blackcob
🖖
Bit of background info - me and my mum share Beauty and have had her and been at this yard for past 4 years. Yard is split into two separate blocks of stables at different sites, one for liveries and riding school horses, one for us DIYers. YO recently bought a little black cob gelding for the riding school which bears a slight resemblance to B in that it is a cob and it is black.
Right. -takes deep breath-
Last night YO's girlfriend rang my mum and asked if they could use Beauty in a photoshoot for the local newspaper, promoting their 'valentine's rides'. The idea was to have a picture of her and Midnight (the little black cob) together as if they were inseperable. YO has asked in the past to use B in pictures for promotional flyers, leaflets and whatnot as she is very pretty and openly regarded as the best kept/best looking horse on the yard (YO's standards of horse care are not high and his look awful).
Mum rang me to see what I thought of the idea. I was all up for it until I realised that I had uni today (I live in a little rented cottage about 5 minutes away from B and an hour's drive from the local university). It meant that unless the photographer was there before 9am or after 2pm at the earliest I couldn't be there. Mum agreed that we'd have to say no unless photographer was coming after 2pm. She said she'd ring YO to apologise but no, it wouldn't be possible. It was her turn to muck out B this morning and she agreed she'd put her out in the field as normal. The field is a half mile walk away from the village and the gate is padlocked at both ends. She goes out with a friend's big TB gelding.
So I got back from uni at 2pm this afternoon, had nice valentine's lunch at home with OH and headed off to the yard at 4ish to go get B in from the field. Her headcollar was not hanging up outside the stable like mum usually leaves it - thinking she must have put it in the boot of her car like she sometimes does I fetched the spare set and went to go get B. When I got there, her usual headcollar was in a pile outside the field gate, in the mud and nearly in the road. Alarm bells really started ringing when I noticed there were two padlocks on the chain that goes round the gate - linked together so that I could still open the gate with my usual key, but the gate could also be opened via the new padlock. Puzzled, I get B's headcollar on and go to lead her down the road. She takes a few duff steps behind and when I look, there's blood all down her white feather on one of her back legs. There's no heat or swelling and it's probably just a small cut, but it looks like a lot of blood when it's on white feather!
Get back to the yard and she thankfully doesn't seem lame on it, the few choppy strides she did might have been my imagination or stiffness from waiting at the gate to be bought in. Start running a hose on the leg to clean it out. Next door neighbour who owns B's companion arrives and we ooh and ahh over the cut. She says 'Oh, she might have done it when (13 year old part time helper girl) put her back out this afternoon. (TB gelding) was a bit upset that she'd been gone and they were hooning around and kicking out when I got here.'
Turns out YO had unpicked the staples that hold the chain on that we use to padlock the gate and got B out, letting helper girl walk her the half mile to the village. Helper girl is a horrible horrible chav with no horse sense who I wouldn't trust as far as I could throw her.
YO happened to at that moment pull up in his car, asking if I liked the photo in the paper. I proceed to completely lose my rag at him, pointing out the blood all down my horse's leg etc.
YO calmly says 'Your mum rang this morning and said it was okay'.
Have just spoken to her on the phone. She rang them this morning and said they could unpick the gate chain and take her down the main yard for the photo, despite telling me that she would say no. Cue me going mad and her putting the phone down several times as I was shouting at her. Once I'd calmed down a bit she told me I was being stupid and overreacting. I told her she'd lied to me and it had resulted in B being injured. She simply replied that if she needed a vet she'd send bill to YO and put the phone down again.
B's leg has in the meantime has started to heat up.
Just been out to buy the paper and there is a picture of my horse on the front page covered in mud and being snuggled up to by chav helper girl, who is wearing eyeshadow, hooped earrings and red lip gloss. Have had a bit of a cry over it all
Am I overreacting?
Right. -takes deep breath-
Last night YO's girlfriend rang my mum and asked if they could use Beauty in a photoshoot for the local newspaper, promoting their 'valentine's rides'. The idea was to have a picture of her and Midnight (the little black cob) together as if they were inseperable. YO has asked in the past to use B in pictures for promotional flyers, leaflets and whatnot as she is very pretty and openly regarded as the best kept/best looking horse on the yard (YO's standards of horse care are not high and his look awful).
Mum rang me to see what I thought of the idea. I was all up for it until I realised that I had uni today (I live in a little rented cottage about 5 minutes away from B and an hour's drive from the local university). It meant that unless the photographer was there before 9am or after 2pm at the earliest I couldn't be there. Mum agreed that we'd have to say no unless photographer was coming after 2pm. She said she'd ring YO to apologise but no, it wouldn't be possible. It was her turn to muck out B this morning and she agreed she'd put her out in the field as normal. The field is a half mile walk away from the village and the gate is padlocked at both ends. She goes out with a friend's big TB gelding.
So I got back from uni at 2pm this afternoon, had nice valentine's lunch at home with OH and headed off to the yard at 4ish to go get B in from the field. Her headcollar was not hanging up outside the stable like mum usually leaves it - thinking she must have put it in the boot of her car like she sometimes does I fetched the spare set and went to go get B. When I got there, her usual headcollar was in a pile outside the field gate, in the mud and nearly in the road. Alarm bells really started ringing when I noticed there were two padlocks on the chain that goes round the gate - linked together so that I could still open the gate with my usual key, but the gate could also be opened via the new padlock. Puzzled, I get B's headcollar on and go to lead her down the road. She takes a few duff steps behind and when I look, there's blood all down her white feather on one of her back legs. There's no heat or swelling and it's probably just a small cut, but it looks like a lot of blood when it's on white feather!
Get back to the yard and she thankfully doesn't seem lame on it, the few choppy strides she did might have been my imagination or stiffness from waiting at the gate to be bought in. Start running a hose on the leg to clean it out. Next door neighbour who owns B's companion arrives and we ooh and ahh over the cut. She says 'Oh, she might have done it when (13 year old part time helper girl) put her back out this afternoon. (TB gelding) was a bit upset that she'd been gone and they were hooning around and kicking out when I got here.'
Turns out YO had unpicked the staples that hold the chain on that we use to padlock the gate and got B out, letting helper girl walk her the half mile to the village. Helper girl is a horrible horrible chav with no horse sense who I wouldn't trust as far as I could throw her.
YO happened to at that moment pull up in his car, asking if I liked the photo in the paper. I proceed to completely lose my rag at him, pointing out the blood all down my horse's leg etc.
YO calmly says 'Your mum rang this morning and said it was okay'.
Have just spoken to her on the phone. She rang them this morning and said they could unpick the gate chain and take her down the main yard for the photo, despite telling me that she would say no. Cue me going mad and her putting the phone down several times as I was shouting at her. Once I'd calmed down a bit she told me I was being stupid and overreacting. I told her she'd lied to me and it had resulted in B being injured. She simply replied that if she needed a vet she'd send bill to YO and put the phone down again.
B's leg has in the meantime has started to heat up.
Just been out to buy the paper and there is a picture of my horse on the front page covered in mud and being snuggled up to by chav helper girl, who is wearing eyeshadow, hooped earrings and red lip gloss. Have had a bit of a cry over it all
Am I overreacting?
