I don’t know why the English (and Scots & Irish) call “wanting to turn back” or stopping at a fence napping, but they do.\u00a0 Rags has not previously been really bad about that, but today…today he was *determined* to turn back and we had several tussles that involved stopping, whirling around to try for it, backing when asked to go forward.\u00a0\u00a0 Nothing was scaring him, and he didn’t act as if anything was hurting, but just “I don’t wanna!”\u00a0 and refusing to go forward.\u00a0\u00a0 No snakes, no vultures, no deer, not even mice or small birds.\u00a0 However, the old gray mare in the saddle dealt with all of these attempts, both the brief and the longer ones (several complete tiny circles were etched in the ground for those.)\u00a0\u00a0 This is one of those times I’m glad to have a full-cheekpiece snaffle in his mouth and not a loose-ring snaffle: the ring the rein is attached do can’t be pulled through his mouth when I have to haul his head around.\u00a0 I know I could be mistaken about something hurting or some smell or sound bothering him (the wind was picking up and it was warm) but the quick and easy movement between attempts to end the ride is against anything serious.<\/p>\n
I had planned a shorter ride, so that I’d have energy for some posting trot, so we found ourselves at the low end of Diagonal, and started trotting maybe a third of the way to Center Walk.\u00a0\u00a0 I sat a few strides of a joggy trot then he moved up a gear and I started posting.\u00a0 All was going well when he tripped and nearly went down in front (well, he did go partway down) and I had a bit of struggle to stay on top of him, but I did, and he got back up, and then we started off at a trot again.\u00a0 My posting is improving and his trot (other than the trip) is improving as he becomes accustomed to the posting.\u00a0 I posted longer today than I did Friday, and I can feel both the posting muscles and the ones I used to stay up when he went down in front telling me they were overused.<\/p>\n
Aside from the napping and the stumble that was almost a fall, it was a lovely late afternoon ride\u00a0 with a cooling breeze though it was warm enough to give Rags a good sweat under the saddle and some on his neck.\u00a0 Bluebonnets are scattered around–not in the masses they would be after a wetter winter and spring, but they’re there and they were releasing their lovely fragrance this afternoon.\u00a0 Blue-eyed grass is also blooming and so is prairie verbena (and intense purple.)\u00a0\u00a0 When he wasn’t stopping, whirling, backing, and just generally being a moderate PITA (a serious PITA would include reading, bucking, and bolting) , riding Rags was just as fun as usual.\u00a0 Once on the way home (leaving out the stumble-fall thing)\u00a0 he was forward and eager.\u00a0\u00a0 I’m hoping (and actually assuming, because this is how horse training works) that he will eventually quit with the nappiness and become a cooperative partner for our adventures.\u00a0 Patience is essential…he needs to finish every ride happy and not sulky…happy not because he got his way, but because on the whole it was rewarding<\/p>\n
The farrier’s coming tomorrow morning, which is good.\u00a0 Tigger’s hooves look long; Rags’s don’t, but he’s been tripping more the last few rides, which means he’s long *for him*.\u00a0\u00a0 Mr. Harbi had texted me, but I called after I came in from the ride, and thus hadn’t seen the text.\u00a0\u00a0 But yay.\u00a0 The boys are going to the vet on the 19th for shots, dental work, and another lameness exam for Tigger.\u00a0 This will put their feet in good order for that trip.\u00a0 It could be that Rags’ teeth are bothering him (they weren’t in good shape when I bought him, and we didn’t see the vet last year bc Covid and Laci being sick a lot so she couldn’t haul them.\u00a0 Also tomorrow morning is the HVAC guy for the non-working unit.\u00a0 Given the need to get up early and work on the horses before the farrier comes, I think tonight will be an ibuprofen night.\u00a0\u00a0 (added after supper:\u00a0 I KNOW tonight will be an ibuprofen night.\u00a0 WOW am I stiff and sore.\u00a0 But I didn’t fall off, and Rags got up OK, and we trotted some more after that.\u00a0 All good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I don’t know why the English (and Scots & Irish) call “wanting to turn back” or stopping at a fence napping, but they do.\u00a0 Rags has not previously been really bad about that, but today…today he was *determined* to turn back and we had several tussles that involved stopping, whirling around to try for it, Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,48,16],"tags":[52,49,17],"class_list":["post-1244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-80-acres","category-horses","category-life-beyond-writing","tag-80acres","tag-horses","tag-life-beyond-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1244"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1244"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1244\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1245,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1244\/revisions\/1245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}