Hay in Her Pockets

We've Got Ribbons!

2007-06-12T23:34:00.000-07:00

My Pretty Show Pony (AKA Sadie) has won 3 ribbons in 2 outings this show season!
First and Third place at her first "real" dressage show...
Seventh place at her second "real" horse trial...
I'm so proud!
And maybe that's why I haven't written anything lately. I've been too busy getting ready and stressing out over shows. Every time I go to a show I wonder why the heck I do this to myself. It adds about 15 hours of chores to my already outrageous amount of horse chores. It makes my digestive system do funny things for the whole week before hand. The day of the show it makes me feel like I might die (perhaps exacerbated by previous show-related near-death experiences). It makes my mouth so dry and cottony that I almost gag. Sounds fun, right?
But it is! When it's all over. There's this nice adrenaline rush. There's the exhiliration that goes with reaching a goal, or getting closer to it, or learning what I need to do next time to do a better job of it. And sometimes there's ribbons to show for our efforts.... but it's not about ribbons. Really. It's about fun. And learning. And challenging myself.
So, here's to the next show and torturing myself!

Death Wish

2007-05-06T02:29:00.000-07:00

My husband says I have a death wish. This is purely based on the fact that I ride horses. I try to point out to him that everyone participates in "risky" activities... say, driving a car? walking across the street (I can't tell you how many times I almost get run over while trying to walk Roxy [best dog in the whole world] downtown)? eating sushi? ... and that we all just choose an acceptable level of risk with which we're comfortable. He does not buy this line of thought. He says things like, "Cars have seatbelts" or "Cars have airbags" or "Cars don't do neurotic things" or "Horses are crazy."

The problem is that Doug's introduction to horses was traumatic. Like many small children, he went trail riding on a family vacation. Like happens to many people, no one told him that horses do not really go on auto-pilot, they have minds of their own, they're prey and therefore flight animals (who seem irrational to those of us who are predators). And like so often happens on these kinds of trail rides, the horse ran away with the child version of my husband, who, of course, had not been told what to do in those circumstances. There's a reason why, when I teach lessons, I don't let my students go for rides outside the arena either until they can steer and stop and walk and trot on their own, or unless I have a lead rope attached to the horse. Anyway, let's just say Doug has a deep-seated belief that horses are scary and his relationship with me and my horses hasn't convinced him otherwise (yet).

It didn't help then, that Doug's first experience with me showing my horse was the aforementioned Fall #6 in which Doug thought I was going to die. Or that at my first "real" show with Sadie, he also saw me fall (#9 ). These are just two of the reasons he thinks I have a death wish and I suspect he probably has his own list of reasons besides.

Now, I'm not an especially brave person. I'm kind of a wimp, especially as far as horse girls go. I really don't think I have a death wish. Don't people with death wishes have to be daredevils? That is most certainly not me. I do like a good challenge and reaching a goal is one of my favorite feelings. More importantly, I just like horses. I like riding. I'm willing to risk being stepped on and bitten and knocked down (all of which have happened to me and which make me sound like a pretty masochistic person). I'm willing to risk falling off. I don't fall off a lot. So far (knock on wood) I haven't been hurt, and I always wear my helmet.

But every now and then, I do something that makes me think maybe he's just a tiny bit right about this whole death wish thing. Usually it's at the prodding of my Instigator Friend Mariah (now, she is brave. and a daredevil.). And so I find myself staring in the face of less than 3 weeks til my next competition. Sadie is just barely jumping the competition height (although we did compete at this level before... see Fall # 9). I don't feel ready, although I do feel more ready than last time we competed at this level, so that's got to mean something, right? I just hope I don't die. That's why I purchased the good-luck talisman that came in the mail today (and why I've been wearing all 4 of my good-luck green earrings for the last 2 weeks). People with death wishes don't buy good-luck talismans do they? Especially not ones in the form of praying angel lapel pins.

I do hope it works. I like winning. But living is even better.

p.s. Just in case it ever comes up, if I'm brain dead, please take me off life support. Really. And donate my organs.

My Cute Ponies

2007-04-27T01:30:00.000-07:00

My cute ponies: Clue, Spot, and Sadie. Do you even have to ask how they're cute?

The Third Hip at Conception

2007-04-27T00:06:00.000-07:00

Well, here it is. I can't remember for sure now, but I believe this photo was actually taken a week or two after conception. See the unblemished middle there? That's the third hip. Cute.

