I knew it!

I just knew that something was going to happen to prevent Farmmom from getting to ride Monkey, and I was right.

At some point yesterday afternoon or last night, Monkey managed to slip in his stall, and strain a muscle in his hip. He's a little swollen, and sore, so he didn't get ridden today. Farmmom did get to walk him to loosen it up while I cleaned his stall and Sparky's horse's stall. Sparky missed class today, so JJ asked me to clean his stall and feed his horse this morning, no big deal.

JJ was worried that Farmmom would be upset about Monkey getting hurt, since owners tend to be touchy about those things, but she understood that it happens.

He asked me why I wasn't riding, when he saw me cleaning the stall, and I told him that Monkey had managed to fall in his stall and bruise himself or strain a muscle or something.

"What? How can you see a bruise?"

"Um... he's swollen, and he's sore. It's either a bruise or he pulled the muscle, either way he's stiff and sore enough that I'm not going to ride him today."

"You've been paying attention in Horse Production, good job!"

"I thought I was supposed to pay attention? You mean I could have been slacking off all this time? Well geez!"

JJ got a good chuckle out of that one. He's upset today because some people didn't fulfill their responsibilities yesterday, and gave him excuses today for it. I can't really blame him, either.

Also, last night was the second night of the college rodeo here, today at noon is the short rounds for all of the events. Last night was pretty eventful, one of the bareback horses managed to kill itself, it ran into the fence after the ride and I think it broke its neck. One of the saddle bronc riders got taken to the hospital, as well, he came off his horse and had what looked to me like some kind of seizure, his head and legs were twitching, one arm was up by his collar bone twitching, and when he stopped moving, he didn't move for a while. He walked out of the arena, but I heard today he got taken to the hospital afterwards.

Another of the saddle bronc riders just had a bad night all around. His first horse fell over on him, which got him a re-ride, his re-ride horse refused to come out of the chute, which got him another re-ride, and this third horse dumped him right out of the chute. I felt bad for him.

One of the bull riders got a re-ride too, cause his bull fell over.

Today, they'll have the really rough stock out. One of the bulls is the number one ranked bucking bull in the country right now, and the horses last night were just freakin nuts, which tells me that today's rides are going to be hellacious.

I'm going to make myself some lunch and go out to the fairgrounds and get myself a good seat. It's just too bad Farmmom couldn't stick around for the finals.

AD, Eat Your Heart Out...

No medical training whatsoever, and I got the same score he did....


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I feel smart!

Of course...

Since I bragged on how well Monkey did a few days ago, he's now being a shit. Still rideable, nothing major, but he's not performing like he should. Just a couple of those days, I guess.

Tonight Farmmom is coming up to watch the college rodeo with me, and either staying over or coming back in the morning, so that she can ride Monkey.

That's about it, really. I gotta clean up the apartment some before Farmmom gets here so she doesn't see what a sty I've made of it this week, so I'm gonna get on that.

Because I'm a Sitemeter Addict...

I check my sitemeter every day, and I usually check the referrals, now that I get them.

Item of note #1: AD accounts for a huge chunk of my referred visits. No, really, its a big chunk. Thanks AD!

Item of note #2: Technorati is way behind, because there are people that have linked to me that I'm getting referrals from, and they haven't shown up on Technorati. Hi new linkers! We appreciate your business, please come again, please talk me up so that my ego can be fed....

Item of note #3: I've been linked as a source for information on women's concealed carry on GlockTalk.... Thanks, Herr Glock! I hope that the piece I wrote is helpful!

A Note to the Inexperienced....

When you're going out dancing, it's usually not a good idea to wear something that constricts your breathing.

Corsets, no matter how cute they look, should be laced so that you can breathe. Otherwise, it'll mean an early night.

Oh, and Sparky? (Like he'll ever stumble across this but still...) You and your girlfriend can dance! I don't care how easy you say it is, I still can't dance like that.

But ya'll still suck for leaving early.

Social life? Holy Crap!

Today at the barn some of the girls were talking about going to the local bar tonight, and one of them was getting all mock offended that no one asked her.

"Don't worry T, they haven't asked me either."

"I know, they're so rude!"

"Hows this, you and I will go and we'll ignore them and be rude right back."

"Sounds good, it's a date!"

So, I have a date with T, and she told me to wear something slutty. I asked her if I would be getting lucky, and this girl had the gall to tell me not on the first date while wearing a t-shirt that reads: Aspen High Altitude Sex Instructor. First Lesson Free.

This ought to be fun, a bunch of the girls from the Ag program are going, and some of the cosmetology girls. At the very least T and I will be able to give everyone shit... she's a smartass too.

I can't be doing that bad...

Today we were in the indoor arena, after the HTM kids finished their quiz, and we did a bunch of different races. One of the races was to go to the end of the arena, get off, walk around your horse, get back on, trot a small circle, and lope back.

Now, Monkey is considered one of the "spooky" horses out of all of the horses in the class. And, at times, he is spooky. But, I got off my horse (flying dismount, which he's getting used to) told him stand, walked all the way around him, and got back on, and he never moved a foot. Meanwhile my counterpart on the other team is busy chasing their horse down the arena because the horse spooked. And that horse is considered one of the calm ones.

Also, after class, when there was only three of us in the arena, I decided to do a little experimenting, because I was bored. So, I tied my reins in a knot, dropped them over the saddle horn, and rode solely on leg signals for a few minutes. He did pretty good, nothing like a bitless reining pattern or anything, but other than some issues with stopping without the reins, and not wanting to turn into the fence a couple of times to do a roll back, he listened to my leg signals and my seat really well. We even loped circles on leg pressure alone. To the right, which is his good direction, but he did lope past the gate after a left turn, which is one of the things we've been having issues with.

I'm pretty danged proud of him, and myself, tonight.