Tied to my chair
. . . to stay in it. I say nothing about staying awake. Yes, yes, it’s true, I should be writing–I should have written–a long, detailed, closely argued* report of my riding lesson this morning. Should have. Didn’t. Oh, I had the riding lesson all right**, but I, cleverly, as it turned out, managed to forget to bring the money to pay for it***, so I took the hellhounds out that way for our evening walk and it just happened that my riding teacher, who is also the yard owner, as well as the owner of the mare, whom I will call Connie†, was about to give another lesson, and she said, oh, this is a very nice warmblood mare, you’ll like her . . . and I did. So I seem to have stayed to watch the lesson.†† I only went by to drop off the money! It’s purely a matter of chance that I also knew that Jenny gives lessons Tuesday evening! And in my defence, she might very well have been teaching a six year old on a Shetland!
And then Peter goes off tomorrow morning ††† and his son John ‡ is here, because John is taking Peter to the airport, so we, er, talked over dinner–a very odd sensation, talking at a meal; my fingers tend to spasm for a keyboard any time I’m chewing–and now it’s late, all right, I realise it’s only midnight, how pathetic, but I didn’t seem to have slept too well last night either and, see above, I have myself strapped to the chair here so I won’t fall out of it. I am going to bed.
* * *
* Although I doubt you can closely argue a riding lesson
** And it was brilliant. And I’m going to do it again next week.
*** Many of you will be aware of the fiendish pocketlessness of riding britches. You have that single tiny loop of material at the front which you can just about fit your car key in. Tissue? Because it’s high hay fever season? Forget it. That’s what bras were made for. Among other things. I’m going to need a sports bra for sitting this mare’s trot. Anyway, I forgot the money, partly because I had nowhere to put it.
† Note that the mare gets a name before the woman does. Wait a minute, I’m thinking. Connie is easy: she’s a Connemara cross, and I like the name. Mind you, when Jenny–I may call her Jenny–told me that she had a nice Connemara mare, I was thinking pony. I’ve known Connemaras that could fill out my leg, so if Jenny thought I’d be happy with her I was sure she was right. Then when I went round to meet her and this grand 16-hand creature put her nose over her stall door, it was like, whoooa. Connemara cross. Connemara x Irish thoroughbred.
†† This was not at all popular with the hellhounds, who had to stay in the car.
††† whimper
‡ Yes, that son. http://ccgi.millstream.plus.com/blog/ And I recommend you click through from here, because it’s impossible to find from google
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Oooh, riding lesson. Perhaps there will be photos of the horses? *hopeful face* And Connie sounds lovely. I MISS horses.
Yes you MISS horses. Absolutely. Jenny said when Connie turned out not to be a top-class show jumper–which is what Jenny does when she’s not running her yard–she should have sold her on but she’s just so *nice*. Yes.
I HOPE there will be photos of horses. It’s in the PLAN.
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http://southdowner.livejournal.com/5138.html
I don’t know if you saw this, but it’s horsey and quite funny – ancient riding gear – well it was 40 years ago! Sapphire (grey pony) was my first connemara who I absolutely loved. I now have a second, who I’ve owned since she was 3, and she’s 21 now. Just enough time left for a third :)
What? YOU, go to BED? You must still be quite out of sorts from yesterday’s escapades. Poor dear.
Thank you, Robin, for the added treat of the link to John Dickinson’s blog. I read on down a few entries and found great clarity in his description/definition of The Enlightenment. He put words around what I had suspected for a long time and greatly helped me understand why making intellect/reason alone the greatest god. I may be a party of one in my opinion and that is all right.
Have you lots of chocolate to keep you company while Peter is gone? I’m glad he will be here after our very unseanal heat wave.
I hope you will write and tell him so. And tell him I SENT YOU. :)
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Ooh, go to bed. Do. One of us should! You need it even more than I do.
I remember you making a comment a while back about the large amount of food that gets tossed in the UK. Well, apparently some guy is testing the limits of the Sold By date by eating expired food.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1024879/The-best-challenge—One-man-boldly-goes-use-dates-food.html
Of course this MIGHT not be the best suggestion to make to you while there is no one around to regulate your eating input.
Heather
I agree with him in principle; use-by dates are more about profits and covering their rear ends from prosecution than about sense or safety. I eat all kinds of past-date things. If it looks and smells all right and isn’t growing any foreign substances–and in the latter case I may merely scrape the foreign substances off, depending on what they are–I will probably eat it. And lots of things RETURN to being edible if thoroughly cooked.
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A TB/Connemara cross is my DREAM HORSE. !!! Sigh.
I currently have a 22-year-old Arab gelding. I got him at age 5 months and did all his training, etc. Somehow I have managed to keep all my fingers (he BITES!). He is very fierce, especially about his grass (he traumatized a poor llama once, who just wanted to make friends) and very good to be on for a trail ride when one might encounter Shady Characters. The only person who he absolutely adores beyond all reason is the veterinarian!! :) Imagine!! I am pleased to report he has mellowed somewhat with age and did not actually throw me off the last time a motorcycle went by (he does not approve of motorcycles).
I make him sound like a terror, but a better trail horse does not walk this earth. :)
My first trail ride with Connie on Saturday. :)
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Oh, my. It’s a dynasty!
*wanders off to the library to check out all sorts of Dickinson books*
Speaking from experience, it is possible to go to sleep at the computer without either crashing into the keyboard or falling out of the chair. I would probably be doing that tonight (this morning?) if I hadn’t already fallen asleep after cleaning up from dinner. Today was a good day in the garden–a start on rescuing a daylily bed from perfectly godawful weed grass and thistles–but I dug out three large composting bags full of vegetation and ROOTS, and bed looks good to me. (The yard waste goes to the county composting site. Based on what I send over there, the resulting compost would generate a new field of weeds as soon as it hit the ground, but I guess they use it for something.)
