31 Saturday Jan 2015
Posted in Horses, Short Story
So technically I know you’re supposed to do throwback posts on Thursday but hey, I am the Fairy Queen of my blog and if I decide it’s Throwback Saturday then it’s Throwback Saturday.
Plus I wanted to post this before I lost the courage. I wrote this in a creative writing class in high school so consider that a disclaimer all on its own. This is for Frances, the horse who we lost too young.
04 Wednesday Dec 2013
Posted in Fifty Shades of Grey Audio Recaps, Horses
Whoo, here’s a surprisingly prompt recap. But first a quick update for those of you who want to know.
Brego’s doing a lot better. He’s back on his usual diet and his white blood cell count is where it needs to be for him to finally go off the antibiotics. The vet says if he keeps looking this good he can go home on Friday.
Phew. There’s a vice around my heart loosening ever so slightly. I probably won’t feel entirely relaxed until I can finally see him in person at the end of December.
I would also like to give a shout out to K Coldiron and Elisa Chavez! Thank you so much for donating. It means a lot to me and every cent makes it feel a little easier to breathe.
Now on to the main event! Go check out the recap on Jenny’s blog to see the visual gags.
30 Saturday Nov 2013
Posted in Fifty Shades of Grey Audio Recaps, Horses
Tags
50 Shades recaps, brego, Fifty Shades of Grey, Jenny Trout, the feelings corner, voice beneath the hat
It’s taken a lot longer than I wanted to get this chapter done. First I had a cold, so recording was out. Then there was a chunk of work to get done in order for the end of this semester to not be really horrible. I had every intention of posting a chapter on Thanksgiving as a sort of holiday treat. But then the holidays punched me in the soul instead.
I believe many of you are familiar with my horse, Brego. I blog about him from time to time.
He nearly died this past Tuesday night. Technically he’s not out of the woods yet as infection is still a danger but everyone at the hospital is very optimistic. After a pretty traumatic surgery he’s perked up a lot, which just speaks to how much pain he was in before they operated.
Brego had a twisted bowel. If he hadn’t been strong and healthy enough to survive the surgery to fix it, we would have had to put him down to keep him from suffering. Nothing about this wasn’t killing me but the part that felt additionally painful was that we really couldn’t afford the surgery. We did it anyway, of course. Like Mom said, you can’t just put down a healthy horse who has every chance of surviving after the procedure.
They’re reducing his pain medication and if all goes well he’ll get to go home in a week or so. The looming, soul-sucking fear that I have is now purely focused on the financial aspect of all this. Setting aside what his stay at the hospital and treatments have cost, the surgery itself was between $7000 to $9000.
So basically Mom and I are playing for time. Time for me to maybe, hopefully get a book published and in the meantime scraping together any extra pennies I can find. We do have some time but just as we were taking a step back onto solid ground this has pushed us right up to the edge again. One more disastrous puff of air and it’s all over.
If any one of you could either afford to click the flattr button or go to Passing the Hat, I would really appreciate it if you could help me play for time as well.
Ahem. And now what you all are actually here for! Be sure to go read along with Jenny’s post or you’ll miss the creepy staring frog. Or is it a toad? I’m not sure.
20 Saturday Jul 2013
Want to know something great about horses?
When you’re walking down the barn aisle singing Queen at the top of your lungs and they all stick their heads out to stare at you, it’s easy to pretend they’re staring because they want to admire your vocal stylings.
Their big, observant eyes seem to be saying, “You rock.”
Yes I do, unwilling audience. Yes I do.
19 Friday Jul 2013
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I love horses. I’m sure this is shocking considering my first post included a picture of a horse wearing a hat but I wanted to say it out loud. Horses are awesome and I love them.
That being said I sometimes wonder at how the equestrian lifestyle has a certain aura of glamor about it. Mitt Romney didn’t help that during the last election. And by the way, I really want to figure out how I can claim my horses as an expense on my taxes. That would be super.
For me personally I often think that being a horse person means paying a premium for a consistent layer of dirt, horse drool and screaming muscles that you didn’t realize existed. After a while the last one fades away, although God help you if you take a lengthy break from riding. Riding utilizes muscles that you just don’t use in daily life. And they secretly want to kill you.
Surely there exists barns where everything is spotless and the riders do not get so much as a flake of dust upon their pristine britches. Maybe the Olympics. Who knows? I just know that I have never ever been to that barn. The horse tribe is a grungy tribe but when you love something you forget about the dirt. You also sort out the shirts that you don’t mind getting filthy on a regular basis.
Look, if I came back to horses after my precious baby Brego stepped on my spine then a little dirt is not going to deter me. More on that story at a later date.
