time in the tack, and less admiring yourself on facebook.
Ooooh, I feel better now;)
(sheathes cat claws) She will learn from that fall, hopefully, 'cause that's one helluva nice horse.

But hey, at least she feeds and loves on her horses. Triple Gold Stars for turn-out!

Other horse owners, not so much. I haven't seen the Society that supposedly would prevent this cruelty to an animal lately, but as we all know, as long as chickens are treated like shite, so too, can horses be treated.
That shine you see is a synthetic product, sprayed on instead of actually, you know, GROOMING the beast. That would take too much time and energy.
I can fit the thickness of my fingers betwixt his ribs. The latest shite/shinola story is that he's allergic to grass, it makes him "break out in bumps". Funny how all of her animals have one HECK of a time having any weight on them. Funny that the first pic I found of him showed him turned out on grass. Funny, peculiar.
sad.

So, yeah, I'd show you his pictures of standing in shite, but that's legal and humane, too. Half the stall is shite, the other half, the half he's standing on to get to his "food", is concrete. But he got his feet done, and he DiD have clean shavings (notevenenoughforcomfort) exactly when the cruelty preventer person came, two weeks ago. Cruelty preventer hasn't been seen since. All is well, in animal welfare.
Not.
I wonder how filthy shelters are actually allowed to be? Heck, it's LEGAL. Apparently. Unnecessary suffering. Not caused here.
Only the necessary stuff.

ETA:
Sept. 20th, official visit, so of course, he was clean-ish today.
Hug your horses for me.

Flip Flashes, Blaze Blurs.

 

I suppose you're wondering why I've been so quiet. I've been stewing, as it were. Anyone remember me speaking of my rock? I have stayed away from society, and it's not agoraphobia, I've decided, just now. It's sociophobia. Fear of the sociological stewage I watch/read/witness/wonder at, every day.

I am skeered of my own species, and I kinda always have been. Never been that easy to get along with, that's me. At least, that's been my take on my effect on others of my alleged kind.  I can teach. I can type. I can't just have a conversation, I need an adventure in conversation, or I tune out. Or something.

I thought again of why I stuck my head in the sand, after and through the rest of my (now just a memory) horse "career".

OH, my old laptop croaked. I have a new laptop, and it's not that comfy yet, and I'm typing on husband's, he's sound asleep, which I should be, too.

BUT, I had to mention my own take on (reader holds her breath) why living under my Rock has been looking really good again.
Why do I have to be aware of this stuff, when many seem so unaware? Why can I read an animal's expression, and be utterly incapable of forming a intelligible human sentence under any sort of duress? What good is that? I guess I'm just super grumpy. Fall showed up, in the middle of August, sorta kinda. GREAT riding weather. Humpfh.

Well, the girl-dogs are doing wonderful. Flip Flashes, Blaze Blurs.
We've got a real show going now, Blaze and I. I realized tonight, that when Blaze's feeling super-duper motorvated, I have to tell her to GO, before she will come. Her brilliant little mind has (correctly) realized than ANY command is a GO command, and she Loves to Go.

Flip never fails to delight me of course. The sisters are the fastest pair of slick black running octo-paws. Their running/stalking/deeking/diving/rolling matches can leave me gasping for delighted air. Flip stalks sister, and freezes, and stares. And inches closer, closer.. The predator is silent motion, one delicately raised paw at a time...
BLAZE, ears akimbo, eyes ablazed (sorry) in delight, goofy grin, shoots away, mach 2 to start, around several laps of our big old evergreens, helpfully circular in shape. Then a figure eight around the shed and apple trees, herculean broad jumps over the biggest, squishiest downed apples.

BUMPER crop of apples this year, BTW. Pulled one tree down onto our little garden shed:(
Sorry, tangent..

Flip waits until sister is utterly exhausted, then proves that Blaze will never be able to outrun her, or out-maneuver her. Death-roll is swift, and painless, Blaze's hind-legs now kicking up in the air with feigned terror.. Blaze will then gasp her way back into the house, Flip, as always, fresh as a daisy. Flip never ever wastes energy. Flip saves it for the important stuff. Like squirrels. Making her bed, as noisily as she can, with much throwing of her pillows and digging/scratching/fluffing. Flip can make the whole house shake, while making her bed, and she's just over 35 pounds.
What, a, dog..

Still learning about this new box, so please be patient. Things haven't changed, in case you were wondering. Yup, he's still there. Now he's on meds for ulcers. Big surprise. Maybe I should get some, too. Five and a half months, and my ire grows. Not good, in a Scot..

An Eye for it. Edit, Aye.

