Trailering & Bogey

Above is a picture of Bogey's sire, Tee Totalin Fred.

Double J Quarter Horses

I forgot that I have not finished up the posts on Bogey's old trailering issues. That's right I said OLD! :D

Bogey had issues going into the trailer when I first bought him. The trainer that hauled him from Indiana to Minnesota said that she had to bribe him with grain to get him into her 4 horse goose-neck slant load trailer. When I went to the trainers house twenty minutes away - he would not load into our former 2 horse straight load trailer. Mind you, this trailer was not your average 2 horse. It was a very tall trailer, white and very roomy.

We tried lunging him around, pulling him, pushing him and bribing him. He would not go. Since it was December and very cold and slightly icy and I did not want a hurt horse, we quit for the day and the trainer said she would haul him over in her slant load goose-neck. He went in, with bribery.

I do not like using bribery, and expect my horses to load easily and practically by themselves. Point and shoot. This was something we would definitely have to work on. Bogey was then at the boarding stable for the winter and we did not address this issue of loading until spring time, when I took him to my house. When I would try to load Bogey, it would become a battle with him and he would back quickly away and lunge the rope out of my hands - he was flat out scared to go into the trailer at first, but then it became a respect issue and a stubborn issue. Bogey is extremely stubborn and if he does not want to do it - he won't without making a fuss. This has been interesting to deal with to say the least, but with his stubbornness comes the added bonus of when he gets something, he's stubborn about retaining his knowledge, he'll remember it. But the trailering issue was almost becoming dangerous, he would rear and pull back - not cool and not fun to deal with, when you just bought a new horse and don't even know what to think of him.

We also bought a new trailer, it was time for an upgrade anyways, a 3 horse slant that can be converted to a stock trailer and used that instead. A dear friend of my came over and helped me load him. She is wonderful with horses and can break things down for them to grasp. Also, she does a lot of Clinton Anderson techniques, and whatever one says or feels about Clinton - he sure can get a horse loaded in a trailer. I do like his methods and they are a common sense approach.

Stacy, my friend, lunged him near the trailer and circled and made him work away from the trailer but then let him rest near the trailer. The rest became closer and closer and finally he was in the trailer. Bogey now can load, no more issues. All summer we were loading and traveling to all sorts of places. All I would do is point him at the trailer and throw the lead over his back - it was that simple. The problem that I had was getting over that initial fight.

Mind you, I did have to repeat Stacy's methods and do the lunging for myself and would have to refresh it ever now and then, but it never became the problem that it was previously. Many thanks to Stacy, for getting that initial stubbornness out.

Long Time No Post

Wow - it has been such a long time since I've posted here. I need to finish up all of my loose ends and start writing.

School is good, very busy, but good. I'm not a fan of organic chemistry, but you'll have that. I love my professors though, they are great!

Onto Bogey news: Bogey had a break all winter long hanging out at my house with my pony Nancy. Hopefully he'll be mentally refreshed for the next season - I have lots of plans! A great friend of mine is building an indoor so we'll be over there a lot, and I have some awesome friends to ride with and motivate each other.

When I'm home next I'll put the images from my shows last summer onto Photobucket and get them onto here, and see what I can write about them, it might be a little too late to remember everything!

Also, this winter I've been watching a lot of training DVD's and quite a few youtube videos and trying to learn so I may have some reviews to put up. I also have some plans for this summer involving Showmanship, one of my favorite clases, and blogger.

Do not fear, I am addicted to blogger and do read everyone's blogs faithfully - I just can't seem to update my own.

The photo above is an old one of Bogey, I believe it was one of the images the old owner sent me when I was looking to buy him.

Contest Won!

That's right, I won a contest! Very excited to see this prize come in my PO box as you can never have enough note-pads especially very cute horse themed ones!



This one comes from a really great blog: The Pleasure Horse Blog. Very fun to read, informative and great contests! Check them out.



p.s. I WILL have updates from my summer, school is just killer and organic chemistry sucks, so that is my excuse from not compiling pictures and posts. :D

Congress!

