Bits and Pieces

Owyhee Fandango 50 was a great success. The glue ons stayed put wonderfully again, Jasper mostly behaved himself, and I finished with a strong, peppy horse who acted as though he could have done another 50 the next day. All in all, I was quite happy. Add to that the fact that I got to vet Sunday at the ride, we had a wonderful weekend.

However, I kinda fell apart on the ride. I've never had knee problems, although my family has a history of bad knees. About 2 miles into the second loop, I got a couple of zings of pain in my right knee on the bottom outside. I tried to ignore them, but then a crippling, doubled-over in pain bolt of electricity shot through me and I ended up forehead-to-mane on Jasper while he flicked ears back questioningly in my direction. It kept it up for the entire loop, but sometimes the pain would scale back into "dull roar" category. It felt as though I had torn something in my knee joint, and lengthening my stirrups actually made it worse. When I was done for the day, the joint was noticeably more swollen/distended than the other and continued to throb a bit for the day. I iced it and took ample amounts of ibuprofen, and the next day it was fine. And it hasn't bothered me since (except for a short sprint across HomeDepot yesterday). Odd. I'm thinking I need to see a doctor of the human type about it....

Jasper's been in heaven the past week--the grass has started to grain up and he and Ony have been wandering through picking off the heads. He's really plumping up, and I'm delighted to think there may be a day in the near future where my fat horse has to put into the barn for part of the day.

Jasper, who SWEARS he hates Onyx with the passion of a thousand suns, was caught last night mutual grooming with him. He must not have recognized my car driving up because the two of them were really going at it. The sight made my heart warm, and I'll admit I got a little misty. That sweet little Onyx probably doggedly pursued it until Jasper finally gave up and then realized it was quite nice to have a buddy to scratch his shoulders. It stopped, of course, the moment Jasper realized I was approaching and he tried to play it off. Then he viciously went after Onyx while I was scratching Jasper, thus "proving" he really does hate the little booger after all.

I started my job last week and had a blast! My very first appointment was a little dog with diarrhea, and I had a moment of blind panic after I'd examined the dog where I was fairly sure I'd just forgotten everything I'd ever learned in school. My mind started racing and I was ticking off a number of plausible/not-plausible excuses for exiting the room so I could look everything up and collect my thoughts. I think I hid it well, as I don't think the tech or the client caught on--I like to think I just looked super-thoughtful for a minute. After a few moments, it passed and I realized I was perfectly capable of handling the case. And I did. And the dog feels much better now, thankyouverymuch. I think these moments will be all too common for the next year, and probably will still happen after that at times.

For the first time in the four years since we bought our house, we've started to actually DO something to it. I'll admit I've been having a really good time being domestic and "ignoring" the horses. Jasper still has another week of rest and Ony isn't going to wither away into dust this week if I choose HOUSE over HORSE. Next week...maybe.