Random Acts of Inattention

It never fails. Whenever I ask my son to take pictures of me while I'm riding, his attention always manages to drift off somewhere else. Sometimes it's the manure pile...

Or the chewed up wood pile...

Or his basketball hoop...

Or the fence...

Or a tire...

Or a bird flying overhead...

Believe me, there are dozens more where these came from. The boy just can't point a camera and not shoot.

Chew Toy

Hmmmm... Mom won't let me chew on the barn, so I guess I'll chew on this log...

Actually, Mom's leather boots smell and taste better than wood. She won't mind...

A Tribute to Roger

Today is my husband's birthday. Happy birthday, Roger! He's not a cowboy, but he understands my passion for horses and has been my number one supporter in that department. While my father completely ignored my requests for a pony, my husband began planning our path to horse ownership as soon as he decided to marry me.

In the first few years of our marriage, he took me to horse stables so that I could ride. One time he even hung out at the stable and supervised our kids because they were too young to ride, while I rode off into the sunset with a group of tourists on rented horses for a couple of hours. This was totally his suggestion. I didn't beg. He just gave me those couple of hours on a horse as a gift. Once our kids were old enough to ride, he took us all on a mule ride through Yosemite.

When we moved into a house across the street from an Arabian horse farm, I took the dogs for a walk each day and stopped to admire a stunning colt who seemed just as interested in me as I was in him. One day I took my husband up the street to see the colt. I'll never forget my husband's expression. It was like this colt took his breath away. He said, "That's one awesome horse. Get him."

I argued that we had no place to keep a horse, no truck, no horse trailer, nothing but land. He said we could build a barn and get everything we need over time. I was skeptical. We were living paycheck to paycheck. I really had no intention of buying a horse, but my husband talked to my neighbors about it. The next thing I knew, my neighbor was giving me a tour of her farm and introducing me to all of her horses, telling me their prices. Of course, they were all too expensive. I pointed at the colt and asked about him. Ironically, he was affordable, but what really sold me was that my neighbor offered to board and feed him at a very reasonable price until we got our own property set up for horses.

That's how we became the proud owners of Bombay. Raising a horse from a yearling was a handful with us being first-time horse owners, but my neighbor was really good about keeping me on track with Bombay's wormings, vaccinations, and hoof trims. She even set me up with a couple of horse trainers once he was old enough to ride. A year after we bought him, we were ready to move him into our new barn on our property, but Roger noticed that Bombay seemed lonely. He handed me a blank check and told me to go pick out another horse to fill the second stall. That's how we ended up with Lostine.

Roger knew that I wanted to experience breeding and raising a foal, so he encouraged me to breed Lostine. I had to bail out of that plan when we lost our jobs after 9/11. By the time we got back on our feet, Lostine was too old to breed, so Roger encouraged me to find another broodmare. That's how we ended up with Gabbrielle. I decided that Gabbrielle was such a great horse that I didn't need to breed and raise a foal from day one after all. I was beyond satisfied... and beyond spoiled. I'm the only person in our family who likes to ride, and I have three horses to choose from. Each horse is unique and each horse presents me with different challenges and different blessings.

However, Roger's giving didn't stop at helping me purchase the horses. He helped build the barns, he built all the horse fencing, he gave me his Christmas bonus one year as a down payment on my truck, he cleans stalls, feeds the horses, takes their blankets off and puts them back on, fills up water troughs, and puts the horses to bed on the days that I'm not home. He has had to do all the work in caring for the horses on several occasions, such as when I broke my arm and when I had to go live with my mother because she broke her leg. Because I am afraid of heights, he knocks down all the hay. He also uses his muscle to help me stock up on bags of stall shavings. Let's not forget the awesome Tucker saddle he recently gave me as an anniversary gift.