Sorry to all for the lack of posts and updates - I'm going to have to go through my summer stuff and tell all the great stories. It was an awesome summer, but busy! Which means no time for the internet! The picture above is from one of our shows this summer - he looks great, me not so much. (Someone also needs to have their hat shaped!)

Congress is upon us so that means that in between my classes and any breaks that I have from Organic Chemistry (yuck!) I will be watching and learning from the live feed!

Click Here!

Also, take a look at the patterns - some difficult some awesome and some just plain interesting!

Patterns

Dancing the Night ... Away?

Alright, I know that I left you all waiting for pictures of my Bogey, but I haven't gotten a hold of my sister yet to put those up on Photobucket - so you'll just have to wait a little longer. In the meantime, I have quite a funny story to tell. You may not think it that funny - but oh my friends and I did.

One of my roommates is in a dance class for her gym credit here at school. With this dance class she had to go to the local dance club The Tapestry Folkdance Center to learn an "ethnic dance". Well the Tapestry does all sorts of interesting dances and since I opted to go with her so she didn't have to go along, we chose the English Contra-Dance, thinking that it would not be that far out of our comfort zone. I think the real reason we chose it was because there were pictures of that dance class on the website and there weren't that many people involved and most of them there were girls so we thought we would be safe. Oh, were we wrong!


(Photograph courtesy of the Tapestry Website)

We expected to see about twenty to thirty people there maximum. There were about sixty to seventy people there. We thought girls would be in the majority - they were but only by two extra girls. My roommate and I went with another friend we coursed into going, and since our friend Roz didn't want to dance with a guy and I didn't want to dance with a guy - we decided to be partners for the first part and I would dance the guy part. That was all fine and dandy, and actually for the best since all I had to do was dance with old ladies and most of them were very funny. Roz on the other hand had to dance with creepy old men. Yep, I said it - they were a little creepy.

There was one man there who was about forty and he had the complete "fu manchu" mustache.


(Photo courtesy of Sports Illustrated CNN.com)

Now, Michael Phelps can wear a fu manchu anytime - this guy, could not. The man's was also fuller, and he didn't wear shoes. That's what really got us, he just didn't wear them - no shoes or socks. Can we say athlete's foot?

There were many other character's at the dance, like a cowboy in wranglers. Now, all for the boots and wranglers, but this is Minneapolis, Minnesota not Houston, Texas. I got the John Travolta "Urban Cowboy" feel, just a little too much.


(Photo Courtesy of Hot Movie Sale. com)

Once we all warmed up to our creepy men, we decided to have some fun with it for our last dance. Now, I was asked by a gentleman older than myself - I'd say he was late fifty's early sixty's. He did not give off the fun grandfatherly vibe, it was pure I'm dancing with a nineteen-year-old creeper vibe. He kept complementing me the entire time.

"You're pirouette half turns in a four beat are wonderful. If you can do those, you are good." It was beginning to be obnoxious, but he was my creeper and - I liked him. He was an extremely good dancer and had been going to the Tapestry for many years, so I finally got to dance the girl part - he could twirl me around and we danced the night away.

Thankfully, I will never see him again in my lifetime, or at least I hope not.

Coming Soon!

Life has been busy, so I have not been able to come on here and post. But, I have been on and reading all of your posts, faithfully, so that's good.

The coming soon is a post about Bogey! I did get to spend a whole day with him over my Easter break and I have pictures and more to share about him. (I just need my sister to email me the pictures as I forgot them at home, and I'm now back at school.)

Makeover - or Under!

Ok, Punchy over at Lucchese to Louis Vuitton had a fun little 5 second makeover gadget. Well, I'm sorry gals - but I do have youth on my side (so no wrinkles really to hide), but I could stand to lose some weight. So when the final project was in, and in all reality this makeover turned into a MAKE UNDER!

Here is my before shot:


Pretty decent - don't you think.



And here is the final product. I had everything done to me, from head on up - I had it done! All to the extreme. haha :D



I think I look like Michael Jackson!

If you want to try these fun gadgets out here is a link: New Beauty