Show, Day Two

During the night I'd come to the revelation that shows don't matter, and after the previous day's disappointments and bitter doses of reality, that today didn't matter either. But the horse was 20 miles away at the fairgrounds, I'd already paid for everything, so I might as well go and make whoever is judging today look at us, whether they like the view or not.

I made a few adjustments so I could avoid yesterday's madness. Since the weather forecast was for much cooler temps, I wore my breeches underneath my jeans. That'll save a few precious seconds in the clothes-changing department later on! I wore a universal white shirt, so I wouldn't be changing into my Official Huntseat Shirt With Collar and Stock Pin. Nothing wrong with a nice white collared Oxford. Having the proper clothes didn't seem to help, so this couldn't hurt.

The horse didn't sleep well, I could tell by the lack of green stains on his sides. But Sunday is always Bran Mash day, horse show days being no exception, so he greedily tucked in to his white bucket of branny delights while I went about moving all my tack/equipment from the draft horse stall at the far end of the barn, to right outside the stall. Less steps to take, less time to waste!!

People were busying themselves preparing for the Showmanship and Halter classes, and I sat in the sun, enjoying a hot cuppa coffee and reading a paperback. The girl a couple of stalls down had her big white Arabian out, prepping him/her for the halter classes I assumed. She was busy spraying him with something. I got a whiff...dang, that STINKS! Phew! Another shower walked by and made some comment to her about how artificial showing has become, and she said something to the effect of "yeah, well, you do what you have to do!" and continued spraying her horse's lower legs...with a can of RUST-OLEUM!!

Yes, gentle reader, that girl was spray-painting her horse's lower white legs with RUST-OLEUM! I thought I recognized the smell, since I'd spray-painted my cart days earlier with the same product!! She stopped to shake the can, and I could clearly see the black and yellow oval logo, and the red plaid design element....couldn't see if it was gloss or matte. What the hell! Granted, it did make the horse's legs very very white...she was more "misting" it over, not going for complete coverage. The fur took on a white, but flat color, maybe she figured the judge would be so bedazzled by the bright white that she wouldn't notice the lack of natural silvery sheen.

Yet one more thing to write in the "showing-is-not-for-me" column.

Eventually I got my un-enameled horse tacked up, hitched up, warmed up, and we once again found ourselves parked in front of my car, waiting for lunch to be over. A friend came up to chat, and her little girl was eyeing the cart...the conversation got around to that eventually, and I asked her if she'd like to go for a ride! Of course, and she got up into the seat with me, and Quzqo headed on away from the showgrounds down the dirt road towards the back of the fairgrounds. I got him trotting (we'd been practicing our "road trot" vs "park trot" and he was actually getting it)...A couple of spins around the field, then trotting back down the road to her mom's horse trailer where I offloaded her. She had a blast, I had a blast, that was more fun than the actual class!

Again we were back by the car, dozing in the sun, Quzqo with his head lowered and a hind leg cocked, looking like the ole' grey plow hoss at lunchtime. Another family came by, and the young girl very shyly muttered something about if I was selling rides. LOL, no, but you're welcome to ride anyway! So she and her younger brother (with Mom's approval of course, not like I'm some horse-drawn child snatcher...though I could have been!) climbed in, one on each side, and off we went, same route as the last time. The kids really enjoyed the trotting, especially when we hit the washboard portion of the road, LOL!

Seriously, I could have made some good money selling cart rides that day. Maybe that's something to consider in the future, LOL!

Eventually the class came again, and I had NO nerves whatsoever. Either I was too tired or too numb, haven't decided which. The competition was already in the arena, "working at will", waiting for them to officially call for the class. Knowing Quzqo's opinion of arenas, I opted to just stay outside in the shade of a tree, until the announcer told me to get in there. Kind of an informal arrangement, but, okay. We just walked along the rail, the judges were standing in the middle, talking to each other, my competitor was already trotting her horse, I didn't quite know what to do, so I started to get Quzqo into some sort of trot when the announcer finally said "Drivers, Trot your horse!"