The list really goes on and on. Horses are not his hobby. He has no interest in riding, so he really gets nothing out of owning horses except maybe a wife who is happier, more centered, and more relaxed than she'd be otherwise. Roger is very nurturing toward animals, especially Midge, our Corgi. While I holler at her to go back to bed, Roger dutifully wakes up multiple times throughout the night to let her outside to pee. Even when our children were babies, he'd get up multiple times a night to check on them. I am a very deep sleeper, so if I didn't hear them crying, he'd bring them to me for their midnight snack. He helped change diapers, helped with homework, taught the kids the majority of what they know, taught them how to play various forms of ball, and shaped them into the model citizens that they are today.

Quite truthfully, Roger has had to pick up a lot of slack while being married to me. He has never complained about the house not being clean. If he thinks something needs cleaning, he just takes care of it himself. He cooks too. He's taken care of pretty much every Thanksgiving dinner we've had as a married couple. To this day I have no idea how to cook a turkey. I can handle whipping up a side dish here and there, but I leave the serious culinary efforts to him. He thinks I don't notice all that he does, but now he knows otherwise.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ROGER!

Steppin' Up on the Eyeball Scale

Gee, Lostine, you're lookin' a little prego there. Have you been hittin' the grain bucket a little too much this winter?

Sunday Stills: Both Belated and Early

I thought it would be fun to get involved with the Sunday Stills challenges, as I'm always striving to improve my photography. Unfortunately, we've been walloped with emergency after emergency at the office, and I have had to give up my holidays and weekends to work, which leaves me little time to go out and take new pictures that are in line with the assignments. So, I'm posting photos I've taken in the past.

Last week's assignment was ARCHITECTURE. I dug up these old photos from 1996. They tell a story about the future (now past) of Northwestern Nevada. There were old abandoned farmhouses scattered throughout the area in the 1990's, and the land was being sold to developers to build subdivisions. This farmhouse is long gone and there is a mobile home park in its place. I can show you a countless number of locations in my immediate vicinity where farmland was paved over to make room for wall-to-wall houses and apartment buildings.

Of course, now after the housing slump, we have many subdivisions that are empty or only half-way constructed with a few homeless people walking past my house each day. It seems so silly to have people living in cardboard boxes in freezing temperatures with all these empty mansions available. I'm waiting for some contractor (or banker) to have a heart and put two and two together. Though I know that most contractors are hurting just as much as everyone else. I wouldn't be surprised if some of those homeless folks once built houses for a living.



This week's Sunday Stills challenge is ACTION. For the past couple of basketball seasons I have been struggling to get some clear indoor action shots. The lighting of a school gym is not the best place for still photos of young men running up and down a basketball court. However, I did manage to get a few shots recently that are clear enough to share. I admit that I just use the action icon setting on my camera, because I can never remember how to use the manual settings when the time comes to take a picture. That's my son in the gold jersey - number seven.





And what would this blog be without a few action shots of horses? This one I find particularly interesting, because it was an accident. I had my camera posed to take a picture of Bombay running past me, but he cut too close and I had to lower my camera while taking a step back. I accidentally hit the shutter release just as I was lowering the camera.

Miss Lostine: The Teaching Machine

Once again I have learned some valuable lessons from my mare, Lostine. Every spring we have to go through this dance of re-establishing our pecking order. She thinks she's the alpha mare, and I have to convince her otherwise. Why does this only happen in the spring? Because she's had plenty of downtime during the wet weather of winter to pump herself up and push the other horses around without having anyone pushing her around. Then once the weather warms up, I come out to the barn, slap a saddle on her, and start telling her what to do. She doesn't like that.

So I was lunging her and trying to get her to stop at whoa, and she refused. So, I had to keep turning her in a tighter and tighter space until she had nowhere to go and had to stop. However, she didn't like being cornered and tried to plant a couple of hind hooves in my face. I'm always very aware of how close I am to the horses, so I never get within striking distance, but her attempt at kicking me was enough to start a pretty big power struggle. I wasn't exactly angry, but I wasn't going to just ignore that either.