Photo Worthy Bruises (AKA My Third Hip)

2007-04-25T23:22:00.000-07:00

Being a Horse-Girl means having lots of bruises. Half the time when I change clothes, I look at my legs and think, "Huh. Did I have that bruise yesterday?" or I spend several minutes cataloging my day's activities to see if I can pinpoint what exactly might have caused that one (like the new bruise on my inner thigh. It didn't take me too long to figure out it's from riding with no stirrups and the stirrup buckle digging into me. I kinda remember thinking it hurt at the time). Sometimes I do something (like walk into a retaining walk whilst looking the other way) and I tell myself that I must remember, when I discover the new bruise, how I got it. I might be a little bit of a masochist too, because sometimes I think, "Ow, what I'm doing right now really hurts" (say, riding in jeans) but I keep doing it anyway (what am I supposed to do? get off, change pants, and get back on?) and then I'm stupidly surprised when I put my pajamas on and see I've got jean lint stuck to my shins and then I realize that's because I've got oozy, rubbed-raw spots on my shins. Make real nice scars, rubbed raw spots do. Other times, like when Teacup shoved her way out of the horse trailer by slamming the divider directly into my nose and squishing me against the wall, I have no trouble remembering why body parts are bruised.

However, none of these bruises can ever compare to the most amazing bruise I have ever seen (no, not even the one my dad received at the hooves of Spot... see below). Not only was this bruise the largest bruise I've ever seen, extending from upper thigh (almost buttock) and nearly to knee, but it also had a glorious mingling of the rainbow of bruise colors: deep purple, violet, blue, red, yellow, green. It was the kind of bruise that when people saw it, they said, "OH MY GOD!" or a long, low "wowwww..." or just looked in stunned silence. And lucky me, the bruise was mine. All mine. If I can ever figure out how to put pictures on here, I will impress and astound you all. Really.

The Most Amazing Bruise in the Whole World has turned into the Third Hip, as I affectionately call it now. I have a nice half-of-a-tennis-ball shaped lump on my upper thigh. Given the fact that the bruise came into being a year and a half ago, I think the Third Hip is here to stay. Dammit.

So, how did I get this lovely modification to the shapeliness of my thigh? Well, a horse bit me. Really really hard. Excruciatingly hard. Hard enough that I swear I could feel the tissue tearing and blood vessels individually exploding. I don't think I deserved the magnitude of the pressure that Kanan put into the bite. I was just tightening his girth. I admit, I was in a bit of a hurry. I was helping my friend Mariah get ready to ride her dressage test and we were running late. But really? Did he have to bite me and then clamp down, with vice-like strength? And it's not like I was wearing shorts and the horse got me in an unprotected spot. Even with the protection of jeans, I had individual tooth marks evident in the bruise patterning, surrounding a nice, comparitively un-blemished center where the Third Hip now resides. The most annoying part about the whole experience (because, I admit, I had a great story to tell) was that the bite hurt so bad, I couldn't even retaliate. No, instead I hunched over in the stall and said "ow! that really hurt." I did manage to weakly swat Kanan, way after the fact, and right before I had to leave his stall to walk off my injury-induced nausea. It hurt so badly I spent the rest of the day icing the instantaneous bruise and popping Advil.

Now if only I could post that picture....

The Horse and I Go for a Spin

2007-04-25T23:01:00.000-07:00

before
the rustle became a roar,
there were 4 feet firmly planted.
The horse statuesque,
coiled to spring,
Panic fluttering like careless leaves.

the spring unleashes
energy roaring through muscle.
grey whirling dervish dancing,
edging along the ridge
of sanity,
firm ground
becomes
firmament.

2 feet firmly plant
as 4 go flying
and the body leaves the mind
behind

Welcome to the Illustrious Falling-Off Club!

2007-04-12T01:21:00.000-07:00

One of the worst things about horses (aside from snot on every clean shirt you ever owned, innumerable bruises you don’t remember having gotten, and scabs you’re obligated to pick whether you want to or not because if you don’t they’ll turn into proud flesh [my husband does not believe this. He thinks I just like to pick scabs. Which is also true.]) is falling off. If you ride for any length of time, falling off is inevitable. Because of its inevitability, we equestrians have all kinds of stories we tell ourselves to make falling off OK. Sometimes, at gatherings of horse people, we tell our favorite (aka worst) falling off stories. It’s kind of like the “man, this one time I was so drunk…” stories except far more entertaining because the storyteller actually remembers the details of what happened. Because we all fall off, there are also cute little phrases we repeat to convince ourselves that falling off is actually good. The Falling-Off Maxims go something like this:
1. If you’re not falling off regularly, you aren’t really challenging yourself.
2. If you can still actually count how many times you’ve fallen off, you aren’t a real horse(wo)man.
3. Everyone falls off. Even Olympic riders. Especially Olympic riders (hence, the membership to the Illustrious club).
4. Falling off itself isn’t bad. It’s just the thinking about falling off that’s bad.
5. Falling off is inevitable.

