Sammy, the Pirate Ship

We tackled something that is really tough for me today.  After the walk/trot/canter, we worked on a pattern.  It was even a very simple pattern, but I had a hard time with the end of it anyway.

Starting at the center line, we trotted a figure 8 in half of the arena.  Then, we halted in the center, reversed, and cantered back to the start.  The figure 8 was a little rough because it was the short width of the ring, and Blondie's a big girl.  I wasn't giving her enough help on the turns, but the figure 8 was decently formed.  It's the canter that kills me.  I just don't get how to make her canter a straight line down the middle!  It sounds so simple, but when I angle, she takes off and canters sideways!  It's so hard without the wall to help me keep her straight.

M had us keep trying this maneuver, and after turning her around about 5 times, we finally got it right, on the correct lead.  While they are in Oklahoma, M suggested that I practice patterns and just come out and ride.  If the weather is nice, I think I will even ride in the outdoor arena.  In the western saddle, though.  It's a little more secure.

Wow, there was a photo shoot at the barn today, and I wasn't the one with the camera for a change.  The photographer who I met at Woodward Camera came out again to practice shooting horses.  I got Blondie ready and then took her down the drive where he was experimenting with shadows and light.  Then we headed back into the arena so he could test out his new spiffy flash.

I trotted Blondie around for him and his friend, while they fired off pictures.  Blondie was getting warm, so I walked her around to cool her off.  She was very well behaved until one of the horse trailers was pulled around to the front of the barn.  Instead of fighting with her, I decided to call it quits.

This is probably the last time that I'll be riding on a Sunday morning for a while.  The trainers are leaving for Oklahoma on Tuesday, and they will be gone for two weeks.  Sunday is show rider day, and since Blondie isn't in training again until next year, I'm technically not a show rider anymore.  It will also allow me some time to step back and put things into perspective.

Blondie is on turnout now, and I will be stopping by after work to just goof around with her.  I would like to work on patterns with her - there's no reason why she can't trot a circle, figure 8, or serpentine.  I will dust off the western saddle and start working on that over the next two weeks, taking things rather leisurely since she is on vacation for the next few months.

It was a gloomy day yesterday, and after a stop at the Salvation Army Store to drop off some old clothes, we headed over to Pars.  We ended up stuck in a traffic jam because Orchard Lake was down to one lane in each direction - not a great thing on a Saturday afternoon!

Pars features Persian cuisine.  This particular building has been about four different restaurants in the past ten years.  My favorite was Tiramisu, and I was very sad when that closed. There is still one in Northville, but they aren't on Saturday for lunch. 

After we were seated, we opted for the buffet, even though it wouldn't be open for another 10 minutes.  I didn't mind the wait, but Dean is a little impatient and he was getting a little restless.  It didn't help that they seated another customer right behind our booth, even though the entire place was empty, and he babbled on his cell phone the entire time. 

The meal started out with pickled veggies.  Dean wouldn't touch them, but I enjoyed munching on them.  They were crispy, but if you don't like vinegar, you won't like the torshi.

Finally, the buffet was ready!  I wasn't sure what to expect, but it turned out to be usual Mideastern fare.  Hummus, kababs, ground chicken & beef.  Here's what I sampled:

Here is the torshi.  I especially enjoyed the cauliflower and peppers

The hummus was delicious, and easily the best I've had in the area. The pita bread, not so good.

My first plate - marinated salmon, which was quite tasty, seasoned ground beef, not a favorite.  I didn't like the spices.  Zereshk polo, rice mixed with sweet and sour currants.  This was very interesting, and the favors very unique.  I couldn't eat much of it, though.  Dill rice with lima beans - I really liked this.  Dean thought it was very bland, but I liked the mellow flavor.  Chicken kabab - the meat was a little gnurly.

My second plate - more salmon, rice, and I worked up the nerve to try the khoresht ghaymeh - it looked yucky, but it tasted wonderful.  Wish I had tried it earlier in the meal, when I still had room.  I also tried the ground chicken, which I did not like at all.  It tasted overpoweringly of onion - not a favorite of mine!

Dessert was the biggest disappointment. Baklava and a honey soaked pastry. They did have a very yummy looking dessert tray, but we didn't see it until we were leaving.

Here is a statue on your way into the restaurant.  Not sure by the one pony is sniffing the others butt.

I thought this lamp was kind of cool.

At 14.95 per person, beverage extra, I thought that the meal was a little pricey. The service was good, and one of the wait staff even ran outside to catch us because I had left my Barbie sized brush on the table. I ignored the fact that he was laughing the entire time - even fashion models have to occasionally brush their hair.

