Boulty
Well-Known Member
Took Fuzzball on an adventure to Ben Atkinson’s clinic at Bishop Burton to see if any of the stuff I’ve been playing about with on the ground with for the last year or so has been even vaguely competent / to see where the holes are.
As I was a few steps away from navigation by braille as I crawled the lorry through the East Yorkshire fog nearly being blinded by the sunrise I did slightly question my life choices. (Ok I mean the questioning started at the 5am alarm, continued when I had to spray de-icer on the lorry ramp to open it & then reached the FFS level when it dawned on me that whilst the hosepipe was resolutely frozen the sludge on the track was not and that the Fuzzball was now part mudball even in a rug… aaand I bothered to spend 2 hours bathing him in the cold rain yesterday why exactly?!)
Anyhow we arrived in one piece without crashing into anything and I managed to get most of the worst of the filth off in the carpark where I could see what I was doing. This was a totally pointless exercise of course because the pony was offended by this rare level of cleanliness and more or less immediately decided he simply must coat himself in the arena surface.
Apparently I am not entirely useless (nobody is more shocked by this realisation than myself!
). On Sat was given a few tips on how to cue a few things a bit more clearly / with smaller asks & how to link a few different exercises into each other aaand how infrequently I use a proper lunge whip (mine is currently missing… probs ought to replace it as not seen it in about 6 months) was on full display as I’m a little bit useless at waving one about in an effective manner. Overall it would appear I’ve not done an entirely useless job at getting things this far which is good to know.
Then today after rolling again about a squillion times he decided that what his adoring public (Other participants kept being annoyingly nice about him… they don’t have to live with him & his destruction!) really wanted was a demonstration of flying a Highland kite! On the plus side he didn’t try to pull me off my feet / respected getting to the end of the rope and no fingers were broken. Might have dropped the lunge whip a few times mind you!
When he’d put his brain back in he was briefly turned loose in the round pen to do some liberty stuff until he decided it was hilarious to keep giving me a little shove with his shoulder because he likes being on top of me. Now got some stuff to work on to hopefully manage that (don’t think it will ever go away as he will happily shoulder barge other horses and also very solid objects!)
We also started to teach him Spanish Walk. This is quite possibly a terrible idea as he probably will try to use it for evil (or at the very least as a treat dispensing method). Please remind me that I asked for this when he reaches this stage!
Have also picked up some ideas for other exercises / things to play with in the future if & when I’ve got time.
The rare sight of a clean fuzzy thing wearing a rug being fed a rare carrot
Sneaking into the outdoor for a leg stretch… quite glad he didn’t choose this as his location for kite flying
Looking a tad possessed!
Yep that’s it… be sure to rub it all the way in!
As I was a few steps away from navigation by braille as I crawled the lorry through the East Yorkshire fog nearly being blinded by the sunrise I did slightly question my life choices. (Ok I mean the questioning started at the 5am alarm, continued when I had to spray de-icer on the lorry ramp to open it & then reached the FFS level when it dawned on me that whilst the hosepipe was resolutely frozen the sludge on the track was not and that the Fuzzball was now part mudball even in a rug… aaand I bothered to spend 2 hours bathing him in the cold rain yesterday why exactly?!)
Anyhow we arrived in one piece without crashing into anything and I managed to get most of the worst of the filth off in the carpark where I could see what I was doing. This was a totally pointless exercise of course because the pony was offended by this rare level of cleanliness and more or less immediately decided he simply must coat himself in the arena surface.
Apparently I am not entirely useless (nobody is more shocked by this realisation than myself!
). On Sat was given a few tips on how to cue a few things a bit more clearly / with smaller asks & how to link a few different exercises into each other aaand how infrequently I use a proper lunge whip (mine is currently missing… probs ought to replace it as not seen it in about 6 months) was on full display as I’m a little bit useless at waving one about in an effective manner. Overall it would appear I’ve not done an entirely useless job at getting things this far which is good to know. Then today after rolling again about a squillion times he decided that what his adoring public (Other participants kept being annoyingly nice about him… they don’t have to live with him & his destruction!) really wanted was a demonstration of flying a Highland kite! On the plus side he didn’t try to pull me off my feet / respected getting to the end of the rope and no fingers were broken. Might have dropped the lunge whip a few times mind you!
When he’d put his brain back in he was briefly turned loose in the round pen to do some liberty stuff until he decided it was hilarious to keep giving me a little shove with his shoulder because he likes being on top of me. Now got some stuff to work on to hopefully manage that (don’t think it will ever go away as he will happily shoulder barge other horses and also very solid objects!)
We also started to teach him Spanish Walk. This is quite possibly a terrible idea as he probably will try to use it for evil (or at the very least as a treat dispensing method). Please remind me that I asked for this when he reaches this stage!
Have also picked up some ideas for other exercises / things to play with in the future if & when I’ve got time.
The rare sight of a clean fuzzy thing wearing a rug being fed a rare carrot
Sneaking into the outdoor for a leg stretch… quite glad he didn’t choose this as his location for kite flying
Looking a tad possessed!
Yep that’s it… be sure to rub it all the way in!
