Friday, November 30, 2012

Oh Facebook...

Did anyone have this video on Facebook pop up?



With this caption...
"Girl on Horseback A deaf-mute girl on a horse that she has ridden for only THREE weeks!!, not to mention the song she picked out to dedicate to her deceased father! Listen to the announcer's voice crack! The horse she is riding is not even hers; she is training it for a client and has had it only 20 days at the time ...of the ride shown here. Note that she rides without a saddle or halter and bit and (obviously) without voice commands. She is using the method used by North American Indians. When you think your voice can't be heard I want each of you to watch this Video. She has no voice. She cannot hear. Yet she has persevered and achieved! Thought you all would enjoy this "
 
Apparently Stacy Westfall is a Deaf-mute that's been riding for three weeks when this video was taken. And for a deaf mute she seems to be doing a lot of talking to the people near the start of the video. The part that is true that she dedicated this ride to her father who had died 24 days before this.
I just had to shake my head when I saw the caption. This ride is amazing! and I'm sure if the caption were more true it would be even more outstanding...Don't always beleive what you read facebook land!

Kitten update.

Yesteray morning was spent at the vet with my little barn cat. I swear I have spent more time there this year than I have any other year. But I am really lucky to have such a great veterinarian clinic so close to my house! I called them up when they oppened and expalained the situation and they asked me for her name...and i paused. They don't really have names, because they all look identical. But their names are Bubbles (the male), Cory and Trevor (the females). Maybe someone will get the Trailer Park Boys reference. But I told the lady on the phone that her name was Cory. I got a few raised eyebrows later in the day when I schedualed the other two for their rabies shots. Aparently girl cats name Trevor are strange.
I tell people that my cats are infact Russian Blues, that way I don't feel so bad spending an arm and a leg to fix them up.

Cory seemed perfectly healthy other than the cuts all over her body. The one on her front leg was by far the worst. So much skin was missing the vet was a little worried about how she was going to stitch it up. We also noticed that she had a cut on her butt, near her lady parts but it wasn't until after they knocked her out and shaved her up that we realized how big of a cut it was. The vet even came and got me from the waiting area to show me. It was a cut about 3 inches long and half an inch deep. She was really lucky it wasn't a bit closer or she would have lost her lady parts. Had she been a male she would have gotten neutered accidentally.

But as I was sitting around for Cory to wake up from her little surgery, I enjoyed a couple dozen cups of coffee. And then started flipping through a book to help people deal with the loss of a pet. Yeah great idea, KK. Read that book and then realize you were sitting in the exact same location when you had to come to face the reality that you were going to have to let Piney go. Great idea... These were a few of the quotes that absolutely destroyed me

 
So there I sat like a crazy person crying for no apparent reason.
 
I stayed at the vet clinic most of the morning. If they hadn't been so crazy busy I would have asked for a tour of the place. I've always been interested in vet clinics. Ever since I was the luckiest kid in my 3rd grade class that go to go and tour the vet clinic in town for our projects on career day. I even got to watch a dog get neutured...It was shortly after watching that I decided that I no longer wanted to be a vet and that maybe becoming an accountant was more my speed. Yes, as a 3rd grader I wanted to be an accountant. I asked my friend who is a vet tech at the clinic and she said that she could arrange for me to get a tour someday. The vet clinic is top of the line and the best of the area. For horses there just isn't any where that comes close within a 300 mile radius. People actually haul their horses from all over the country to get one of the vets at the clinic to look at their horses. She specializes in equine gastrointestinal and orthopedic surgery and she was the one who worked with Piney when he came in. (She even was the vet that got to stich my Cocker Spaniel back up when we had a unfortunate mishap with the clippers) So when she told me that Pineys' chances weren't good for him to survive a surgery, I took her word on it.
 
After Cory was cleared to go, I brought her home. and set her up in a nice kitty condo in the basement. I don't know how I am going to evict her when it's time for her to go back outside. She has it pretty good in the house. She gets canned food (a friend who does the extreme couponing gave me a couple hundred dollars worth of canned cat food), she gets a little scartching post, bottled water, warm blankets and a clean litter box. Now don't get me wrong my barn cats don't have it bad either. They get two HUGE bowls of food each day, a nice kitty bed made out of an old insulated barrel, tons of blankets, and wraped up in an old horse blanket. They have anything they desire to use as a scratching post, all the mice they can catch. and they use the world as their litter box. Pretty sure they have a pretty nice life.
 
I've also realized that giving cats medicine isn't fun. I would much rather give a horse meds orally, than give a cat her meds orally. The good thing is I will have a lot of practice since I have to give her meds twice a day for two weeks...
 
Oh and last night i managed to freak the husband out a little bit. Kitty had an accident in her travel crate and messed up the blankets so the vet tech put them in a black plastic bag with a knot on top. I had set it outside by the front door and had forgotten to bring it in to wash it. When he came home he asked what was in the bag and I casually said "oh....it's the cat". and then had to let him know that the cat was doing great, and that was just some towels. I'm an awful person...

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Life sucks some times.

Well I kinda knew it was only a matter of time...one of the kitty-kitties found out why sleeping in the hood of a pick up truck isn't a good idea. She is alive, but she skinned the backs of three of her legs. I cleaned her up and made her a nice warm bed in the basement. On one hand she is a barn cat, their life expectancy isn't as long as house cats. But on the other hand she is my kitty-kitty and my heart is bleeding for her.
I took another look at her and she has a pretty deep cut so I am thinking it best to bring her to the vet. We wrapped her leg, and fed her. She ate all her food and seems comfortable. But I just think she needs stitches. Why are all my pets falling apart this year?