I kept pushing her this way and that, controlling her turns and speed until she decided to respect the whoa command. There was a lot of snorting and ear pinning before she got to that point, and I would liken her demeanor to that of an angry hornet. I'm sure the neighbors must have thought I was crazy to mount her after all that ruckus in the round pen. An airplane pilot got so interested in what I was doing with my horse, that he veered off course and flew really low directly over our heads. Fortunately, he had a fairly quiet plane. I looked up and saw the words "U.S. Army" on the bottom of the wing and I waved hello.

I spent the majority of our ride working on whoa and the one-rein stop. You've got to check those brakes before doing anything else when you haven't worked your horse in a while. I probably should have practiced an emergency dismount too, but considering that I need a step stool to mount a 14.2-hand horse, I didn't feel like practicing throwing myself off her over and over. The entire time I could tell that Lostine had the intention to throw me. She kept trying to get a running start into a buck, and each time I shut her down. I made it clear that we were only doing walking, halting, backing up, and turning maneuvers today.

Anyway, the big lesson Lostine taught me today is that once you start challenging a stubborn horse to the point where she's worked up and ready to kill you, you have to make nice-nice to get that control back. So, every time she followed a command I stroked her neck and praised her. After consistently doing that enough times, she let out a huge sigh and relaxed, realizing that we were no longer in a fight.

I also desensitized her some more to the horn bags by ripping open the Velcro seals and zipping and unzipping the zippers. She was fine with it all. Then I dismounted and took her for a hand-walk along the road. Here's where the other lesson came in...

IT'S NOT ENOUGH TO DESENSITIZE YOUR HORSE IN THE ROUND PEN AT HOME. YOU HAVE TO THEN GET THE HORSE OUT OF ITS COMFORT ZONE AND DESENSITIZE IT THERE ALSO.

Lostine kept spooking, running forward and then turning around to look behind her. We've never had this problem before, so I had to figure out what was different. Usually, I walk her up and down the road without any tack on. I had to deduce that she was hearing the sound of the horn bag rustling and the new saddle squeaking on her back, and she thought something was behind her. It doesn't matter that she heard those exact same sounds in the round pen. Now that we were in a scary place away from the herd, those noises suddenly sounded threatening to her.

So, I just kept walking her and letting her turn to look behind her. Then I'd wiggle her saddle and the horn bags so that she could re-connect those sounds to them. Eventually, she caught on and was able to walk calmly. One neighbor was working on his motorcycle engine as we passed his house, and that didn't bother her. It always seems to be the little things that unhinge the older, more experienced horses. Until the next lesson...

They're a Gang Again

I went outside on my lunch break to clean stalls and found the horses sweating under their blankets. It was originally supposed to snow all week, but will be in the 50's the rest of the week. I might actually get to ride a horse or two this weekend.

Anyway, I removed all the blankets and put the horses together in the paddock with the gate to the round pen open. I was getting a kick out of watching them re-establish their pecking order and friendships. There was a lot of activity going on. For instance, there was rolling...

and more rolling...

bucking...

and Simon Says drink water from the water troughs.

There was yawning...

and more yawning...

and a lot of peeing going on...

Book Review: BAD MONKEYS by Matt Ruff

This book review has nothing to do with horses, but I enjoyed the book enough to be inspired to write a review on my blog. Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff was one of my Valentine's Day gifts from my husband. Being a writer myself, I'm very picky about what I read. I had been complaining that I need a good, fast-paced suspense novel to get lost in since I have so many things I'd like to forget at the moment. Books are great tools to get your mind into an altered state when your own life sucks or is just plain boring, and you don't want to have to think about it.

However, my quandary went beyond just needing something new to read that wasn't a how-to manual or horse training book. I wanted a suspense novel that wasn't cliched and predictable. I have spent hours perusing the back covers of novels in Borders, and after a while they all sound exactly the same. Someone was murdered, someone was accused, some riveting plot unravels, and you are supposed to be left clenching your sphincter muscles in excitement. If I'm interested in murder, all I have to do is turn on the TV and tune in to any channel, whether it be a drama or the news, which saves me the hassle of having to tire my eyes reading small print.