And then there’s that membership to the club thing. Membership to a club always makes one feel better, right? Of course, there are some problems with the membership requirements. For instance, does it count if you unintentionally dismount your horse but land on your feet? Does it count if your horse was at a standstill when you parted ways? What about if your horse falls and you just happen to stay on until he hits the ground? Are there special perks for falls that result in injuries? Or perhaps for falls that should have resulted in injuries, but didn’t?

And then there’s my own list of falls. I (sadly? I do so want to be a real horsewoman…) can still count my falls. Except that I remembered another one several days after I started thinking about this topic, so maybe I can’t actually remember them all and only think I can. So let’s see…
1. My horse Doc (see post below) spooked when a cat jumped out of a bush. We just happened to be walking on the road. He just happened to slip and fall. I stayed on until he hit the ground. In fact, I guess technically he landed on my right leg, although I was able to get “off” him while he was still on the ground, Damage? a hole in the knee of my pants.
2. Jumping bounces, I was “bounced” off Sahara. I landed on my hands and knees in the arena sand, which probably tells you something about my position in the saddle right before I fell off. Damage? Zero.
3. Teenagers like to do dumb things. I decided “once” to sit on my horse Spot with my butt in the saddle but my knees over the front of the saddle (ask any teenager, it’s really comfortable). That wasn’t the dumb part. The dumb part was forgetting that Spot has a wicked sense of humor (really. She does.). I decided to give Spot a hug while in the aforementioned position. Spot (wicked wicked horse) decided at exactly that moment to put her head down. Who knew a horse’s neck could turn into a slide? Who. Knew. Damage? Just my pride (it’s no fun when 10 other teenagers laugh at you).
4. Once, on a trail ride, Spot spooked when a deer jumped out of a bush (do you see a pattern here?), spun around, sent my dad, who had been walking next to her, and me, who had not been planning on anything other than heading straight, flying. I landed on one leg with the other one in the stirrup. It was only when I kicked my foot out of the stirrup that I fell on my butt. Damage? My dad got a really nice, photo-worthy bruise somewhere near his butt. (photo-worthy bruises are a whole other story)
5. Once, on a trail ride, Kharma (thankfully not my horse) spooked at rustling in the leaves. She really wanted to bolt. Bolting just happens to be my least favorite horse activity of ALL TIME. I took evasive action in the form of forcing Kharma to make a very small circle, but I neglected to remember that she was trained as a reiner (I still don’t understand the purpose of this training. At. All.). Thus I was very surprised when she went into a reiner spin and showed no signs of stopping. I made an untimely retreat when Kharma spun off the edge of the trail. Damage? My approval rating of reining training dropped to negative numbers.
6. My worst fall ever occurred when my horse Clue decided to bolt (ugh) at a horse show. Have I mentioned he used to be a race horse? He can run reeeaaaallll fast. In a complicated maneuver to avoid running over the open platform upon which the judge was sitting, Clue ended up slipping on pavement and spinning (hmmm… more patterns…). His spin sent me flying, which was a darn good thing because then he got stuck between the platform and a wall and proceeded to flail about. Damage? cuts, scrapes, a concussion, and a semi-permanent suspensory ligament injury for Clue. Blood-stained show clothes for me. (who decided white breeches were a good idea? Who??)
7. Jumping over the biggest jump I’ve ever “jumped”, I misjudged the speed, distance, and just about everything else one could possibly misjudge. Lady, the horse I was riding, did her best but clipped the jump (a nice, immovable, solid cross-country jump) and stumbled on landing. I went flying, did a nice somersault. Damage? Does getting the wind knocked out of me (my worst “injury” to date) count?. Lady cut the inside of her lip.
8. Jumping my horse Sadie, she dodged a jump (pattern anyone?) and I flew off in what is called a Zig Zag fall, as in my horse zigged and I zagged. Damage? None, unless all that sand in my mouth was bad for my teeth.
9. Jumping Sadie again, she got going too fast and got too excited and we jumped a tiny log. I was expecting a tiny jump to match, but Sadie sometimes likes to jump reeaaaallll big. She did and I went flying. Damage? My pride again, damnit!

