Because this blog has the magical ability to jinx every plan I ever make, I never share those plans.  Fuck you, blog curse.

So here's my big secret and why I've suddenly been a little "fuck it" about Archie's feet and skin and riding and sanity and my penchant to drink a lot of beer:

I've scheduled this post to publish upon the departure of my flight to New York.  I've never been to New York.  And I'm not staying.

From New York, the hubs and I will be hopping another plane.  To Nice, France.

A train to Geneva.

A train to Paris.

A train to see a certain someone in Luxemburg.

A bus to a car in Frankfurt.

A car to Fussen.

A car to Munich.

A flight to Amsterdam.  Hopefully a last drink.

And a flight back to America.

Expect your instagram to be flooded with European attractions, hopefully some men in lederhosen, schokolade, a couple of ponies, my handsome ginger, me, and the tip of our selfie-stick, and beer.  Lots of beer.

Happy birthday and five year wedding anniversary, my love.

I'm oozing joyful stories this week.  Like butt funks and whoopsies.

So, I dropped my farrier, who I've had for five years but would have pleasantly dropped at any moment prior due to various unmentionable reasons, in the same manner as was the winner for last week's poll*.  This was less me wussing out or caving to the norm and more a conversation with my barn manager.  I asked her opinion and she said I didn't have to do anything, so nothing I did.

Playing with Excel font options.  Who knew?

Five of y'all badasses don't fear confrontation apparently at all and dumped your farriers in person.  Ballsy.

Let's back up like... two weeks.  Archie had one shoe and I went out to "ride" him.  Because after the ordeal of strapping on a foam pad, all we really did was trot around in circles for a little bit.

I'd noticed the day prior that the Kid had some hives on his butt and flank, but wasn't uncomfortable or any thing.  We'd done our little ride and he was fine.  Lo and behold, the second day, Archie's ass is completely angry and raw.  I didn't ride and instead gave him a little bute and sprayed his angry butt with Chlorhexidine.



The next day, I went out to check his butt and found that, whoopsies, now it's clearly rain rot.

Somewhere around that time, he threw the second shoe.


Fortunately, or unfortunately, I'd scheduled a recheck with the vet for his cough.  Because we'd been riding so much, right?  The appointment is for 7:45 and at 7:25, the vet and I are both walking out to Archie's pasture.  Thanks, dude, for killing any attempt I made at preparation.

The vet asks how he's been and I sort of laugh and answer that he's been a hot mess.  I talk about his butt funk and his bare feet and, oh hey, by the way, firing the farrier, done with life, yay.  He asks if I want to ride since Archie is barefoot and I'm actually dressed for the occasion and the Dude's just been wandering the pasture between having his feet pampered and his butt scrubbed, so I figure that he can handle it.  We walk a little  bit and when I ask to trot, he gives me this enormous front-end hobble and the vet validates my decision to not ride the Kid barefoot.  Because ouch.

He works out of the cripple okay, though, and we trot and canter long enough for the vet to clear him and declare the stall the culprit.  With a side of well-trained owner, stopping to let dear Ponykins slam on the brakes and drop his head at the slightest provocation.  At least I'm considerate?

A hundred and thirteen dollars later, I have a bottle of Malaseb and a joke, after we discuss the stall and allergens:
Me:  At what point does it become Recurrent Airway Obstruction?
Vet:  At recurrent.
(Not funny..?  I laughed.)

(don't be jealous of my life!)

How Do You Dump Your Farrier?

D and I were driving home from a local city on a road we rarely use (which I found out that I've been mispronouncing and now can't remember the correct pronunciation for) and noticed a brand-new sign for a barn.  The name of the barn struck something in me and I realized that I'd see it before, in some of OR's IG photos.

For those new to the game, OR (the Other TB Rider) boarded out with me for a while and we had some fun adventures and then she changed barns about a year or a year and a half ago.  I contacted her to see if I could come out and see this other barn with her.  I offered to bring my camera, because who doesn't want pony pictures?

Romanticized a bit due to my massive mare crush.

And then she said I could ride.

RIDE?!

RIDE!

I haven't ridden a horse other than Archie since that time I hopped on that pissed off chestnut quarterhorse mare and pushed her until she stopped being an asshole.  It wasn't a very long ride.  And that was a really, really long time ago.

Not this chestnut mare.

After driving the whopping thirteen minutes from my house to her new barn,  I met her in the open aisle way and met the BM and started what would be about four hours of talking ponies.  We grabbed two of her three horses from their respective pastures, pausing to take a few photos and to talk with the BM about how the ring hadn't been drug in about three days - for which she was very apologetic.

While tacking up her gelding and her new mares, we talked about saddles and personalities and random stories about horses there.  She offered to switch half way through, allowing me to ride both of her horses.  Considering how rare it is for me to offer Archie up to people, I'm extremely flattered and grateful.

I didn't catch the brand, but this was an amazing saddle.

The horse I rode first was her new liver chestnut Quarterhorse mare.  As she was pulling Sug from the pasture, I commented that, by golly, her brand sure looked a lot like the Arches at the University of Georgia.  (Go dawgs!)  Derp, derp.  Wonder mare was bred at UGA.  OR purchased her from a lesson program and this mare was dead broke.