I'm looking for something fresh that uses the author's imagination. I'm looking for quirky characters who I carry with me in my head throughout the day, wondering where their actions will take us next. I don't want just another novel written by someone who simply imitates other suspense novels or sticks to a predictable formula with some sappy romance blooming on the side.

I want to read books loaded with action written by people who can think for themselves and weave whole new worlds, so that I as the reader can feel like there really is so much more out there beyond what is under my nose. I have way too many responsibilities for me to be able to sit still through a long, drawn out, pointless conversation between dull characters, or sit still through pages and pages of more description than anyone ever needs.

Much to my surprise and pleasure, I managed to devour Bad Monkeys in three days. I probably could have done it in one sitting had I that kind of time to spare, but this was a book I took with me to work and read over my lunch breaks. I was willing to lie shivering in the back seat of my truck in freezing temperatures while snow was falling all around me in order to read this book without interruption.

Let's just call the book fantastical, but believable, easy enough to step into the pages yourself without hesitation or the questioning of loose ends. This plot is tight. There are so many twists and turns that I felt like I was on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. I hesitate to offer too much information, because I don't want to give anything away and spoil it for you, so here's the summary on the jacket:

Jane Charlotte has been arrested for murder. (Normally, at this point I would sigh and put the book back on the shelf, but this next line grabbed my attention...)

She says she's a member of a secret organization devoted to fighting evil. She says she's working with the Department for the Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons -- aka "Bad Monkeys."

Her confession lands her in the jail's psychiatric wing and earns her countless hours of poking, probing, and questioning by a professional. But is Jane crazy or lying? Or is she playing a whole different game altogether?

The book is catalogued in the following categories:

1. Secret societies -- Fiction

2. Vigilantes -- Fiction

3. Psychological fiction

I must admit that when I first read the synopsis, I was a bit worried that this might end up being a long, tedious monologue by a self-absorbed, pathetic, whining patient to her doctor, but this book was constructed so well that with the exception of every other short chapter, I forgot that Jane Charlotte was telling her story to a psychiatrist. There are short chapters where the psychiatrist brings us back to the present and challenges the facts, but there are longer chapters in which we the readers live through Jane Charlotte's amazing life, which includes seriously creepy serial killers, axe-wielding clowns running through the streets of Las Vegas, and some secret organizations that bring a whole new meaning to the term "Big Brother."

If you are looking for a fast read, I highly recommend this book. It is a National Bestseller.

Gate Crashing

Hmmmmm. I'm bored. I just rolled in the mud and ruined my pretty purple blanket. Now I think I'll try to bust out so that I can help myself to the haystack.

That didn't do it. I'll just wiggle the gate a little lower.

Nope. Lower now. Ahhhh, I found the chain. I'll tug on that with my teeth and push on the gate with my muzzle, and I should be home free to chow down on as much yummies as I wish.

Sorry, Lostine. You're not getting past that double lock.

But seriously, folks. For those of you new to horse ownership, do whatever it takes to keep your horses locked up. Get creative with your locking system on your gates. If your horse breaks out and gets into the hay or grain, your horse can founder and you'll end up caring for a lame horse that you can no longer ride, or worse yet, your horse can colic and die. It can also wander out into traffic causing an accident, and then you'll find yourself with a lawsuit on your hands, and possibly an injured horse. So many things can go wrong.

Over the years I've become a pro at catching other people's loose horses. I'm thinking maybe I should go into business: Put an ad in the local paper that says something like, "LOOSE HORSE? CALL..." Not only will I catch and lead or herd the horse right back home, but I will charge a consulting fee on how to prevent escapes from happening in the future. Actually, the number one reason for horses getting loose is forgetfulness. Someone simply forgets to lock the gate.