First the bad news - Tank, the upper barn kitty, died while we were at ASHAM. He was my favorite cat because of his cantankerous manner, and I was really bummed to learn that he won't be napping under my saddle rack anymore.  They tried to save him, but he didn't make it.  Rest in peace, Tank - you weren't one for catching mice, but you were always ready for a scratch on the head.  But only on the head - you'd try to bite if someone dared to scratch anywhere else.   I'll miss you.

I rode Doc bareback, with a bareback saddle pad.  He is pretty darn bony, that old guy.  I was a little nervous at first, and M's instructions on how to bail should I lose my balance didn't help much.  However, I never felt that a fall was eminent, but we weren't exactly tearing around the arena, either.

We worked off the longe line, at a sitting trot and posting trot.  We didn't work up to a canter, though.  M had me trot circles, which was hard, at both ends of the ring.  By the time the lesson was over, my legs were getting a little sore.

Blondie is going to stay inside until November, with daily turn out. Then she can be outside for  November - January.  I haven't figured out what to do with her after that, but I think I am going to try and take lessons at a few other barns, just to see how they do things.  I left a message for one trainer, and I'm going to call another one on Monday.  Hope they call me back.

Glory

Blondie's tail set has been retired, so it must be the end of show season.  It's so much easier to get her ready without having to struggle with that confusing mix of leather and snaps, and putting her away is a breeze.  It's so hard to get it all back on correctly, especially when she won't stand still.  Can't say that I blame her, what with a pillow being crammed under her tail and a girdle being strapped around her middle.

We worked on collection during this lesson, but first we had to get the horse to not pull on the bit.  That's all Blondie seems to do at the walk, and it's so frustrating!  For a few fleeting moments on Sunday, I figured out how to bump her head up and keep her off the bit, but I quickly lost it.  I just don't get it.  I don't understand how to keep her from pulling, which means that I can't get her head up.  I bump her sides and wiggle the bridle, and even worked on bending and turning to get her give a little, but nothing lasts for more than a few seconds with her.

We did have two very nice canters, but again, she was hanging on her bit.  If I can get this figured out, I know that everything else will start falling into place.  If I ever get it figured out.

Tomorrow is a bareback longe line lesson on Doc, if his feet got  trimmed.  He is tripping too much to do it if his hooves weren't trimmed.

Let me take you on a quick tour of the Michigan State Fairgrounds.  Until this year, I had never been there, and I'm sad to admit that I was a little underwhelmed with the facilities.  The fairgrounds are starting to look a little dog-eared, and needs some sprucing up.  At the Spring Show, the bleachers by the warm-up ring had inch thick crusts of bird poop on them.  No exaggeration.  I didn't look at them this time around to see if they had been cleaned up. There were dead leaves blown up against all of the fences both times, and an alarming amount of trash never made it into a trash can.

The Coliseum is a blast to show in, but after the State Fair, they turn it into an ice rink.  The show was held at the Equestrian Club next door, and the footing in the arena was a little scary.  It's very powdery and slippery, and the rubber mats leading to ring weren't very stable.  I don't remember seeing the ring watered or groomed, and it was very dusty in the arena.  There was a very nice lounge that I didn't discover until Sunday.  If the rest of the place looked like the lounge, this would be an awesome place to show.

Not wanting to dwell on the negative, I snapped some pictures of the more attractive areas at the fairgrounds.  I now regret not taking a picture of the bull - maybe next year?

Presenting - the fairgrounds!

Lovely foliage for Blondie to eat.

Even the flowers were beginning to wilt under the blazing sun

Stretches and stretches of hot pavement - it was very hot on Saturday.  I think it made it to 80!

Chilling out in the shade with more flowers.

Blondie in Ludington

Got up at 5:30 so that I would have enough time to get ready.  Yuck! One of the kids almost missed her class on Saturday because her mom was running late, and I didn't want that to happen to me.  Blondie wouldn't need a long warm up, but I didn't want to feel rushed.

I arrived in plenty of time for the COTB Saddleseat Pleasure Championship.  There were 10 horses this time around, still enough to make for a jam-packed ring.  I had Blondie's head crammed back for the warm up, but I just couldn't repeat it in the ring.  I do feel encouraged that I am starting to figure out how to set her head without pulling on her bridle, but I really wished that I could have done it during the class!  It was another free for all in there, minus anyone falling off.  Blondie hit all of her gears, but we didn't place. 

M commented after the class that it's just hard for her to compete against all of the show pleasure horses, and I thought back to last year when she was a show pleasure horse.  What the hell happened?  The more I think about it, the more unhappy I am with Blondie's training at the barn.  What to do, what to do??

D & A showed up just before the final session.  At that point, one had to wonder what the whole point of that was.  I'll not vent much about how disappointed I am that he ditched his paying customers to go to someone else's horse show, but what the heck, I'm just one the idiots that keeps writing training checks to him, only to learn that my horse became someone else's "project" horse.  Sorry, I digress, and this blog is supposed to be about happy things.  I'll save the bullsh$t for a post another time.