So there’s my catalog of falls. Only 9. I’d better get working a little harder. Well, I did almost fall off today, jumping with no stirrups. I don’t know why my husband thinks I have a death wish….

Broken

2007-04-09T00:25:00.000-07:00

Blink and it’s there again…
the grotesque horror
the tortured panic.
Close your eyes but it won’t
Blink away.

All power and panic,
the horse pummels the ground:
Escaped. Free.
But he slides
and plummets
and pounds and pounds and pounds
until he flails himself upright.

Blink your relief,
only to open
to the macabre horror
of maimed beauty.
Fragmented foreleg flapping
like laundry
on the line.

After, waiting for the execution
we blink tears,
she weeps and moans for a gun.
There is nothing to be done
and if there were,
the damage couldn’t be undone.

Later:
Our abject human ring
holds up the horse,
watches the blood bead
and encircle the shattered leg,
a necklace of grief around
our shattered hearts.

Our dogs circle,
licking bloodstained earth
as headlights highlight
the mercy killing.
Fervent wishes won’t save him
and he falls again tonight.

But every blink brings him back.
The flapping sock of foreleg.
The crumpled forms
(His and hers).
The broken hearts
(ours).

There are a myriad of ways that a horse can break your heart. As we stood encircled on a chilling fall night, that much was clear. As we leaned into each other and into the pain, each of us wept for the horse in front of us and the horses that still danced in our memories. The circle of pain encompassed real heartbreaks and ones that might have been, and although none of us could plumb the heartbreak of the prostrate woman in front of us, we each knew more about the depts of that pain than we wished. We floated in a haze of our own memories as theinterminable minutes drifted past... as we waited for the horse's pain to end... as we watched the life ebb and flow from him... as we silently begged for it to be over soon...

Hee hee!

2007-04-09T00:00:00.000-07:00

I got comments! I got comments! Woohoo! And they made me giggle. Well, not the one about pushing my husband over to the dark side... but I don't think he reads this so hopefully I'm safe, seeing as how he does like to push boundaries.

2007-03-30T23:36:00.000-07:00

My first broken heart was not at the hands of some clumsy pubescent boy. Rather it was the result of the trampling only a horse can dish out. It wasn’t his fault either (that’s horse corollary number one, by the way: It’s Never the Horse’s Fault: see Lessons post below). It just so happened that he couldn’t really do his job anymore (I think that’s why people dump boyfriends, too, isn’t it?) and my parents could only afford one horse. Believe me, I tried to convince them that we could have two horses. I could take care of two horses. Really. I could. I could help pay for his food. I could do more petsitting and babysitting (in that order, please). But it was not to be. And so I had to break my own heart and find a new home for my best friend. I remember perching on the top rail of his fence, Doc watching the street behind me as I petted his shoulder and sobbed, wondering how a person could possibly sell her best friend. It seemed wrong. It still seems wrong. Even though Doc got a nice home, it felt wrong. I remember my dad driving away, my mom and I both crying as we sat on the truck’s bench seat, me squeezed in the middle. It didn’t matter that his new owner said we could come visit him any time, just like it never feels any better when you’re being dumped and your boyfriend—ex-boyfriend—tells you he still wants to be friends.

But if the sole purpose of dating and breaking up is to learn life lessons, I suppose my first heartbreak taught me one as well. My next horse Spot was the first beneficiary of this lesson, and so she was issued the promise which was that I would never ever sell her and that I would keep her for the rest of her life. This seems like the sort of promise that only a 14 year old kid could make (or perhaps at 22 year old at the altar) but here I am nearly 16 years later and Spot nickered at me just this evening. Of course, it helped a lot that my parents seemed to support this commitment I made to Spot, taking care of her during my first year of college. Paying for college so my only responsibility was to pay for my horse. Letting me bring Spot home after college while I got my teaching credential, got married, and moved to the Bay Area. But even had they not helped me, I still would have found a way to honor my promise. I'm good with promises as long as they don't involve what time I'll be home from the barn.

Having made a life-long commitment at the age of 14, the idea of commitment has never scared me the same way it seemed to scare my peers. I learned the hard way that if you really care about someone, you didn’t let go of them, no matter what. But being comfortable with a high level of commitment didn’t make for easy high school relationships. I was destined for teen years fraught with heartbreaks. But that was character building, right? And it makes for fun storytelling. Especially to my high school students who find it humorously pathetic when I tell them I’ve never dumped anyone. Well, anyone except a horse.