My personal worst disaster happened when I was at work and my husband forgot to lock the gate. Lostine got into the haystack, and I had these tarp ties holding down the tarp over the top of the haystack. Lostine took a big bite out of the bottom of the stack, breaking some twine that the tarp tie was attached to, and the S-shaped hook skewered her right through her nostril. My husband came outside and found her with this rubber tarp tie hanging from her nose. He said it was really hard to remove, because Lostine wouldn't hold her head still and he had to gently thread the curve through without tearing anymore skin. Amazingly, by the time I got home, I could only barely see the nose piercing. I cleaned it out and a few days later it completely healed. Fortunately, my husband found her before she consumed too much hay.

For more information on how I lock my gates and stalls, see Escape Artists.

My Snoopervisor

This is the view from my home office window where I am once again working on a holiday...

This is the view from another home office window...

This is my snoopervisor...

Moon Above a Gambrel Roof

I took the time to notice the moon the other night.

When I first noticed it, the sky below it was pink and red, but by the time I got my camera, the colors were gone.

This is a house that looks like a barn off in the distance.

I could fit a lot of horses in there.

Young Horse + No Distractions = Training Success

It's amazing what you can accomplish with a young horse when you don't have high winds and other distractions going on around you. After the endless spooks and bolts from yesterday, I did the exact same lesson today without experiencing more than a single spook, and that spook was definitely my fault. I blame my lack of brain cells.

I always go outside with a game plan, but on my way to halter a horse I get distracted by things that need to get done around the place, such as dwindling water supplies, tarp ties that need to be reattached, and blankets that need to be removed in the mid-day warmth. Then when I actually get around to haltering Gabbrielle for our leading lesson, I forget what the game plan was.

So, I walked her straight up the RV lane to the front of the house, through the gate, up the driveway, and onto the street. The entire time she was walking on a loose lead totally relaxed and I was thinking, "I'm just going to keep going since she's in a great state of mind."

Then up popped the head, the tail flipped up over the back, and the snorting commenced. "What the?"

I couldn't hear anything over the roar of a truck engine, but here came Bombay galloping around the barn toward us. Gosh dirn it! Now I remembered what my game plan was! I was supposed to tie up the other horses before taking Gabbrielle for her walk. I turned Gabbrielle around and took her back to the house, tied her up, and then tied up the others. I knew this was no guarantee that things would go smoothly, because at the same time Bombay had been galloping around the barn toward us, a truck driver decided to pull a U-turn on the street we were walking on. Since both distractions happened simultaneously, the experience was that much more intense for Gabbrielle. It must have felt like she was being attacked from all directions. Despite that, she held together pretty well. At least she wasn't running circles around me and rearing like last year.

We began our walk again, only I had lost that nice, relaxed loose lead I previously had. She was definitely on alert, but it helped not to have other horses charging us and trucks turning around on the street. We were able to get further off the property than ever before. Oh, we didn't walk for blocks and blocks, just a few feet further than ever before, but an improvement none-the-less.

The other change I made was holding the riding crop in front of her chest. I was trying to use it as a cue that she needs to slow down if her chest touches it. It did help a little, but one technique I found to be really crystal clear was tapping her front legs with the rope if she takes a step after I say whoa. As soon as she saw me bringing that rope down to her legs, she remembered to stop moving her feet.

I can't tell you how nice it was to just spend 15 minutes walking my horse without her jumping on top of me. My next major goal is to get her to stop pulling on the lead rope.

Sorry for the lack of pictures. I have them all stored on another computer that I don't have access to at the moment.

One Step Forward - Two Steps Back

I was beginning to see improvements in Gabbrielle's lead line behavior this week. When I brought her out of her stall in the morning, she wouldn't budge until I clucked my tongue. She was conscious of not pulling the lead rope tight, and waited patiently while I closed doors and gates behind us. She walked a comfortable distance beside me instead of either running to the end of the rope or crowding me. When I said whoa or stopped my feet, she immediately stopped and did not take any more steps. It was like we were playing that old children's game of "Red Light / Green Light," and she'd hold still as a statue.