Sitting. Doing nothing.  You do a lot of this at horse shows.

My final class was the last class for the barn.  It was the Country Pleasure Championship, and there were four entries in it.  Since Blondie has already gone earlier in the morning, she didn't really need a warm up.  Amber and Harley were in the Walk/Trot Championship right before us, so M was ringside for them, leaving me with A.  We took Blondie out to the warm up ring, and she heaved me onto the saddle.  I trotted around a few times, and then went to stand in the middle of the ring.  When they called for the line-up for Amber's class, I headed to the arena, with A and D trailing behind me. 

As w/t horses started streaming out of the arena, Amber and Harley were nowhere to be seen.  Why?  They had won the class!  Good thing D had showed up to grudgingly nail Harley's loose shoe back on his hoof.  It would have been a shame for the horse to have thrown a shoe and ruined the kid's ride. 

When they finally emerged, M handed Harley off to A, and she helped lead Blondie in.  There was a horse for her to follow, so Blondie wasn't too skittish about going into the ring.  I tried to ride my heart out, but Blondie started feeling very hitchy the first way around.  That is the reason I was so upset that the Saturday night class had been pushed to Sunday morning - I wanted her fresh for both classes.  It wasn't likely that we would win either one, but she's more fun to ride when she's not all tired out.

She got all of her gears right, and stood, for the most part, quietly at the halt.  The second way, I thought that J's kids were going to spook her, because they came running over to the wall to wave at me.  Argh!  Don't bring your kids to the horse show if you're not going to watch them!  Thankfully, the walk was called before they could scare the crap out of my horse, or any of the other horses.

We ended up 3rd out of 4.  

The show season is over, but now I have some big decisions to make.  Ever since Ludington, I haven't been happy with the way things are at the barn.  Every day I am less happy.  If things don't change, and soon, I feel that I will have to move to another facility.   And that totally bums me out.

Yeah, so Day II never really happened.  After hanging out with Jen and Mike most of the day, which included a run to Joann's, the mall, and then some lunch, I headed off to the fairgrounds, only to discover, after I had already started to change, that my class had been bumped until Sunday morning.  What an utter and complete pain in the ass.  No sleeping in on Sunday morning for me!  Wish someone had called to let me know, because I probably would have just gone home and taken care of a few of neglected tasks.

Since I was there, I decided to just stay.  The most amusing part of the evening to was Ride a Buck class.  A2 rode Diesel, but she said that she would quit when they called the canter, and M rode Harley.  A2 ended up cantering, and Diesel looked like he behaved himself.  There were only 6 participants this year - 2 years ago, there were about 20.  Attendance at the shows has really dropped off, and it was really evident during the fun classes.  So sad.

One of the girls in the class rode a mini, which just had us cracking up.  It may have been a shorter fall to the ground, but that little guy had the roughest looking gaits.  It was so funny, and I really wished that I had remembered to bring my video camera.

A2 was the 4th rider disqualified, and M won on Harley.  He has a pretty rough trot, but a very smooth canter.  Yay! Wonder what she'll do with all of those winnings!

The most exciting class was the Road Pony Championship, which had three entries - huge for this circuit.  Audie and Bentley were up against some adult amateur exhibitors, and they entered the arena just smoking.  I have never seen Bentley look at sharp as he did on Saturday.  Audie had his head jacked back, and he was so fast!  If she could have kept his head straight, I think she might have been able to pull off an upset - instead, she was the reserve champion.  It was a fantastic class!

Got home late and dreaded the thought of having to get up early to get ready and be at the fairgrounds in time for the start of the 9AM show.  Our class was the second one of the morning.  Ugh!

After taking a break from the fairgrounds to grab some lunch with my parents, it was back to my favorite horse show activity - waiting.  I did manage to entertain myself by snapping some pix of the fairgrounds, which I'll post later.  When Audie reappeared, I asked her why she wasn't taking part in the scavenger hunt that the show was putting on.  She said she didn't want to, until I offered to help her.  It was a lot of fun chasing around after her as she tried to track down the clues.  We got stuck on Clue #6, which required the show's farrier to be there.  He had left for dinner.  Audie was just gnashing her teeth because the other kids were catching up to her, and she had been so happy that she had a huge head start on them.  At first she didn't want to talk to them, but by the end of the show, they were hanging out, thicker than thieves. 

There were a lot of class cancellations in the evening session, so everything was accelerated again.  I got early ready, just so I wouldn't feel rushed again like in the afternoon.  Then I was able to watch some of the classes.  I was supposed to tail one of R's weanlings, but she found someone else who wasn't showing later in the session to help her instead.  That meant that I didn't have to change clothes in a rush.

