Silly Braids

I am so sore this morning. I've upped my ab workouts, and with the increased amount of sitting trot and overall "I'm not playing the pulling game so listen to my core" work I've been doing, my entire midsection is a big block of ouch. That's what I get for letting myself get a little...er, "fluffy" over the winter. But since New Year's, I've already lost five pounds out of the ten I want to lose by the end of the year just by limiting my junk food intake (sob) and putting more than sloth-like effort into my minimalist workouts. See, Bobby? I'm torturing you, but I'm torturing myself, too. At least you get as many cookies as you want.

Speaking of torturing, I finally got so fed up with Floppy Mane Magee that I threw in a dozen braids to train his mane over. He looks like an idiot, but that's really nothing new. And actually, he looks kind of cute in the mirrors when viewed from across the arena.

he also needs a face shave unless he starts shedding soon. slob.

Despite yesterday being "the nicest day we'll have in the next seven to ten days", we crawled back into the indoor. It was damp and cloudy and cool and not at all nice. Bobby was in a baby mode and had to put his nose and lips on everything. He finally focused long enough to get led to the mounting block and we got started.

He warmed up really well. Leg yields to the right were not brilliant, but certainly acceptable. To the left, I kept my hands lower and wider than proper, but it kept him a little steadier in the bridle and he stepped under himself better than he has before. His canter was calm and quiet. As we walked around on the buckle for a break, I was foolishly like, "You're being so good. This is almost boring!"

I am too funny.

Moron.

I decided to break up Training A and work through some of those movements. Yeahhhh, he was a wild child. I couldn't get him to trot to save his life so I was like, "Fine. We'll canter off some energy and get back to work." Nope. I got into halfseat after the first round and that did seem to help, but he was still being a bit over dramatic. After three hard days of butt work, we were cantering to the left and I think that stifle was just hurting him. Once I got a 20m circle without swapping or head tossing or bit snatching, we quit.

But we didn't quit quit. The weather is supposed to be miserable for the rest of the week, so he'll be getting at least two days off. As such, we hacked up the hill alongside the pastures. Poor, poor Bobby butt.

headed back down.
clearly not a place to take a spooky horse.

We wandered around the farm a bit when we were done, checking out "scary" things like the tarps over the wood pile. Bobby gave me his patented Look when I stopped him.

"is there a reason we're stopped? i don't give a fuck about tarps."

The vet will be out in two weeks-ish and we're going to have a long converstation about joint maintanence. He's only eight, but he's had this issue since he was a wee baby. Maybe pokes would be good for him.