Sigh
Double-sigh, PDF Alert.. 
 Some people look at things with their eyes, I look with my body, I think. My eyes correlate/corroborate something else inside what I'm looking at. Scares me, how well I can see sometimes.

Then I must think of Andalusions of Grandeur, our old friend, Emily, a woman without that gift so many take for granted. How gifted she is, and how well she sees. And how different we are, with our eyes! Everyone sees the world a little differently, with or without their eyesight.

It is impossible for me to put blinkers on, I guess, is what I'm saying. I can see happiness or fear or sadness or joy, in most living things. You all know what I look at, day after day.

The neglected but shiny nightmare has had his feet done, after five months. Great education the owner is getting, on the government nickle! AND he's got clean bedding! AND he has sweet feed and crunch, left open for the flies and rodents! AND, this is a good one, he still has to practically strangle himself on the panels of his cage, to reach his hay!! sigh.. No, of course he isn't getting out, and no,of course he still has no air flow in that oven. But hey! Feet AND bedding! If only he got the basics of life all at the same time, but I guess that isn't part of our mandated laws. I'm asking too much! Next thing, I'll want him braided and ready to show!
No. I would expect ANY animal to get food, water and sanitary shelter and exercise. But, as we all know by now, you do not have to exercise your animal, ever. Even if that animals' physiological well-being depends on movement. Och, what do I know? It's all in what I see.

ANYway, enough of the bummer stuff.

Let's pull out a big old light bay.

GoLightly's Lessons

I'll let you enjoy getting him groomed and ready, he's such a funny guy. He'll be watching you carefully, one longer ear mindful in case you're an idiot, but as your soft, steady movements reassure him, he starts to relax and tell jokes. Did you hear about Revel, chasing DuhDave out of the stall? Snicker, snork, tap on the crossties. Revel just put his ears back at DuhDave, like this! and snort...snort, snort. GoLightly likes to count the cross-tie chain-links with his lips. Then drop them with a clatter. That's hilarious! GoLightly likes to laugh,  must be the Irish in 'im.

(GoLightly ideas of funny, really were. He'd get bored with flat work, if I was droning on about something, and he'd look up, and fart, just as loud as he could. Only if I was droning, though. If I was really into what we were working on, so was he. I couldn't do anything with a perfunctory/bored air. GoLightly disapproved of that attitude.)

Anyway, you'll curry and polish him, and gently soft brush what little hair he has, thin-coated old bugger he is. Never touch his tail! He doesn't have any! Well, he does have one, but you really must leave his alone, at all costs. He really doesn't have a lot of any hair, at all. The crest of his neck is so thin, pulling his mane is a breeze. And with no white on him anywhere, he really is an easy groomer:)

You have to be careful tacking him up, he's built uphill, and his saddle needs to start out a little forward. GoLightly's massive shoulders really needed the leather device which has completely left my brain, not a crupper, the Other way. GAhhhhhhhhhhhh.
Ahem, the device was needed when he was jumping big, or his saddle could slip back. BREASTplate.
No wonder I couldn't remember, I've never worn one ;)
Well, I did, but only for a week or so, when I was 11. Flatly refused to ever wear one again. I'm glad Mom had the sense to skip that argument..

I'll be blathering aimlessly so you won't be too intimidated when you finally clamber on. GoLightly is 16.2, he's big, and long, and a lot of horse. But as you ask him to move off, you're immediately struck by his long, easy straight ahead strides. You swing along, mouth open, agog at the easy forward power you have beneath you.
I laugh, and warn you about flies.
Somehow, your leg just feels right, and you don't have to struggle to maintain a comfortable position, legs hanging easily down his sides. It really doesn't matter, exactly where your legs end up, as long as you go along with his fluent forward motion.
(ETA, NCC is clinging to his side at this point, and he stops and puts his lip up, this is the equivalent to him ROFLHAO.) I remind NCC that her legs should stay on either side of the horse, and she should not attempt to cross them, while riding. I have never told anyone this before.
;)
First Times for Everything, I guess:)
NCC & I discuss side-saddle, but I don't have one, and I'm not sure I could ask GL quite that much, at once.)
If your legs (amazed at their own length) slip forward, or back, out of balance with his going forward, he stops, or speeds up. GoLightly does just exactly what you are telling him to do. A truly great schoolmaster always does what he's told. Unless you're doing it all wrong, of course. You are no beginner, you've been up there on a horse before. One of GoLightly's best features is his ability to adjust to his rider. As long as you don't bang him in the mouth (a cardinal sin, which he'll wrinkle his lips & nose in disgust at), and allow him to go on, he's a happy camper:)


To be continued...

OH, really cool link..If Horses Could Speak

To All Our Nuchal Ligaments!