And so, now that I’m a big girl and I pay my own bills (my husband might dispute this), I strangely seem to have ended up with a collection of horses. Three adorable horses. Which more than proves, thank you very much, that I could have taken care of more than one horse. And even though Spot is the only one who actually got the verbal promise that I’d keep her for the rest of her life, I think the other two can rest assured in my record of never having dumped anyone. If I decide I love you, then apparently you’re stuck with me. Unless you're the one doing the dumping. Fortunately for me, although horses are pretty good at breaking hearts (that’s another story), they never really seem to do it by dumping you. Well, at least not in the figurative sense (that’s a story for another day).

Lessons

2007-02-26T20:51:00.000-08:00

I've been taking riding lessons lately, trying to improve my riding ability and hopefully get myself (and my adorable horse Sadie) a bit more competitive at the shows and maybe even move up a level... Taking lessons is cool. I learn new things and I happen to think that learning new things is very cool. My horse learns new things and becomes more fun to ride. However, in the process of taking lessons I am also rediscovering a fact that is, paradoxically, both my favorite and least favorite thing about riding.

So what is this favorite/unfavorite fact? I've heard it phrased several different ways and I've even told other people this very same nugget:

It's never the horse's fault.
If you can't get your horse to do something, it's usually (always?) because you're doing something wrong.

It reminds me a bit of a line from a Liz Phair song... "If you do it and you're still unhappy, then you know that the problem is you..."

So what did I learn this weekend? Yep. The problem is me. I wanted to take jumping lessons because "Sadie really likes to take off long and launch over jumps" and "Sadie doesn't seem to really understand how to package herself in between jumps" and "Sadie goes way too fast and out of control over a course of jumps." Well... as it turns out, I've been inadvertently telling Sadie to take off long and launch over jumps and go fast and out of control. Miraculously, as soon as I changed a few things about how I was riding, suddenly Sadie was so much more relaxed and happy. Suddenly Sadie was quite nicely packaged in between jumps, and lo and behold, she wasn't too fast or too out of control.

So, why is it my least favorite thing about riding? Well, because it's my fault, damn it! That's no fun! Noone likes discovering they've been screwing things up, for themselves and their adorable horse who is just trying to do what she's being asked.
Why is it my favorite thing about riding? Well, because it's a lot easier for me to fix myself than it is for me to try to fix some other sentient being. If the problem is me, theoretically, I can take care of that. Now I just have to get out there and figure out to control myself so my poor little horse can do her job!

p.s. One more way horses are cute: They try to do what you ask. They forgive you even when you ask them to do things in such a way that makes them harder. And they don't even hold it against you later when you get in some other argument about something else (which you'll eventually figure out was also all your fault anyway).

p.p.s My other favorite riding paradox? Letting go of the reins causes your horse slow down (and its corollary: a death grip on the reins causes your horse to speed up). Now doesn't that just seem backwards? Maybe that's why I have such a hard time with the concept even though I know it's true.

How are Horses cute?

2007-02-23T08:27:00.000-08:00

How are my horses cute, you ask? I have been thinking about this for over 24 hours and I'm starting to realize that this might be inexplicable, but I'm going to try anyway. I have this feeling that unless you have horses, my examples of their cuteness are going to make very little sense. Sometimes I am just completely overwhelmed by the absolute adorable-ness of my horses.... you know, that heart swelling, innards expanding kind of feeling where you almost want to eat something and make it completely yours, it's so cute? Don't get me wrong, not that I ever want to eat my horses... My mom tells me that is how people feel about their children (maybe not the eating part) which is probably some kind of hint that I continue to choose to ignore.

