Big Red

This is Big Red! We were slightly rushed before the ride so I didnt get a chance to take pics when he was clean.. so this is the best you get for now. We hauled up to Mann Rd to ride, went out with his Owner Gerri (who is pictured with Red) and then Shannon (who is training/selling Oakley, actually she rode Oakley on the trails that day) and then Shannon's son and 3 of her friends came along. A good size group and Red was not a bit worked up.. he was cool and collected, you would not have known he'd only been ridden a handful of times in 2 years by the way he acted. He has a nice walk on him, he'll po-dunk down the trail when he's in the back, but he also will walk out very well and keeps up nicely.

His only issue was that he got a little grumpy at the end of the ride towards the other horses, but I'm not at all worried about it. :) He didnt threaten to kick or anything, just pinned his ears. He loads up in the trailer well and I'm excited to get him home this weekend. If the weather is good, we'll ride again at Mann Rd on Saturday, take some video of Oakley while we are out there, help Shannon video Oakley at the arena as well, along with some of her other horses she is selling and then bring Red home at the end of the day. Gerri is such a nice person, I am glad I met her and I hope she is as happy about this as I am. I think so.. I told her if she was at all uneasy with me, she could change her mind, but Red and I got along really well and although I had to spank him a couple times to remind him he had to walk through the mud and not around it, Gerri completely understood and encouraged me to make him mind! :)

It was funny though.. I have to tell this story. So Friday night we had a social gathering with some horse club members at Alene & Jon's house.. It was movie night, we watched Flicka and even though it is mainly a chick-flick, we all made it fun enough that the guys enjoyed it too! Anyways, so I had emailed Arlene and a few others earlier in the week to see if anyone was up for riding with us on Saturday. I didnt hear back from anyone that could make it on Saturday which was no biggy, we ended up with a good size group as it was. Arlene had asked about Red and I had mentioned he was a very nice horse, but that he was a little goofy lookin! No offense to Big Red or Gerri, but he's got very long legs, a half-eaten tail, thick arched neck and a huge head, so sometimes he kinda looks like a moose! lol

See I'm used to a Quarter Horse type look.. this standardbred thing is all new to me and I love my classic Quarter Horses.. so to me, he looks a little different than what I am used to. Now under saddle, he looks different and his oddities do not stand out so much. So anyways, the point of the story is.. We were riding along, only about 15 minutes into our ride and I am at the back of the line on the trail. Up ahead I can hear that we've run across riders heading towards us and as they are getting off the trail, I can hear Arlene's voice up ahead.

So Shannon and her friends and son are all ahead of me, then there was Gerri (Red's owner) then me and then Derek taking up the rear. I speak out and say "What are you too good to ride with me Arlene!" I was just teasing, I thought it was great that we ran across her and Jon and Sara Jane. What was funny is that as she is off to the side watching me pass, she says out rather loudly "Oh Piper, he's not goofy looking at all!!!" OMG, I was so embarassed, here his owner just heard that and I was backpeddling just a little.. I didnt want Gerri to think I thought her horse was ugly or I didnt like him.. lol

Gerri made a comment that he was not the most elegant looking of horses, or something like that.. and we just moved on and I tried to change the subject. I wasnt upset with Arlene, and although I was really embarassed, I thought it was pretty funny. :)

I was going to take Edgar out on Sunday and ride with Danielle, but she couldnt get out to ride and Derek & I were both a little sore from riding the day before. Not my legs or butt, but my back was really stiff.. takes a while for my back to get into the swing of things again. We took a lazy day and stayed home. Actually I had loaded this game on our laptop that I had played/finished at work. I thought Derek might enjoy it, and 4 hours later he looks up and is like.. "damn, its almost 4pm already!" I just laughed at him.. a few hours later he got back on the computer and finished the game. He's not normally a computer buff like that, but it was a good game that kept you intrigued from start to finish.

I am so excited to get Red home.... :) OH and Shannon has a tractor with a grader type implement on the back of it, she said we could borrow it to level out our pasture this spring, and while we have it, Derek will spend one day working on the pasture and then 2 days repainting it for her as a thank you.. so I am excited that we have a means to redo the pasture, but the bummer is that means 1 more year of keeping the horses completely off it. We will wait until we move the horses to their summer pasture (which should be by April) and then we'll level the fields and install the permanent fencing...

The Olympics just finished up yesterday.. I've never really sat and watched them much, but I did discover the ONLY way to watch them is to record ALL of the airing episodes and then fast forward through 90% of it! It was awesome, I was able to watch what I wanted and skip the rest. The frustrating thing about the Olympics is sometimes random events are just thrown in here/there, so if you dont record it all, you might just miss it. I can't wait til the summer ones come in 2012 so I can finally for the first time ever, catch all the horse events! :)