We put her super fancy dressage saddle on the mare and I mounted up.  And proceeded to ask OR to double-check my girth tightness, because the last time I cinched up a dressage saddle was probably a good two years ago.  Better shamed than sore and broken, right?

Took a photo to memorialize the moment.

We probably rode around for about half an hour to forty-five minutes.  She said both horses were a little out of work, given that she's undergoing the huge strain of building a facility on a new property. I couldn't really tell it, though.  Sug didn't believe my leg, didn't believe she had to move forward, but once at a speed had that magical quality of maintaining everything until I told her the next step.  I fell in love with this little mare.

I asked her to canter and promptly pulled out my phone because I wanted to capture video and felt so incredibly, so fucking comfortable and trusting that she wasn't going to do anything stupid.  OR made a seriously solid purchase of this horse.


After cantering both directions and doing a little, tiny bit of trot, we traded horses.

I've seen her OTTB gelding, Bu, go a lot more than the mare I rode first.  I've seen him buck and flail and tell her nope.  So I was a little more apprehensive about riding him.  He needed to work on the right lead canter, which is my horrible direction (thanks, Archie), and which is the one more likely to make him do his crow-hop flail.  I asked, he flailed, I shortened my reins and growled, and he picked it up a wee bit nicer.  OR even commented on how cute he looked.

Not the OTTB you're used to.  Check out the tiny birdcatcher spot on his left ear.

After riding, cooling, grooming and feeding, we headed out for Mexican and promptly talked about picking up heavy objects, which is a new interest of hers.  I've rarely been able to talk to other women about my abhorrence of the bench press or what it's like to work out and have it not be cardio.  It was great!

And after we ate and talked more, I headed out to see my own pony.  I'd forgotten that the days are shorter and pulled him out of his pasture by light of the big lamps.  I groomed him a bit and put on his bridle and just walked figure 8s for a few minutes, before oiling his hooves and shoving beet pulp in his face.  Both of the horses that OR has are dead-broke, happy, non-crippled ponies and an absolute breath of fresh air.  But I still appreciated that my gimpy monster felt the left rein pressure, the touch of my left heel, and immediately spun (slowly, at the crippled walk) right around his haunches.  I still can't get over what a gratifying feeling it was to hop on to a well-broke horse and be able to ask it questions and not get a temper tantrum or bucked off.  It was so amazing for my confidence as a rider.  New year's goal:  get some lessons on some non-Archie ponies.  And some lessons on the Archie pony.

We were on the cusp of a hurricane this weekend, which diluted to a measly storm and headed somewhere to the west of Florida.  But still managed to give us some rain.  So, Friday, when I finally meandered to the barn, I hopped on Archie bareback and worked on his circling cues while the thunder built.  Of course, once I dismounted and slathered stuff all over his hooves and shoved beet pulp into his face, the storms cleared.  Life.


My in-laws and grand-in-laws came to visit on Saturday, to celebrate our birthdays over the next couple of months.  I woke up to D crawling out of bed at some god-awful time, telling me I could stay in bed but that his parents were already there.  I can't even imagine how early they rose for the trip.  The day went exceptionally well, including the installation of an electric fuck-you fence for the dogs (it's a mild zap, we all tested it) (and before you think shit, consider that it'll hurt a lot less than a car).  And the first sweet potato beer of the season (not pictured, because it was guzzled almost instantaneously).  And I got a circular saw (so I'm gonna start ripping off all of Emma's jump plans). And, the best part, D and I were done in time for me to head out to the barn to ride.

All the pretty colors.

This ride was slightly more productive, albeit still short.  He's still coughing some and I feel like it had gotten better and has now gotten worse.  So I'm not working him hard because of that and also because he's missing a shoe.  He can still work on bending and lifting and some lateral moves.

Can't.

I rode again on Sunday morning before the worst of the storms hit.  It was 79º and felt damn near cool, but the humidity was at 100%.  It got steadily cooler as the ride went on and the clouds rolled in.  Because of that shit-tastic humidity, I opted just to walk.  It's amazing how much I've overlooked this gait since we rehabbed from his leg injury and the fucker now moves like molasses up a cold hill.

And he coughed.

A lot.

To the extent that we never moved out of a walk.  It improved as the ride went on, but it was alarming nonetheless that he became symptomatic at a point where he previously hadn't been.  I've texted my vet about it and he's not sure if it's an outlier for the data or what.  So, I guess the hay test continues?


And to add to this, I spoke with the farrier on the phone Monday afternoon.  First time since I moved barns and had the BM to be a go-between (I think?).  He pretty much was telling me that if he came out this week, he'd be charging me to tack the shoe back on.  And if he did a full job, he'd be charging me again in two weeks when he did the rest of the barn.  I explained from the onset of the call that his shoes weren't registering as my highest priority in regards to my horse.  He can survive without shoes.  He can't survive without breathing.  So we're going to hold off and he'll stay one-shoed until the guy comes out and does everyone else in two weeks.  I said I felt like he was going to lose the second one in a week to ten days, that I was riding him in a foam pad, and that I'd be texting him some photos if I felt like the feet went to shit before then.

What?  You don't ride like this?