Boarding School

Some of you may remember some old, melodramatic posts from a while back about me going off to boarding school. I am currently at said boarding school and have been for two days now.

I'm going to have a busy schedule, starting yesterday, meaning that I won't be posting much.

However, I do need to post that we are in the midst of Irene! Yesterday we had a bit of rain but starting last night it really started to come down. And the wind started up. Today we are on lockdown and are not allowed to leave the dorm, just in case the wind becomes gale force. A little after I woke up, around 10 am, there were very strong winds for a minute or two. However, it is supposed to pick up after noon or so, or at least that's what we're hearing. Dining services brought bagels for breakfast and we are supposed to have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch. Dinner will be made hot and either brought down to us by the brave members of the kitchens, or if the weather is better we will go to the dining hall together to eat.

On another note, I would like to talk about work jobs. Every student has one. Most freshmen get bad jobs like cleaning the buildings or chopping salad early in the morning, but my job is working with the horses on the farm around noon. This is because a) I asked for that job and b) I ride horses. It should be a lot of fun.

If I don't post, don't worry, I'm not dead. Just busy.

Maricruz's Excellent Adventure

The title is based on the title of a LOST episode, by the way. Locke's Excellent Adventure.

Maricruz went outside today--on a leash, of course, since she would be off as fast as she could if I hadn't put one on. At first she was skeptical.

For a while, she just poked around on the deck.

Then that became lame and she decided it was time to explore the wild and terrifying yard.

Here are some of my favorite shots from the rest of her excellent adventure.

Summer Circuit Show Part Two

Does anyone else agree that I'm terrible at posting show reports? This post will cover the entire show, not including the warm-up day which I have already described/

The first day of the show was great. Jones and I did Limit and Modified, both of which were in the outdoor arena, as well as doing a warm-up round in the indoor arena. The rides were okay at best, which was fine with me because my preferred event is actually Youth/Non-Pro in the indoor and that wasn't until the second and third days--I figured that we would be fully warmed up and ready the next day. Jones listened very well during those three rides, but we didn't place. I forgot why that was in the Limit round, but I really screwed up in the Modified round. This was because someone had parked themselves in front of the course sheet, so my trainer had to tell me what the course was. And then I misunderstood her, and did the first two jumps backwards. Now, I still did a perfectly plausible course, but obviously I was disqualified. We did get to finish the round though, thanks to the wonderful judge.

My favorite pictures from the first day of showing:

Mandy (my catch ride) and Ali

Rocket horse!

The second day started off less well. Jones had had a touch of colic during the night and was very agitated that morning. Before I got there, he was already on his way to the vet clinic. You may ask why he was sent off so quickly, and that is because he colics easily. Lucky for us, it was very minor and he just had some slight blockage. Still, he was out of it for the rest of the show. As long as he was fine, I was happy, but some of the kind members of the barn offered me their mare, Mandy, to catch ride. I took her in Modified and Youth/Non-Pro on Saturday. We did not pin in Y/NP, but we did get third in a large Modified class. That was a very pleasant surprise. 

Some of my favorite shots from day two of showing:

Otis

This photo brought to you in part by Purina...

On the third day, I went with one of the women at the barn to see Jones at the vet clinic. He was perfectly fine, if a bit annoyed that he wasn't getting any food. He kept trying to push past Amy and out the stall door. In fact, one of the pictures I took of him looks like a mug shot.

After seeing Jones we went to the barn to visit Amy's two mares, Isabelle and Gabby. Then it was back to the show. After waiting around for a while, I took Mandy in Youth/Non-Pro. We had an amazing round, but even I didn't expect to place in second like we did. That's a big class! Of course, I was thrilled. Mandy was great, and it was a lot of fun to ride her. It was my third time on her, so in my opinion we did pretty well.

Not posting pictures from the third day. It's too late at night.

Summer Circuit Show

This is the second show I've been to this summer. I also went to the first Summer Circuit show, where Jones was  really good and listened to me better than he ever has before.

Because the Summer Circuit shows are three days long, today was for schooling. I went out at around 10:30 and stayed all day. First, I and the rest of the barn group who were out early helped set up the barn's area and stalls. Busting open the  Jones was great! We had a few refusals, which were due to rider error, and on second attempt we usually fixed the problem. I'm feeling pretty optimistic for the rest of the weekend.

I also took lots of pictures. Here are some of my favorites.

I have more, but I don't want to stay up too late.You will see plenty of photos of horses and people in show garb during the rest of the weekend!

Bad Eva...

Umm... yeah. I haven't posted in a long time. I'm only posting now because my parents have been bugging me nonstop. Sigh.

I'm not posting pictures now because I'm not on my computer. This is just so you all know that I really do still exist/know that I have a blog. I've had a busy summer and slow internet, so posting has taken a back seat to much more interesting things like hiking, reading, and sleeping. And taking photos, of course. I have lots of photos waiting to be posted...

So. Pictures and updates will come eventually.