5 Days Til Show Day

Mon May 8, 2006

5 days 'til our first show! It's 2 hours away, which means we have to leave the barn at 6 a.m., AAAGH! His tail didn't heal up right from the break this past winter (DAMN!), so he's got a lump at the top, but I figured if I fluff up the hair at the tailhead and zap it with hair spray, it "looks" normal from a distance...so we'll still do halter.

Luckily this show has no Novice Showmanship, so we dodged that bullet, LOL, but it will have Novice Pleasure (open) and Novice Equitation (open), don't know if my friend with the Paint will go Novice or into the Grown-Up class (she just learned to ride huntseat this winter, so I'd think that'd qualify her as a Novice!).

Anyway, we had a great lesson yesterday with the trainer, along with two other ladies and their young horses (Novices on Young Horses = Wacky Hijinks!) (there's a difference between a "novice" rider and a "novice" SHOWER...we're all experienced riders, but novices at the Showing aspect) (and there's a SHITLOAD of difference I found out, lol). Coos was copping a big 'tude even while I was brushing him...it was 11 in the morning on a sunny day, can't blame him for feeling his oats, so to speak, and even lunging him in the round pen barely got the edge off (sadly he never raised his tail past the horizontal, ah well).

Well, the lesson was pretty much the trainer harping (nicely) on me about Quzqo's headset and his head-tossing, trying to avoid "giving" (he'll "give" if he's in the mood...if he's not...screw YOU!), yet going on about keeping my feet right in the stirrups, and sticking my chest out...I'm supposed to do all that AND "bump the horse" and "see-saw" with the reins when he tries to take the bit away from me (i.e. suddenly plunging his head down and yanking the reins from my hand). He was
wearing his nummy copper-roller snaffle, so don't think I had some rusty bicycle chain mule bit in him and was abusing the boy (LOL...the softer copper parts of that bit are now dented with toothmarks from his chewing and playing with it). A lot of it was just "The Emperor Declines Your Request To Give To The Bit"!

After about an hour (there WERE periods where he did drop his head and round up and we just FLOWED across the dirt, much to the delight of the trainer and the other ladies), the trainer asked if SHE could ride Himself. Sure, be my guest! She wanted to see if she could work on his headset. I was looking forward to seeing how beautiful my horse is under saddle, lol...hell, I can't tell from riding, and that split-second glance at our reflection in the show booth's glass window. She got on him (from the ground, grrr...the woman has 5 foot long legs I swear!) and off they went, and boy, did he give her shit, LOL!! He wasn't going to behave just cuz she was on him, nuh uh! Arena sour little shit, snrk.

But she wouldn't give and he couldn't surprise her and yank the reins from her hand, and he gave her some shit at the gate forcing her to spin him in a circle (huh...that's what I look like on trail rides! Pretty spectacular!)...after a few minutes he DID give up and tucked his head nice (not cranked to his chest, just a pretty above-the-vertical) and trotted with so much extension he looked like a danged dressage horse! Phew! Pretty boy!!

When she got done she was out of breath and said I deserve a million "gold stars" for putting up with him, and she now appreciates how much effort it is to ride him, keep him straight (not veering to the gate), and the headset nonsense. I got back on and the difference was amazing...he was behaving, LOL! He tried a couple of times to yank, but I did what she told me, and it must have reminded him of what SHE was doing, because he'd give up and just hold his head nice, be rounded, and trot along!

The trainer insisted I ride with her during the week so she can nag me, LOL! I guess I need it!

When I was done riding, Quzqo stood like the End of the Trail horse...head down to the ground, tail lax, poor tuckered thing. But when I turned him loose in the pasture, the little shit TORE off at a canter up the hill, LOL!


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Next Day....

Guess yesterday's lesson stuck with him (and me!). That, and he was half-asleep since I don't think he came in last night and thus camped out in the pasture, lol!

He got a partial bath (just worrying about the manure stains on his tummy), tomorrow a cold front comes through and no baths for a while. Nice thing about having such a normally dirty-looking blotchy grey color, you can't tell what's dirt and what's not (unless it has greenish tones). Supposed to rain the next two days, so maybe he'll get some of that dust washed off his butt!

We tried a new hairstyle tonight (I'm trying different French Braids to see which looks the nicest)...yesterday I did sort of a triangle, but it kind of flopped around. Tonight I did a tighter braid up along his crest, and when he tucked his head it looked AWESOME! Phew! Need to get some white/light grey yarn so I can tie up the end properly-like (since there's around 15 classes between his halter class and our novice classes Saturday, I think I'll have plenty of time, lol)

Ah, me. And so it begins!