Bentley's Birthday Party

Look a carrot cake for big B!  Oh yes and we couldn't find party hats so he got a birthday Lei.

We wanted just a nice picture of the 2 of us with the cake.  Sadly, this is the only picture that he isn't moving around and looking blurry, therefore I had to ruin the picture and be blurry.  Hes looking at it as if saying "Oh, that looks edible!  Is that for moi?"

Bentley gets his first bite of cake.  Thankfully we were able to keep him to one corner so everyone else could have cake after.

He decided the cake wasn't as tasty as beet pulp (silly horse!) and got good and messy faced instead.

Guess who has a birthday today?

Yes, today is the momentous day Bentley turns 4.  I am calling it the "Sweet 16 of the horse world" because he is now officially old enough to ride the OCTRA Mileage rides, Training Rides, Set Speeds, and CTRs.  Yes hes legal!  But not for everything, endurance and long CTRs he has to be 5, so next year can be his equivalent to 19. 

He is much like a child to me, and often does silly things such as a child would do.  In honour of his birthday, let me share some of those now (in fact many of these happened just last night).

Last night he missed the door as I led him out to his field. Bonked his head right on the wall/door gate. Was displeased with himself and proceeded to buck in place halfway through the door.

Made a new friend Marlo out in the field who is about the same age. Decides halter tag is a really fun game and grabs at Marlo's halter, and drags him around the field. Marlo returns the favor my removing Bentley's fly mask and starts shaking it wildly. Drops it. Bentley picks it up and resumes the "throw the flymask" game.

Presents man-parts while being groomed (from being relaxed, not excited!) and learns that I will grab it with gloved hands and sponge clean it. Has now been doing this on regular basis and every time, lifts his hind leg in "dog peeing on fire hydrant" pose and just holds his leg up while I finish the job.

Discovery of PNW electrolytes. LOVES them. Licks hand for 5 minutes and through fingers to make sure all the deliciousness off. Renamed these "horse cocaine" as it has become his new favourite treat and you can just see his expression go "boinnnggg!" when he tastes it. If any OCTRA people are reading this, you have licence to be jealous now!

Blew off steam in outdoor arena by bucking and galloping figure 8s. Jumped a jump on his own. Charged the cat sitting on the fence post and knocked the cat off into the bushes. That cat really flew!

Hits the NOS button when playing. Yes, he lets out a fart and takes off galloping and bucking like a wild man.

Eats thistles, the pricklier the better.

Bucked me off after a very tiny but quite overzealous jump. Most shameful expression on his face ever!

Managed to get flymask upside down but not off. I didn't get a photo, but here is a crude drawing to explain why this is so hilarious. "Look ma, i have neck-ears!"

• And of course, his famous soccer video

Happy birthday big guy! 

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Searching For Answers

On Monday, Linda and I took a good look at Bentley to see whats "up" with him.  I wanted that second set of eyes on him since its hard to run him and look back at him at the same time... I fear each time I will end up eating dirt.

So after running him straight a few times down the arena, our first answer was "yes he is still sore"

Then proceeded to lunge him in both directions.  He certainly was worse on one side than the other.  After a bit of time trotting, Linda thought it might be his hind left leg that's actually bothering him.  I gave him a bit of a chase off the lunge line to get him to canter and he always picked up the same lead.  This also suggests more soreness in the one hind in the other, as there is unequal pressure on the legs in the canter gait.  Hence why we weren't seeing any lameness in the canter, he was always picking up what felt most comfortable to him.

The vet is coming in to do ultrasounds on it next Monday to give us a better idea of what we are dealing with and what sort of rehab he will need.  It doesn't appear that hes so much lame as he is just sore, but the length of time its taking him to recover does cause some concern.  So it will be nice to figure out whats up.

Monday we also re-fit his saddle as he keeps changing the shape of his back on me.  Looks like I will have to get a different cushion.  The saddle fits without cushion, but I don't think I can ride without it, so I need to go down to the slimmest cushion.  Right now it does fit him, but uses a ton of shims which I would rather not use if we don't have to.

There is always something on the shopping list isn't there?