We had four horses going in the evening, but they were a little more spread out.  I was in the last class, and it was a Jackpot Judging class.  For $5, people could purchase a card, and if they placed the class exactly as the judge, they would win half of the kitty.  The class was 12 horses, so that wasn't going to be easy.  I don't know if anyone won.  I wasn't so thrilled that it was my class, because it meant that there would be a ton of people watching.  Grrr.

Since Blondie had already gone twice, I didn't want to even trot her before the class.  The warm up ring was packed, so I just walked her up and down the drive.  I hate waiting, and just wanted to class to be called into the ring.  It finally was, and off we went.  I followed Sammy in, and soon it was sheer bedlam.  The ring is too small for that many horses!

I love big classes.  Why?  You don't have time to worry about anything but keeping your spot on the rail and avoiding collisions.  Horses were breaking all around the ring - cantering when they should have been trotting, walking when they should have been trotting, stopping when they should have been moving forward.  I just tried to stay clear of everybody else.  During the canter the first way, one of the horses slipped, pitching his rider right over his head.  I was cantering by when it happened.  There was so much noise that you couldn't even hear the announcer call for a halt.  I was just trying to find a place to stop where I wouldn't get creamed.  The rider was ok, she dusted herself off and got back on her horse.  The only bummer was that Blondie was working so well before it happened, and it was hard to get back to that.

We ended up not even placing, but it was so much fun that I didn't care.  I hope that the class tonight is like that again, minus the falling off part.  I just need to work on Blondie's head set; she did everything else except that she did jig at the walk.

There was a dessert party after the session, and I ate 6 cream puffs.  Ugh.  Back to the diet on Monday.

Make that an order of fries to go.

OMG! Yesterday was just exhausting. A lot happened, so I'm going to break up the day into a couple of posts.

After getting home late on Thursday, my carefully crafted plans of sleeping in on Friday were ruined, and I had to get up early to be back at the fairgrounds.  Since I wasn't able to ride Blondie Thursday night - they weren't finished getting the arena ready, and even though they encouraged us to come on and use the ring, it just didn't look safe.  Instead, we entered into my classes for Friday, and made plans to meet again in the morning.

I had only planned on riding in two classes this show, so I decided to commute.  Bad idea.  I ended up in four, and it would have been better to stay a little closer to the fairgrounds.  Problem - there isn't really any place that is affordable, safe, and close.  Boo.

Our trial run around the ring went pretty well, and though Blondie kept looking around, she didn't react to anything going on around her.  The arena footing is awful - it's like a fine powder, it's very dry, and by the end of this trial run, I think I had breathed in a pound of dust.  The ring is also small - not much bigger than the  one at home.  I am very disappointed with the facilities.

I had enough time to run up to a quilt shop in Berkley.  They had a beautiful selection of fabric, and I speed shopped, wondering what I was going to do for lunch the entire time.  I didn't want to eat a lot because I would be riding soon, and it had to be fast.  Solution - Taco Bell!

I bought extra tacos in case anybody else wanted to eat, and headed back to the fairgrounds.  Then I discovered that our classes had been moved up because there were so many cancellations.  Argh!  I only got to eat one taco because I had to get ready.  I hate rushing around like that!

The classes flew by, and M and A2 were scrambling to get us all ready and into the ring.  Because we had worked Blondie earlier, she didn't really need much of a warm up - just a trot or two around to loosen up her muscles.  Then it was time to go into the ring.

The biggest disappointment at this show is that I can't trot in through the chute.  That is the most exhilarating 5 seconds.  Ever.  But alas, at this show we had to trot over concrete and then over rubber mats that shifted and moved and made more than a few people nervous that the horses might trip.  It's a little scary going through there, too, so M had to head us in to the ring.

The Country Pleasure class had three entries.  I was very nervous, which was dumb.  There was hardly any one there watching.  Just people from our barn, my parents, and people from the other competitors' barns.  Silly to be nervous when there are so few people there. 

My biggest apprehension for this class was the halt.  Blondie is not so big on manners, and the last time we tried to do this, she started rearing when she was supposed to be standing quietly minding her p's and q's.  This time she stood rock solid, both directions.  She didn't necessarily want to get moving again after her little break, but I would rather have that than the previous result.  She even stood quietly in the line up.

We were second out of three, and I was happy with that.  My hands were too busy the first way, and I didn't get my nerves under control until we reversed.  I later discovered that one of the other "trainers" from our barn, who that was not in attendance, had commented that Blondie would never stand quietly at the halt.  Maybe the problem is that the horse trainer thinks that they know a little bit more about training horses that they actually do?  More ranting about this at a later date.