It's All Chelsea's Fault

I've been thinking. Scary thought I know. I was reading one of my favorite blogs Knottynuff Stock Farm and I've been inspired.

The past few days (granted I have the attention span of a particularly slow cow) I've been thinking about Bubba and barrel racing. We had a spectacularly horrible run on Saturday. Overshot the first barrel 2 strides and did roll backs around two barrels before hitting the third one. Bubba turned one stride too soon and shouldered the third. And that got to me to thinking. I was in a horrible mood after that. I thought we had moved beyond this mess. I thought our barrel hitting days were behind us and 2D/3D checks were headed our way! And our run on Saturday was a great big smack in the face.

To write a thesis (since that is my current academic distraction), you have to be organized. Collect data and compare patterns and sources. And, as big as my brain is (har har), if I want to improve my riding, I have to be organized. I would like to use this blog (and I really don't like that word. How about web-based rambling?) to record my rides and my observations, hoping it will prompt me to make more of them. I'm not the most observant. I can't go at this any longer in this disorganized, distracted fashion if I want to improve. I don't want to win futurities or go to the NFR or ammy rodeo successfully. My goals are simple. I want to draw a check. I want to qualify for World again. I want to run in and know we're going to turn the first barrel. And Bubba, bless his evil soul, is not the problem, as much as I would like to blame him. It's me. I have to ride better and I have to be an active participant.

Once I got home and unloaded Saturday, I went out to the Aucilla River and watched a storm roll in. And did some thinking. That run was almost letter perfect to the runs we made BA (that's Before the Ammerman). And he ran that way because he was sore. So what made him sore Saturday? I thought about it for a while (again, slow cow) and, like a lightbulb, it came to me yesterday when I was riding.... in my Jim Warner hackamore. My equine dentist was supposed to make a trip up to the hinterland (read: North Florida panhandle) and float Bubba's teeth. He's been doing them for years and I'm loathe to trust someone else to handle his teeth. However, that trip has been postponed more times than I care to think about. Saturday, I ran him in a bit when I should have run him in the hackamore and prayed we stopped coming out the gate. In my bad-run induced funk, I made Bubba an appointment with the vet for a lameness exam (because he also hasn't been wanting to pick up the right lead) and now, a teeth float. It might not be as thorough as my dentist but it will at least take the points down until my dentist can make it up here.

We're headed to Branford in two weeks. I'll ride in a bit after Wednesday and make my headgear decision then. Branford is a closed alley so I'm not too worried about running through the crowd. I might run in my hackamore and see how it goes.

This is another one of those times when I wish Ed was this weekend. I have so many ideas for "gear changes" that I don't even know if I need. German? Tie down? Just ride right?

Lord only knows. One day I'll get it together.