Welcome to Adulthood, my dear Hippo

August marked a full year with the Hippo, the first consistent year she's ever had.  With the end of her first year comes the transition to being asked to behave like an adult who has to work for a living.

The tone of our rides lately:
Yes, adulting is hard
No, adulting isn't optional
Yes, you may have an apple afterward

I hear you, dear horse

I mean, I get it.  Adulting is highly overrated.  But if I can work full-time to keep her sheltered, she can suck it up to work 5+ hours per week.

But this transition to adulthood has to happen. Now we're transitioning to fall, so aptly named.  Its a season of crisp temperatures, shorter days and increasing equine dumbassery.  And the Hippo is feeling much more full of herself.  Evidently the temptation to spook at everything/nothing for sheer entertainment purposes has been irresistible. However, I appear to have found a solution!

Welcome to the Samuel L Jackson school of attitude adjustment, where spooking results in an instant Pulp Fiction-esque response.

Or in our case "Spook again, Hippo"

Lest you think I am unreasonably harsh, I did give her 5 months to acclimatize in the ring + 24/7 turnout + regular work + hacking + majority roughage diet. And did I mention that the behavior was almost absent at horse shows?  Hippo logic, spook = distract = don't have to work so hard.

We're approaching the point where I see my darling mare eyeball or tilt an ear at things she usually spooks at and decide "It ain't worth it."

Not worth spooking? Good decision

Thank god for that, because she's usually spooking at the arena itself.  You see, we're in a cover-all type ring ... on top of a hill ... on the ocean ... going into winter. The end walls of the arena wiggle, waver and 'flap' randomly and with increasing frequency.   And its a very, very long time until spring.

The flapping, like these adorable ears ... with more 'exciting' results

Why is the 'insert beverage' always gone?

Sweet mother of god, there's not enough coffee in the world. Screw TBT, I don't have the energy to mine the archives.

Ditto the coffee...

You know know you're in trouble, post-riding lesson, when you start with a quadruple espresso yet still want to stab your eye out with a spork to distract from the fatigue.  Never mind the unfortunate side effects that come with that much caffeine hitting your system that quickly. (sprint)

Why so tired you ask?  Well, my coach asked the infamous question last night, "So, what do you want to work on?" and like an idiot I responded, "Up to you".  Cue a mischievous gleam in her eye. This didn't bode well. Neither did the quick warm up and the infamous casual words "Come on over here for a minute."

DANGER WILL ROBINSON!  I know this trick, she's trying to get me in arm's reach.  Nothing good ever came from getting within arm's reach of a mischievous looking riding coach.  (Seriously, its a good thing y'all don't play poker.)

Did she say come here?

Me: walk horse to 10 feet away
Coach: No no, come here
Me: walk horse to 8 feet away
Coach: No, really, come here
Me: Do I look that stupid?

After a few token protests (I'm old, its expected) the stirrups are crossed and out of reach of my desperate little toes.

Time to die

Walk, trot (crap), walk, trot (crap, crap, bounce)
Turn by throwing one's ass to the inside, scramble quickly as one's right ass cheek ends up alone in the air with no saddle or horse underneath it. BOING
Stop, unclamp legs and ass to prevent bouncing. Rinse repeat.

Ok, This isn't going so badly, which (of course) means we are going to canter.  Cue the peremptory "I know I'm going to hate you in a minute" and off we work on a few canter transitions

Somehow this engages my inner 'fuck it' at which point I volunteer to jump the cavaletti ... without stirrups ... repeatedly (WTF?)

Which turns into jumping a low bounce combination ... still without stirrups ...

I mean, not so bad for a dinosaur who hasn't ridden without stirrups in around 10 years and hasn't (purposely) jumped without stirrups in 20.  Its going to be a looooong winter, I may need to start drinking before lessons.

Consciousness, balance, the ability to tame one's wandering bastard of a lower leg ...

Foot Stomping Hippo Tantrums

Well, its been a little over a week since we returned from the Horse Trial and the weather has been awful for riding.  Its been HOT and HUMID.  When I say humid, I don't mean 60%-70%, "Wow its muggy" humidity.  I mean 90%-100%, "It feels like I'm breathing hot soup" humidity.

I don't remember this moss and algae on my house yesterday...

So, there's been a lot of very quiet rides.  Riding to the lake at a walk, then walking around in the lake, then back to the barn was still resulting in a sweat drenched horse.  Even the velociraptors have been dragging their tails.  Yesterday, finally, the humidity actually broke ... to 65%!  After the past week, it felt positively chilly.

25 deg C, 65% humidity and I'm almost cold?

So, a great night to make the Hippo work for a living and the first serious ride after the competition. The big mare has decided that dressage is boooooring. I disagree, but she making it clear that working on rhythm, forward and relaxed needs some livening up. "Did you see that monster hiding inside the traffic cone?" *wiggle tapdance* "I'm sure I heard something dangerous outside" *zoom forward* "Have I told you about the dangers of barn swallows?" *twitch dodge*

Seriously, didn't you see that?

