Yesterday Cowgirl, my horse that I ride for class, was lame so she was not allowed to be ridden or lunged. I went to go find my teacher to see who I was supposed to ride and she didn't even know that Cowgirl was out lame. So she sent me to the barn manager's office to have them give me a new horse assignment. The barn manager told me to take Tari. When I got to Tari's stall this is what I found.
Tari was one of the freshman's horses for their showmanship test just after our class. So Tari had her mane all done up and had the sleeve over it so that she wouldn't mess it all up or get it dirty. I had carried all my tack to her stall and had just taken off the sleeve when the student who was testing with Tari came up to me and asked if I was going to ride her. I replied yes. She asked, somewhat nicely, if I could go get another horse. Well it was 1:15 and I had to be in the arena by 1:30. So I went off in search of my teacher or the barn manager to see if I could get a different horse. The first person I saw was my teacher so I told her the situation and she sent me to go get Skittles.
I went to make sure Skittles wasn't being used and found her stall getting done, so I couldn't tack up in the stall. I grabbed Skittles and took her across the aisle to an empty stall and quickly groomed her and tacked up. As we were walking to the arena Skittles kept trotting ahead and wouldn't settle down. I was thinking to myself that I should lung her, but when I got to the arena class was ready to start. I thought to myself "well here goes nothing. Hopefully she behaves." I was a little nervous and frazzled with being late, running back and forth in search of a horse to ride and then I get plopped onto this horse! I mounted and started to warm up. Skittles was a lot different than the other horses that I had ridden so far in class. She responded really well to my hand movements and you hardly had to move your hands or she would toss her head and overreact.
I found out that Skittles is afraid of cows and is a very anxious and nervous horse. Her body felt tense and not relaxed throughout most of our ride. While we were going through the course for our first time Risky decided to knock over a plastic watering can and it spooked Skittles so bad that she started to stagger, rear and somewhat buck. I stayed on and survived so no worries, but we were sent to time out in the corner of the arena. My teacher made Skittles and I stand at the opposite end of the arena as everyone else, because all Skittles wanted to do was be with everyone else. As punishment we were in "time out."
The best part of the day was when Hailey, another student in my class, braided Moby's mane and tail. Moby's mane is very thick and long and gets in the way all the time. So Hailey did this really nice braid.
Well when Hailey stopped to talk to the barn manager the barn manager freaked out and started to panic. She thought that Hailey had trimmed Moby's mane! All three of us were laughing hysterically.
Monday night at Pre-Vet club three students gave us a presentation on their internship in Japan this past summer. The internship sounded amazing!! You get more hands on experience in Japan than you would in the United States. I was very interested in this internship and it sounds like a lot of fun.
Here is a photo of the three students in their pink coveralls and milk bikes; used to get from barn to barn. They made the comment that this didn't just scream American.
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