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Sale Ads.

For every good horse sale ad I find on the internet, I find a handful of awful ones. for example I found this one on good ol Craigslist. Click on the pictures if you need to get a better view.


Are you seeing what I'm seeing?


Yep, that horse is definately peeing.
But the horse does look very sweet. I can't seem to wrap my head around the idea that some people just don't have many, if any good pictures of their horses. If I was to sell my two boys today, I have at least 5 good ones of each on my phone. Also I keep pictures handy incase they decide to make a jail break again, and need to show someone what they look like. In this digital age, how hard is it to take more than one picture? not very hard!

And then there are ads that make me sad for the horse. This one has a mare that could use a bit of groceries, but still looks pretty good for this area, but she is tied to a tree. I know that some people tie horses all the time and that that is fine, but I have a panic attack looking at it. What if that horse spooked? what if that horse stepped on the rope? ugh.

 I enlarged these pics and blured out their faces.
 
I mean they did a good job showing that anyone can ride this sweet mare, from little kids in sandals, to grandmas in just a halter and lead rope too. But that first fella in the orange shirt bugs me for some reason. I can't seem to pin down what it is though. I really hope that mare gets an upgrade. Someone posted a response to this ad a day later saying that the horse was lame, and that the people have no clue what they are doing with a horse. But that seems to be par for the course. "Hey I have an acre, I should buy a horse and keep him in my back yard!" I am so thankful for my years, boarding and working in horse barns for the knowledge I picked up. You can read all you want about horse care in a book, but it doesn't come close to what you learn first hand working with horses. I picked up so much information from hanging out at my barns. From just hanging around listening and asking questions when the vet was there, to picking my farriers brain, to bouncing ideas and thoughts off my riding instructors. I value every second I spent in the barn. If it wasn't for the experience I picked up walking colicy horses at my last barn I would have had no clue how serious colic can be, and probably would have just brushed Piney's first and last bout with colic, to him being "really lazy". He would have suffered much longer than he already did, if I didn't know the symptoms or what to do.
 
If that little mare was a gelding, I would scoop her up in a heart beat, get her some groceries, a vet check, farrier visit. She looks like a really sweet little mare. Plus she comes with a saddle and "bridal"
 
 

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

A little venting about shopping...

I've been looking at a lot of horse sale ads. I have yet to go and look at a horse in person, but I am just giving myself time. But so may for sale ads make me shake my head... I mean really...

13 year old Gelding For Sale
Broke to Ride-Trails,Trailers,Farrier Safe!
He Needs another Horse to Ride with-He don't go by himself >>lol 
Sorrel-Saddlebred Quarter Horse
4 white socks
His Name is: TOO TALL
Luvs his Treats-& Comes when you call his Name-But you better have a Treat Ready For Him : )
Jordan, MN Location
Reason for selling-I don't have time-
His front feet hurt at times-
Mounts Mares-will Kick a Horse close by-or Bite the other Horses Butt Ahead on Trail Riding LOL
$1,000.00 Cash Best Offer
Emails Welcome


Putting LOL next to his bad habits? Doesn't make them cute or funny. A buddy sour horse that mounts mares and bites and kicks nearby horses on the trail...Awesome, where do I send the check?

Another thing that really bugs me, is people that have their sale ad saying "I need to get rid of this horse, we don't have room!" but at the end of the ad will say "Will trade for well broke, bomb proof gelding" Did you not just say you don't have room for one horse...so you will fill the space that you don't have with another one? Why not be honest and say "the horse is too much horse for us, we didn't realize we aren't able to handle this much horse, please take it off our hands so we can get a horse we like better".
I have just been shaking my head a lot when I read horse ads lately. I've also found myself doing something I never thought I ever would...I've been looking at a lot of ads for Arabians... Yeah, I know. There is just something about them that makes me click on every ad that mentions that it might possibly be an arab. I would consider a few test rides on one...
This holiday weekend we had planned on going to Deadwood, South Dakota for a little vacation, and we were going to stop out at the ranch where I got Piney and see what there was available. But we decided that we should probably stay home instead and work on house projects. Probably for the better. It would be kind of nice to just feed two horses for this winter and then head out there in the spring. Especially since I have no clue what type of winter I am going to have this year so I don't know if riding will even be an option. Even though I have looked at ads for all types of horses...I think my heart is with OTTB's.
There is one OTTB that I have been somewhat obsessing about lately. Here is one link to him. He has an ugly knee where chips were removed. And he will never be an upper level horse, but lets not kid anyone...I am never going to be an upper level rider...Ever. I trail ride, and occasionally like to play "dressage queen" but that is about it. The pony also has a video. I've watched it a dozen times. He doesn't have the same floaty, pretty movements that Piney did, but he still looks like he would be a lot of fun.
 
So that is where I am these days. Online shopping for horses. Not a whole lot of other exciting news in my life.

Friday, November 16, 2012

New ride.

It was time for an upgrade and we needed something that could haul ponies easier. It's got a Hemi :-)

Saturday, November 3, 2012

One of those days...

I am currently watching the Breeders Cup, but am really missing a certain red racehorse that used to run at that same track.