Hot Hot weekend

The heat started out as a good thing initially.  As I mentioned before, the air in my side of the building was broken.  Fortunately I am stationed right outside of my boss' office, and he was equally hot... meaning he got fed up with it and we both took an early weekend!  I have to say, hes great for those sort of things, I am pretty bad at leaving work or taking time off and probably would have stayed here if he didn't make me!

So I took my early day and decided to go straight to the barn.  I took Bentley down to the creek with a camp chair, book, and refreshments in hand.  I plunked my seat down in the creek and let him graze.  He was pretty good, but got distracted a few times by the herd of horses and walked over to see if they would accept him into their club.  Not the case... the tiny pony Cindy was by far the worst and charged him away. 

I went home and cleaned myself up a bit while Bentley ate his dinner.  The kids were planning a hoedown so I had promised to return!  When I came back, everyone screamed my name with delight as I walked down the drive.  Love these girls!  They are always so welcoming and the whole barn has become such a family.  Its quite a wonderful environment to ride in.

Saturday was the annual sale at Bahr's.  I had intended on going there to get 20% off supplements and a tub of Furazone, maybe a lead rope because mine has a tendency to disappear.  Including those, I also found myself leaving with a pair of $200 dress boots.  I had recently taken my aukens in to get quoted on the zippers replaced and had been quoted $120.  Yikes!  I wasn't going to spend that much on a pair of boots that were $160 new.  So although $200 seemed like a lot for someone who only intends on only doing "some" eventing, I reasoned that it was not much more than fixing the ones I already had.  Plus, these boots were incredibly beautiful, well made and soft, and lots of foot support, clearly they had to be almost half off!  They surely felt like they were made custom for me.  I have big feet and small ankles then big calves again (we call these endurance or dressage calves haha), so I have a difficult time finding fit for ANY boots.  So I forked over the $200, and on the way home, I was curious enough as to what the new price was on these.  Here's what I got:  http://www.bahrsaddlery.com/ariat-monaco-field-boot-with-zip.html
Ok I feel a little better about forking over seemingly big cash :)

After that, it was off to Flesherton for Linda to ride in the CTR, I was going as pit crew.  Both days were so stinking hot, I was dunking my shirt in the water trough hourly to try and cool myself even a little bit.  Luckily i had also brought freezies, so that helped me a little!  Things went pretty smooth for us, Linda came in off each loop smiling, Sable aka I'm No Angel is becoming the opposite of her name.  It sounded like the terrain was really tough.  Those who were in the open category had an away vet check and hold, so it was pretty quiet for us back at the site. 

It sounded like there were lots of pulls for lots of reasons but I am not too sure of the exact stats yet. 

Linda placed first despite a few points taken off for a girth sore and some scrapes on the inside of her front legs.  We think this may be interference from the easyboots as she isn't used to wearing them quite yet.  Oh and did I mention?  Linda lost one boot in the creek on the first loop and was able to dig it up on the second!  Wonderful not to lose one of those!

 We stuck around for the awards, and our group did very well indeed! It seemed like everyone who won were close friends of ours, the usual suspects who spend the evenings around our table. Or maybe that's more a sign that we are very quickly becoming friends with everyone in the sport, which is just as wonderful!

Friday the 13th

Its Friday the 13th and my misfortune seems to be coming in the form of technology problems.

The air conditioning at my side of the building is not working on a day with an extreme heat alert, which is particularly rough because its 1) the south side of the building and gets a ton of sun and 2) almost entirely windows, which makes me cook like a greenhouse.  Makes me think back to when I had a beta fish and put him in the window because it just looked so pretty!  Then the poor little thing just got too hot and didn't make it.

Oh and also, ALL the printers are broken in the office.  Literally jamming after every other page.

Normally I don't believe in the 13th, but the heat is impairing my normal good sense.

Finally!

Finally someone from the general public gets it right:

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/olympics-fourth-place-medal/olympic-sport-hardest-fourth-place-medal-ranks-32-195706044--oly.html

Sick and tired of people saying "the horse does all the work"  or "Oh ya, I am a rider too"  (aka I got on a horse once on the beach at cuba and i went all the way to the other side of the beach)

Can't wait for the olympics to begin.