Then we had a windy day. I first walked her on the lead rope around her pen thinking there wouldn't be any problems, because she'd been standing in that pen all day. However, once I walked her past some weeds blowing in the wind, she snorted and nearly jumped on top of me. I gave her rope a yank and said no in a firm tone.

When she gets like that and jumps into me, my defense mechanism is to put out my fist so that she gets punched in the shoulder when she hits me. I want her to be more afraid of coming into contact with me than in whatever is spooking her. I am careful not to block her with my fingers spread, because that is how she's broken two of my fingers in the past. She has also knocked me flat on my rear, tweaking my neck and back, by jumping into me while looking in the opposite direction.

Ideally, I should carry a riding crop and smack her shoulder with it when she spooks sideways into my space. Believe me, this 800 pound horse is more likely to injure me than I am to hurt her. The riding crop merely stings and gets her attention back on me. It is imperative that she stay out of my space. Otherwise, I may end in a hospital or a coffin and then I won't be around to feed her. No one wants to see a horse starve and go homeless, do they? I mean, I know nobody gives a damn about me getting killed, so just think of the fist and the crop as insurance that my horse will always have someone around to feed her. (Taking tongue out of cheek now.)

So, the next time I walked her past those moving weeds, she ran past and out in front of me. I yanked the rope again and said no. The third and fourth times she pulled on the rope and tried to drag me past the weeds. I stopped and worked on getting her to give to the rope by pulling her head to each side, releasing the rope and petting her each time she put some slack in it. Only then when I walked her past the weeds did she relax, because she understood that I was asking for a loose lead line.

I walked her out of her pen and down the RV lane toward the front of the house. As we were passing the haystack, the wind was whipping the tarp around and she jumped into me, knocking me off to the side, and then ran past me. I yanked the rope, said no, and then walked her past the tarp in the other direction. She tried to sneak behind me, which I won't let the horses do. If they are directly behind me and spook, they'll trample me. I corrected her and brought her back onto my right side and said the "walk" command as we walked past. I had to pull hard on the rope to keep her walking.

We did this back and forth with no improvement, so I grabbed some peppermints. I put a peppermint in the flat of my hand and lured her right underneath that flapping piece of tarp, and then fed it to her. She spooked in place multiple times, but stayed with me because she wanted more peppermints. The tarp was flapping quite violently, but she stayed with me.

I then left her under the tarp with a wheelbarrow full of hay to see how long she would stay if I wasn't there. I think she made it for about 30-seconds and then bolted. Guess where she ran? Right into me. She was like a big dog trying to jump into my lap. I waved my arms and made shushing noises to get her out of my space, and then hooked up her lead rope and led her past the tarp one more time. She maintained a loose lead, though she did have her neck arched and was snorting. I then took her back to her pen for her to eat her lunch and decided to save the off-the-property walk for another day... preferably one without wind. Ugh. Whatever happened to the good old days when Gabbrielle feared nothing?

More Shavings Bag Fun

Gee, Bombay can shake the bag all he wants and no one runs away, but you put that bag in my hands and it is suddenly a weapon of mass destruction!

Shavings Bag Fun

Hey, Bombay! Come check out this empty shavings bag!

What's the matter? Where are you going? I want you to meet my little friend.

For some reason the horses started running when I was carrying this bag around. They were running...

and running...

and running. I got tired watching them. I left the bag on the ground and went inside the house. When I came back out, this is what I found:

Back to Leading Basics

I got my quiet sunny Sunday today. When I cut the horses loose, they whooped it up, galloping all over the place, rearing and bucking, and of course, rolling in the mud. The ground condition wasn't safe for riding, as the horses slipped and nearly fell several times, so I spent the day dry grooming them, and working on leading skills.