No day at the ranch with the horses is a day wasted, even if not all that much riding gets done. Speaking of which, the day before I left for Atlanta I had just such a day.
The vet was coming out to the ranch for vaccines so it wasn’t going to be a particularly heavy day anyway because he prefers us to work the horses lightly after the injections, which, yeah, fair enough. His day wasn’t great either as he ended up being an hour late because one of his tires got intimate with a nail. That threw us a bit off schedule but you accept delays as a given when horses are involved.
My first ride of the day was Benny. Sadly he’s no longer with us.
Not dead! Sorry, that was seriously bad wording. He’s been sold and has a new, happy home with a very nice lady. I’ll miss working with him but he was my substitute horse and since Brego is no longer spine-stepping I’m okay with Benny moving on to new and better things.
That’s Benny. Isn’t he handsome?
Anyway, first thing I’m on Benny for our usual workout. He feels a little strange at first but Benny can get a little jiggly and stubborn. Also he was recently ridden by a man who shouldn’t be allowed within five miles of horses, much less on top of them. He’s gone now, apart from the semi-stalking, and Benny got better. But that day something felt a little off.
We were making a twenty metre circle a few times at a trot when I looked down and noticed a shiny horseshoe in the dirt. I hadn’t seen it before and I knew I would have noticed. You don’t want chunks of metal hanging about in the arena where horses do their work. So I stopped Benny, had his hooves checked and sure enough he’d thrown a shoe. Well, that was the end of that ride. We put Benny away and I waited to find out whether I would be put on Brego. It hadn’t been decided whether Brego would need his sheathe cleaned with the other boys and the vet had the final word.
As it turned out the vet decided Brego needed a sheathe cleaning after all. So there was no way I was riding Brego that day. You see, to get the sheathe properly cleaned you have to administer a drug that makes the horses a wee bit… loopy.
There’s the vet setting up the bucket and sorting out the elbow-length gloves.
Ah, possibly I should clarify about what I mean by ‘sheathe’.
Penis. I mean penis.
Feelin’ the glamor, yet?
This is the point where Brego was really feeling the drugs. It was his second time experiencing this procedure so he wasn’t nearly as out of it.
I briefly thought about taking a few more pictures of him with my hat but Mom talked me out of it. She was right. It’s one thing when he’s a conscious participant but coercing him while he’s in a weakened state is wrong.
His bottom lip was so floppy!
Anyway, his sheathe got squeaky clean and I hung out with Brego until he was steady enough to walk back to his stall. He only tripped twice on the way. I was very proud.
Sadly he had to wait a while before having lunch because it isn’t safe for a horse to eat under the influence. He was very happy once we finally deemed him adequately recovered.
Days like that are useful for life lessons. See, some days you get sweaty and covered in dirt but on other days you sit back and watch your horse get his penis cleaned.
It’s all a part of being a horse person.
28 Friday Jun 2013
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My post about Georgia is coming. I’ve been here at least a day and have made enough inane observations to make a relatively interesting point but my internet is tenuous and I’m hoarding until I have a better connection. Also there’s a whole post about how glamorous horses are, emphasis on the sarcasm, coming once I download the pictures. A vet and indignity is involved, but that’s all I’m tellin’.
Right now I have a really inane thought to share. It became a tangent and I decided I might as well post.
Today I read the line, “I want to ride you hard and put you away wet.”
Don’t ask me why I read that. You don’t need to know.
Anyway, I immediately thought about how being involved with horses has limited some of the sexy talk I could use while engaging in intimacy. For instance, I could never say that. Or have it said to me. My immediate reaction to that line was, I swear, “How irresponsible.”
And it is! I’m not crazy. If you ride a horse hard and put it away wet you are a terrible person. That isn’t to say riding a horse hard is bad. Sometimes a horse needs a good, hard ride and that’s perfectly reasonable. But putting it away wet? Er, no. Not unless there’s some kind of emergency and even then I’m dubious.
First of all, are we talking about putting the horse away wet with sweat? Because that’s pretty bad. Do you want to be stuck in a stall dripping with sweat? Does that sound fun to you? The sweat will harden and it’s seriously unpleasant for the horse. Ick. Would a bath really take that much time out of your day? Just hose the horse down!
That brings me to my second point. If you have hosed the horse down and put him away wet, then what is wrong with you? Again, emergencies aside, I am giving you the side eye. Fungus will pop up on horses when you don’t dry them properly and put them back in their stall. No one wants a horse to have to deal with fungus. If it goes septic you will have serious health problems on your hands. It’s just not right.
Oh, brain, why must you kill something that sounded so sexy in the abstract?
But hey, if its sexiness has been killed for me I might as well kill it for anyone who stumbles on this blog. Have a great day, everyone!
Beneath the Hat 