Royal Spanking

Well folks, I feel like yesterday was a complete fail. It all started at work, where I had a horrible day. Things were already not going my way and it was lesson night for Vinny and I.

I arrived at the barn later than normal – probably closer to six. This is not my fault though. Got held up by my the bestie. Anyway. Jerk face was looking mighty adorable when I pulled him out of his stall and into the crossties. But alas, it is a front. The pain began pretty much as soon as I started grooming. He tries to nip me as I’m brushing him. I don’t know why. “Vinny, stop!” “NO!”. –insert growling-. Put chain back over his nose. YES I know this is not safe, but but what else do I do? I hold the lead in my hand and pop him one every time he tries something naughty. Eventually he got so bad that I had to take him off the cross ties and back him up. Any tips for dealing with this would be appreciated.

Fast forward into lesson. We begin by doing our usual walk and then go over to S and stand and talk for awhile. S happened to get a great deal on one of Vinny’s supplements. I mean, half the cost of what we normally pay. So we were all, yippee and stuff.  K happened to be there riding another horse so it was nice for all three of us to chat together for once.

I have to say, I really do like my trainer a lot. He is great. His lessons are very personalized and goal oriented and I feel that he enjoys the chatting as much as I do. We often end up going way later than an hour. Usually 1.5 hours after all the talking.

Commence the work! Annnnddd here comes the battle of the trot.

It was bad. Very bad. We went the entire way around the ring, kicking and growling before K offered up her crop to me. I was like heck yeah! Give it here!

Now I am spanking Mister Jerk Face over, and over. Like really whacking him. At this point S and I are just shaking our heads at each other.  Finally I get the weak, all-over-the-place trot. I have to sit and squeeze on literally every every down beat of posting just to keep this floppy trot. We do several laps to really get him working and warmed up (me too). S throws in some two point and after 1.5 laps my peroneous longus is KILLING me on both sides, so I have to stop and relax and stretch them out. For anyone who doesn’t know what this muscle is, it is the one that runs down the outside of your calf/ankle. So it’s basically like getting a shin splint, just in a different location. PAIN. Eventually (after even more spanking) I do another .5 lap of two point and back to posting. We do some very nice circles on either end of the ring, and wow, he is actually bending around my inside leg. Good boy, Vin!

This was probably the only part of the lesson that went well.

As we begin adding cantering, every time he passes K on Rocco, he throws his head up, pins his ears, and pathetically attempts to charge in his direction. All I can do is LOL at this Child-horse stupidity and growl, “stop making faces at him, Vinny!”

S decided to split my lesson and only work on flat work today. I was like okay sure. My legs are killing me anyway. So we ended with me picking back up my working posting trot (again, spanking) riding down the quarter line and leg yielding to the rail. We did this several times. Each time was a fail. I was literally turning my toe out and kicking him with my heel to move him over. Still wasn’t really listening and it just ended up turning into a battle. So we say okay, we’ll try this at the sitting trot. FINALLY I get one semi-decent leg yield and we call it a night.

Kaysee is not happy with this. I let S know. He says it’s okay. L

I’m thinking at this point that I have got to end on an even better note, so I jump off Mister Vinster and head outside. I remount and we head over the bridge and into the potato field. I only had him go about ¼ of the way around before I turned him around and headed back. It was just too buggy. But we both really enjoyed being out there for a few minutes.

To finish up I hosed him off and sponged on some linament solution. Brushed his tail out and put him back in his stall with the fan on and a flake of hay. My horse is spoiled. OH yeah he also got a handful of Tums. My boy has a sensitive tummy, okay?! Hah.

In other news:

-          I am competing at Shallowbrook on Saturday. We’re just doing the English Pleasures, but I am pretty dang excited since Vin will get all braided up and fancy. J

-          I ordered this cool grooming mitt that is sisal on one side and fleece on the other. super cool! I will review this later this week.

I don’t have any pics today. sorry. L