With all my equitation lessons last year, I spent way more time riding Bombay and Lostine than I did ground training Gabbrielle. We had a bad experience last spring when I tried to take Gabbrielle for a walk up and down the road, and Lostine kicked a rock into a sagebrush bush, which spooked Gabbrielle, and she ran circles around me, only stopping to rear. I just kept dodging her hooves and trying to lead her back to the barn. Pulling on the lead rope and commanding her to whoa had no effect. I was hanging on with all my might, but afraid she might get away from me and run out into traffic. Fortunately, with each circle we got a few steps closer to the barn until finally I could close the gate behind us and let go. I didn't try to lead her off the property after that, because she obviously wasn't ready for it.

I decided to try again today, as this is one challenge we will have to tackle if Gabbrielle is to move on in her training. It's all about the progress. Knowing what great memories horses have, I decided to take it in baby steps. First I walked her just a few feet out the gate and said whoa. She stopped and looked around while I petted her. When Gabbrielle is curious about something, she reminds me of a King Cobra the way she lifts her head so high that I can't even reach it. I then turned her around and walked her back through the gate onto the property.

I continued this process of walking further and further off the property, saying whoa each time she started to pull on the lead rope, and stroking her neck as a reward for stopping. Instead of getting better, her behavior got worse, so I had to back off and return to her comfort zone. Lostine wasn't helping by running back and forth whinnying. Lostine was jealous because she thought I was taking Gabbrielle out to the pasture to graze, but Gabbrielle was interpreting Lostine's behavior as a warning that there was something to fear.

When my arm couldn't take anymore pulling, I contemplated using a stud chain, but my goal was really to make going off the property a good experience and adding a chain under her chin to get better control probably would only make the experience worse for her. Instead, I put her away and took my other two horses for walks up and down the road. What a difference! There was no pulling what-so-ever. Of course, whichever two horses I left behind ended up being a nuisance by charging up and down the fence line. They even got my neighbor's horses going, and there was a lot of galloping, whinnying, bucking and rearing going on. Fortunately, my neighbor was only cleaning a stall, so she was safe. If anyone had been riding on her property I would have stopped my horse walking.

I also did a little despooking with Bombay. He still hasn't let me rub one of those white plastic supermarket bags all over his body, so I fed him a carrot out of a plastic carrot bag. He jumped and stomped when I tried to pet him with it, but within 30-seconds I was able to rub the carrot bag all over his body and give him lots of praise. Hopefully, after a few more times using that smaller bag, I can move up to the bigger plastic bag and make some progress.

Gabbrielle is a pro at backing up for me, even when I don't have her on a lead rope. Yet she has a long way to go before she can lead forward on a loose rope. Right now leading her is akin to being pulled down the street by a Saint Bernard on a leash. I know I need to make this a priority or I will have even bigger problems when she grows. I'm going to have to work daily walks into my schedule. I'll have to make taking walks a habit for all of us, in part so that I get my exercise, so that Gabbrielle learns to lead and feel comfortable in new spaces, and so that Bombay and Lostine learn not to panic or get jealous when I do take Gabbrielle away.

I went to the market while the horses ate their lunch. Some low-class shart left a cart smashed against the side of my car. I had purposefully parked way out away from all other vehicles so that some idiot wouldn't put a dent in my car by carelessly swinging his door into it, and I ended up getting scratches from a shopping cart. Then when I got home I discovered that I bought a tub of Deli Select meat that someone had opened and ate 3/4 of the meat! Of course, I immediately threw what was left in the trash. This used to be such a nice town, but I have to wonder about its future with some of the riff-raff that are moving in with no social skills and morals. Of course, I know a kid could have eaten that meat or smashed that cart into my car, but what kind of parent just puts a partially empty meat container back on the shelf and allows their kid to smash a cart into a car?

I took Gabbrielle out for another walk when the horses were rested with full tummies after lunch. This time Lostine and Bombay seemed less concerned about me taking her away. Gabbrielle walked on a looser lead and got a lot further. I let her graze on our lawn and was happy to see the first sign of spring: Green grass underneath the brown grass. I was going to walk her back to the barn, but she wanted to show me what a big girl she was by walking part way up the street. I gave her lots of pets and pats and we ended on that good note.