I did write a blog yesterday, honest. But for some reason it didn’t publish correctly or go out correctly. So if you want to read on what happened yesterday, here is Trot-on Tuesday.

So for the past couple of nights my boyfriend and I have been catching up on the last season of Castle while puttering around the apartment. Feeding Stormfly, him on his computer and me watching the tv or reading the book. Castle is good background noise. And it doesn’t wind me up too much before I go to bed, so sleeping isn’t that difficult for me.

But on to today. So today I worked at the stables again. Yay, extra hours. I like the extra time of being around and riding horses, it seems to help me keep my head on straight. I started my day off with working Cherokee, who I found out (after asking his mom) is a Tennessee Walking Horse . I interrupted him while he and everyone else was eating breakfast, so he was very put out for most of the time we were together. I was told to work him first, since his owner was coming out today to ride him. So I put him in the surcingle and side reins rig and we went to work. We had a nice lunge, no major bucks or kicks, but a few rushing moments and a little bit of crazy cantering.

Once I was done with Cherokee, I got Sunny out. Remember how last week he pulled up lame? Well apparently that only lasted for 2 days and then he was fine, just tender footed the day after he got new shoes. Sunny did great today, doing everything that was asked of him. I did a lot of bending and lateral movement with him after kind of having a lesson with my boss yesterday. I figured out more of what she wanted and expected with each ride, and how to get it out of the horses that I work with. He’s a fairly easy horse to get into frame, and he moves well off your leg when you ask him.

So while we were riding the fire station down the street (like a 1/4 mile away) was doing some sort of exercises with a helicopter. The helicopter would lower down with no one attached to the rope, and then a few minutes later what looked like a team of 2 would be attached to the rope and being taken off somewhere. Later in the day the did the exercise in reverse, they were brought to the fire station while dangling from the rope and the helicopter would leave empty. Luckily the horses that we were working with weren’t bothered by the helicopter. But the two other riders I was with said that it looked terrifying and would never do that. I said it looked fun and would give it a shot, and they looked at me like I was crazy. True, I have a thing with heights. But once I’m over a certain height, or if I knew I was properly secured I would be fine. And we are ignoring the fact that I didn’t go on the drop tower, that is different. So here is a photo of the helicopter, its in between the cables. I’m sorry its not better, but it was a last second idea to take a photo.

After Sunny I worked with Maggie. She felt super heavy today, just difficult to work with. I felt like she was just hanging on my hands and arms, unwilling to carry her own weight. I tried doing some of the exercises that I had done with Sunny, trying to get her to be light and carry herself forward, but it wouldn’t work. She won’t lift her head past a certain point, and its not due to her body build. She was also super stiff to the right, unwilling to bend or give, I had to really get after her with my spur to get any kind of bend out of her. I don’t like to get after a horse with my spur unless I absolutely have to.

The last horse of today was Sherman. Good ol’ Sherman. I think he is becoming one of my favorite horses, but that might just be because I get to jump him. But not today. Today we did more flat work. But he was really soft and subtle from the lesson yesterday, being excellent with the bending and with the moving off my leg. It was me who was having issues. It was a bit warm today, but not the hottest I’ve ever worked or ridden in, but I started to have breathing problems while working him. Like I felt that I was about to have an asthma attack, so I kept the ride a little short and walked him out while talking to one of the other riders. Well, the only other rider to be honest. And I forgot to take a photo of him, but if you want to see who he is he’s in yesterday’s blog.

After that I grabbed some lunch and came home. I figured that I would have lunch and re-charge myself for a few hours, go over and see Gucci, and then head to group which I missed last week. Well, that didn’t work out. I ate lunch, put on some Doctor Who, and then for some reason I lied down on the sofa and that was it. I woke up at 5, the last time I had looked at the clock it was 230. I called up my parents to see how Gucci was doing (I’m sure that I am going to be in the pony house when I see him tomorrow). They said that he was fine and had spoiled him by giving him a whole watermelon. He loves watermelon.

I’m not really sure on what we are going to do tonight, probably more of what we have been doing the past couple nights. But I think that I am going to do some coloring, get some of the stress and the anxiety building up in me released.

So thanks for reading, hopefully this blog will get posted and shared correctly.

Just keep swimming!