Of course the mare gets a name first. I’ve been in dog-training class with many of the same people for years and still know them principally, if not exclusively, as “Dog X’s mother.” Naturally, I know Dog X’s name and have remembered it from the first class on. I prefer not to speculate on what a psychologist would have to say about this. :)
Last week’s rain moved east and we got a couple of lovely days, but more is coming in tonight over the whole midwest. I hope Peter has packed a raincoat. May he have a safe trip.
Well, we know he *arrived.* So far so good.
As I understand it part of the point about county council composting sites is that they’re BIG enough to get the heat HIGH enough to kill off weed seeds, not possible at home. I comfort myself this way as I lazily send pretty much everything from the cottage garden to the council. Third House has a compost heap. The cottage . . . it’s just so much EASIER to give it away.
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Ooooohh! A connemara cross! So jealous! Pleeaasee photos!
I’m very glad that you enjoyed riding again (tho somehow I knew you would :)) and have found somewhere that sounds so nice – how did you choose the stables?
******** Note that the mare gets a name before the woman does.
Well, yes, what’s unusual about that????
******** the fiendish pocketlessness of riding britches.
Oh yes, I remember this well! Purse dumped, keys dumped, 1 tissue, two coins and if vital, one key :) When mobile phones came out and everyone suddenly had to take them riding, all these gadgets appeared to carry the phones… but the joddhy (?sp) pockets remained minute :)
******** That’s what bras were made for.
Does anyone still not kmow this? ;) Tho sports bras are very difficult to fish things out of without portions of anatomy exiting also lol. Sitting trot and sports bras – a match made in heaven !
I keep meaning to blog about how this all happened. I didn’t want to talk a lot about it till it had finished getting started, since I was feeling a trifle SUPERSTITIOUS. How often are you just *offered* a gorgeous horse????
I find the problem with sports bras is that because they’re so busy clinging to you to be SUPPORTIVE you can’t peel them away far enough to fish your car key or whatever OUT.
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Very pleased that you’re out on a hack on Saturday. Schooling makes the riding feel good, but hacking is just sheer joy on the right partner… and Connie sounds lovely. When you feel sufficiently established in the arrangement, it would be verrry interesting to hear how it all started.
And in the meantime there’s that granmother with a rose bush dedicated to her – it’s no good just dropping snippets… :)
Congratulations on starting to learn to ride – something I never mastered (but then, I took up ice-skating in my forties, so it’s never too late….).
Am all sadly today because my parents’ Senior Dog has had to be put down, and they are probably too old to get another young dog so will be a One Dog Family now. So I thought instead I would send you a link to an absolutely delicious (I’ve made it!) chocolate sorbet:
http://chocolateandzucchini.com/archives/2007/08/dark_chocolate_sorbet.php
I only didn’t send you it earlier because I was away, or I’d have linked when you posted about your new kitchen toy.
STARTING to learn to ride–I’ve been riding since I was *nine.* This is my first riding lesson in five years, not my first riding lesson! Jenny is paying me a tremendous compliment offering me part use of this horse!
THANK you for the sorbet! Thank you thank you thank you!
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Yes, Robin, please go to bed. If you are in bed at midnight, I might actually get to bed by two-thirty. Your hours are having a negative impact on my (already very poor) sleeping habits.
Nighty, night. Sleep tight. Don’t let the bed bugs (or hellhound tummy bugs, or ME terror bugs) bite.
It’s getting hot for candles, but our thoughts are with you. (What did you have for supper now that Peter’s gone?)
Watercress pesto over broccoli and blue corn chips, and I only dare tell you that because PETER DOESN’T READ COMMENTS!!!!! :)
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Why that sounds perfectly respectable for supper? Maybe a bit of protein and some complex carbohydrates should be added, perhaps some fruit, and how do you know that he won’t check out the comments just because he is trying to keep up with you 8)
Corn IS a complex carbo, and there’s nuts in the pesto. :) And I had my fruit earlier.
Oh, watercress pesto sounds divine! Did you make it or is it one of things one can only get in the UK leaving us sad statesiders all bereft? (Like Fat Frog, an Irish drink I would pay loads to ship here if only I could figure out how).
It came in a jar from a local company, yes, this being the Watercress County. But there must be a recipe. If there isn’t, one of us should invent one. :)
*whimper* Connemara x Irish thoroughbred…. *sighs pathetically and tries too hard to tell herself that horses are a bad habit best left to the rich or those with land to support them*
If she’s keeping her for her personality then you’ve got a total winner there. She’ll be a lovely school horse.
Peter and his son look SO much alike! I would say that was amazing, but then someone would say something snide about genetics, I’m sure(: Very cool. More books to look into. Yay!
Sounds like a nice lesson! What did you do? Hunter-seat oriented stuff, like one would expect from a jumper expert? Any dressage? Etc.
*****Many of you will be aware of the fiendish pocketlessness of riding britches. You have that single tiny loop of material at the front which you can just about fit your car key in.*****
You know, I once discovered long ago that men’s britches had pockets — at least one brand did — when the corresponding women’s britches did not. Typical. Might be worth checking out.
Judith
No, flatwork. Jenny knows I’m a dressage girl–although last time around she managed to finagle me into jumping and probably will again–and while she’s a show jumper herself she’s a show jumper who believes that it ALL DEPENDS ON THE FLAT WORK. Connie does have that disconcerting show jumper thing of flying changes if you shift your balance however.
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*****Connie does have that disconcerting show jumper thing of flying changes if you shift your balance however.*****
A nice advanced dressage move! Now if you can convince her to do twosies and onesies…
Judith