Now today there was no "park trot" or "road trot". No, today we just had "trot" and "extend the trot". Well, don't know about that, so I just made him trot faster, hoping he was extending. We got going quite well, he had more energy than the previous day, that's for sure! The judges called for us to "reverse"...not "reverse across the diagonal", just "reverse". I was just turning the corner onto the short end of the arena, so there was no way I could reverse across the diagonal, so I just did a big circle until I was facing the wrong direction. My competition did the across-the-diagonal because she was already on the long side and could do that without looking ridiculous. The fix was in, eh?

Quzqo did VERY well I thought, backed beautifully with his head tucked and neck arched. In the line-up, the judges came by, and the man judge carefully looked at each horse head-on, then walked around both sides, inspecting the harness I assume. *gulp*. Can he tell mine came from a discount tack dealer on eBay, and that it had cryptic (Red-dot) Indian words scribbled on the inside of the tugs?? Did he have disdain for (gaaag) pipe carts??? But he never said a word.

As I expected, we got 2nd under both judges. But hey, it was fun and we got to do it, so that's what it's all about.

The chaos between harness and equitation went much smoother this time. It was easy to peel off my pants, put on the boots, put on the hunt coat, put up my hair, ready to go!

It's also easy to go into the show ring with absolutely NO expectations whatsoever. I was figuring on another last-place day like Saturday, so if you figure you'll fail, you're never disappointed.

An amusing side-note; as we were entering the arena to find a spot on the rail, one of the ladies in the announcer's booth who knew me exclaimed "YOU'RE RIDING!!!" Er, yeah...I only broke my leg in two places, that doesn't mean I can't still ride, LOL! Glad to be able to amaze!

The Equitation class went well, I thought. Quzqo spooked a little at some people along the rail, and slowed a bit at some people on the other side...maybe he didn't see them when he had the blinkers on, who knows! Again there were four of us adult novices, and I about fell out of the saddle when they called out the placings, and I had placed 2nd under "Judge A" (the lady)!!! "Judge B" (the man") placed me last, so no more about him. That made my day, and I found myself thinking "this showing isn't so bad when you PLACE!"

The Step-up was a near-repeat of the previous one, but with five entrants instead of three, and as we were cantering, I heard a quiet voice along the rail "wrong lead!". I relaxed my seat and tried to feel his stride...sure enough, the little stinker had been merrily cantering on the right lead...except we were supposed to be on the left! I hauled him up, re-cued, back on the right (wrong!) lead! Arrgh! Lather, Rinse, Repeat! Third time he got onto the left lead and after four or five strides they called for the trot. Quzqo doesn't like cantering on his left lead, and picked a fine time to make his point!

So, we placed 4th & 5th, but I enjoyed a little Schadenfreude when Bob's 7 yr old granddaughter didn't win under BOTH judges this time (only one)

Huntseat Pleasure we went back to our old ways, and even though I don't know of anything either I or the horse did wrong, again, we came away with two Last Places.

That was it for the day. I wisely scratched the Trail class when I saw it contained a "rope gate" and a "water obstacle". NO thanks. Just as well...the judges were amazing hard-noses about it, and even with the kids' classes, were disqualifying them right and left for going off-course or failing to negotiate obstacles! Just another of life's hard lessons to learn, kids.

I got the horse cleaned up and settled into his stall for the rest of the afternoon, and headed for the food stand, only to discover that they were all out of everything except coffee and half a bag of potato chips. Luckily I still had two peanut butter & honey sandwiches in the car that I'd made 36 hours earlier, and by that time, I didn't care what they tasted like!

Since my friend, Sandy, is on the board of the association that put on the show, I had to stick around until they were done cleaning up the fairgrounds of all stray poops, making sure the stalls were stripped, gates closed, lights turned off, etc, etc, etc, so poor Quzqo and Spike were pretty much the last horses to leave the fairgrounds around 8:30 p.m., just as rain showers moved in. We had NO trouble loading, as you can imagine!

So that's how it ends. There really aren't any other shows I could attend this summer, even if I wanted to, so that makes it easier to avoid the temptation. Instead I think I'll practice enjoying the trails and back roads, both in the saddle and in the cart, and not have to worry as to whether I'm posting on the correct diagonal, or if the horse is road-trotting or park-trotting.