Anyway, some actual examples....
OK, here is a nice little list of cute things about my horses...
1. When you show up at the barn and as soon as your horse sees you, she whinnies at you. It's cute in the same way it's cute when your dog gets all excited to see you. And for anyone who might say that horses are only whinnying because they want their food, I can tell you that's not true. They nicker for their food, and when I first show up at the barn I don't feed my horses. My horses don't make the same noise for the ranch hand who feeds them as they do for me showing up at the barn. Now, maybe it is just because they want out of their stalls, but that's still cute because getting out of their stalls means getting ridden and if they're whinnying for that, it follows that they must like being ridden and that, my friend, is cute.
2. Horses' muzzles are very very cute. Soft like velvet. And, as an added bonus, if you put your face right against a horse's muzzle and breathe deeply through your nose, you'll get to smell pure, unadulterated horse which is a great warm earthy smell. yum.
3. I have three horses. It is really really cute to watch them together (when they're getting along). The cutest is watching them play together, which is often like a chain reaction. One of them starts galloping for the pure joy of it and they all join in. One of them starts bucking and jumping around and the rest of them join in. It's cute to see them play and it's amazing to watch the things they could be doing when I ride them that Thank God they don't.
4. Horses have personalities. And senses of humor. It is really fun to discover their individual idiosyncracies because those things make each horse really cute. For instance, Spot (one of my horses) is very clever... can open gates... that sort of thing. But she hasn't figured out how to open her sliding door. She does know that pushing on the door will make it swing outward and when it swings back into place, it makes a pleasing (to her) banging noise. Pleasing because it gets my attention. Pleasing because then I'll do something to make her stop... like taking her out (which is what she really wants) or giving her food (which works in a pinch). Clue, one of my other horses, is a neurotic weirdo. He is incredibly athletic, but he is also totally clumsy. He seems to forget all the time where his head begins and ends. Consequently, he will bang into the stall wall or bump himself on the fence all the time. He also will shove you with his nose and rub his face against you with so much force it's hard to stand still. It's cute, really. I mean, he could go rub on a fence post or something, but he'd rather almost knock me over. Sadie, my last horse, is cute because she just tries so hard to do what you want her to do. It's very sweet.
5. It's cute to watch your horse being ridden by someone else (especially a kid or a beginner) and to realize that your horse is taking care of that person and being extra careful. It's a little annoying when you get back on and your horse decides to buck and be silly, but endearing that they know when it counts to be careful.
6. The other day, I was riding Sadie and another person at my barn was practicing roping things and then dragging them behind her horse. Now I don't do any of that stuff with my horses and Sadie is my jumping horse, so as far as I know, she's never seen anything on the end of a rope being dragged in the arena. The particular object that was being dragged was an orange pylon. Now, Sadie was just fascinated by this. Not scared. Intensely interested. She watched that cone like it was the most amazing thing she'd ever seen. And then, all of a sudden, she decided to chase it. Now, horses are prey animals. They are used to being chased. They generally prefer to run away from things. A horse running after an object and chasing it is a bit weird. But there she was, running after that cone. I just let her go and she would have followed that cone around for an hour if I'd let her. It was really cute to see her so interested in something that she would just run after it.
7. All three of my horses grazing side by side or nose to nose. That is cute. Or, when they nicker because they're happy to see each other. Or, when they sniff noses in greeting... their necks arch and their noses meet and it forms the shape of a heart. CUTE!
8. Horse hugs. Those are very cute. There are two kinds of horse hugs. The first is when your horse puts her head right against your chest and just rests it there. Spot usually does this if I've been gone for awhile. She refuses to "speak" to me for the first day I'm back, and then the next day she'll give me a hug. It is totally on her terms and never lasts very long, but it's very sweet when she does it. Clue does the other kind of horse hug which is where he wraps his head and neck around you and then squeezes. It can be a bit disconcerting when he squeezes hard, but it's also very sweet.

But really, what makes my horses cute is that I love them. Wasn't it the Velveteen Rabbit who said that being loved is what makes something beautiful? The more I love my horses, the cuter they get.

Do I win?

2007-02-21T19:50:00.000-08:00

Have I ever mentioned that I'm competitive? I really like winning. Even when there's nothing to actually win. This blog is really only in existence because of a challenge. A nice friendly challenge from some friends. And this challenge has nothing to with horses or ponies or hay. I just wanted to win the dare and be the first to get my blog off the ground. So, do I win??

I solicited name ideas for my blog from my husband, and he came up with some great ones. Yeah, if I'm trying to attract pedophiles and sexual predators:
Dirty Leather Tack
Hay in Her Bed
Bareback Princess

Maybe he thinks I'm going to write about something besides horses. Or else he has some latent desires I'm not aware of. But I am flattered that he thinks I'm a princess. Still.

Maybe I'll write about my ponies tomorrow. They're really cute. Maybe I'll change my blog name and get started on my Wishlist. My ponies could use a lot of new stuff...

p.s. my husband says the hay in my bed is actually my truck bed. Well, that's a relief anyway.