Short version, she's just screwing with me.  We both know it, which is why I've also set up some jumps to occupy her busy brain.  Low stuff, easy to blend in with the regular work. Good plan, right?

Someone has come back from the Horse Trial with higher confidence about jumping. Trotting fences is boring, let's canter! Zoom,WHEE on landing.  How about a RAMPAGE towards the fence?  Jump, land turn?  How about I start turning AS I jump? Sounds easier to me!

And if she doesn't get to do it her way? Stompity stomp stomp, pout, flounce around in a huff, act like a 1200lb toddler in the cereal aisle.  Because she knows what she's doing, and I am getting in the way of a good time.

I'm the unreasonable asshole dressed in black

Trust me, when I say that this is actually a good thing. She thinks jumping is fun and wants to get to the party. I just need to make sure she doesn't party too hard for her own good and stay on.  Let's just hope I can manage the 'stay on' part

Craaaaap!!!!

Introducing the Dancing Hippo ...

Its gotten to the point that I should properly introduce my partner in crime, the Dancing Hippo.  As I said recently, she's gorgeous, solid and athletic; with the bonus that she makes my T-Rex tail look smaller.   I mean, look at that face!  Its adorable!

Soft eyes & flappy ears get me every time.

The Dancing Hippo is my dressage prospect. When I got her, I intended to train and sell fairly quickly.  Turns out she requires a lot more time in the finishing process.  Not so much like clay sculpture, a lot more like marble.  Going to be beautiful but takes a little (lot) more time.

The hippo doesn't respond so well to rushing things...

Hang on, you say?  Thought you were the T-Rex EVENTER?  What's with this prissy, dancing, dressage bullshit?

Well, back in the stone ages, I used to event and jump. (See what I did there? har dee har har) Blah blah blah, hit the ground a few too many times, horse that wouldn't jump consistently, horse without brakes, bills to pay, getting old, stupid knees, and don't forget gravity (that unforgiving bitch)

So, I converted to dressage.  Its an endless puzzle, the methods go back to the dawn of time and NO obstacles. Awesome, its elegant, and perfect for the mildly obsessive.  (Note to friends of the T-Rex, stop laughing at 'mildly'.  Let me have my delusions)

Buy the hippo. Train the hippo. Find out that the hippo is utterly steady about obstacles.  Not so much about open doors, weird sounds or ponies in zebra fly sheets ... again I digress.  Six months in, slowly add in poles, then raised poles then low crosses etc.   Some call it 'desensitizing', I call it the 'boiling a frog' method.

Evidently the hippo enjoys cross training ... and now we're scheduled to drop a toe into the eventing world.  I get my dressage, she gets her obstacles and hopefully the T-Rex doesn't fall into a tar pit ...

Someday soon ...

Saddle Shopping ... What's a T-Rex to do?

Ah, the saddles of the English riding world.  How do I describe the hell that is saddle shopping? 

 Imagine you are shopping for the PERFECT pair of jeans. You know the kind: perfectly fitting, not too loose, not too tight and comfortable for prolonged periods of time. Not prone to pinching or rubbing you the wrong way, if you get my drift. (As in owwww, not ohhhh). Now, expect those jeans to fit two different species equally well.  

Welcome to the rider's dilemma.

I mean it's tough enough for the stereotypically slender rider with a small tail. When you're a T-Rex?  On a budget? Sweet Jurassic. 

Years ago I was lucky enough to find a dressage saddle that fit horses like a dream and accommodated my tail beautifully.  And 2nd hand to boot. And it was adjustable. God, I loved that saddle. I was keeping that saddle until I fossilized. Seriously, trying to suggest a different saddle would get your head bitten off.   

And then it got stolen out of my car, which meant saddle hunt (Yes, I drive. Even a T-Rex has to get around).  

So, several saddle trials later  I finally found a reasonably priced replacement of ... the same brand and model I had before. 

Evidently, saddles have evolved on a different path. Take up archeology. Way easier, possibly cheaper. 

T-Rex out. 

T-Rexs, we're still out there!

You might've heard that dinosaurs were extinct, especially the T-Rex, but I'm here to tell you we are alive and well!

How can you claim to be a T-Rex, you ask?  Easy enough!  Let's look at the defining characteristics of a T-Rex shall we?

• Big head?  According to a lifetime of frustrated hat shopping, that's covered. Well, barely covered depending on the manufacture of the hat but you get my drift.
• Big tail? Ummm (checks mirror)  According to the family/friends consensus that Sir Mix A Lot's anthem "Baby Got Back" should have been written for me ... check!
• Little arms? Well, that used to be a joke. Then I took up yoga for a while.  I found out that there was a whole series of seated poses where your hands were supposed to reach the ground. As in flat palms....and bent elbows.  I could only reach with my fingertips. 

That's not even getting into my carnivorous tendencies or the fact that it took me years to realize I was a T-Rex (hello little brain!)