Or... Holly makes bad life choices too. :) Or... Dan makes it abundantly clear what he wants and he gets it too!
Sigh... today was a rough day. It shouldn't have been. It was fine. But my hormones are kicking in and I got so frustrated with the mare. I just wanted to cry. So I took a deep breathe and took Dan up to the arena for his rehab.
I decided to just lunge with the cavesson today. I'm a little afraid that the long lining sometimes makes him curl and undoes my hard work at keeping him soft, forward, down and out. So we did our psoas stretch at the arena gate. Then we went in and did our two laps of pillar walking. We also adding in a bit more pillar 2 today. He's getting the hang of the shift back without the step back, but I'm not so sure he's lifting as well as he could be. It's hard to tell. But we also did pillar 3. He was quite chewy today.... he kept grabbing my shirt. But politely. :)
So then we went to lunging. And other than grabbing the lead rope once or twice and half-heartedly trotting off... I didn't even lose him, I just jogged with him until he spit it out and then I sent him on his way.... he was a good boy. Actually too good. Like... "what's wrong? are you sick? good. Ack! I mean.. not really. He just did all the things he was supposed to politely and correctly. And his trot was a little on the sluggish side perhaps. He was dragging his toes a little bit, but it's hard to say if that's because of the glue ons.. because he was being lazy... or because his pred wore off and it's just the NSAIDS now?? We did some walk to trot transtions and he was super good. We did a little over 20 minutes so I decided that was enough. He wasn't puffing or anything and didn't look stressed, but he just didn't seem super thrilled to work, so.. we didn't push it.
After I pulled his cavesson off and gave him a cookie I left him naked. But he wouldn't follow me out of the gate. He just stood there staring at me. Okay, I get it... you're bored. Me too buddy, me too! So then... I walked back in and he was still sitting on the fence line. Hmmmm.... "Are you thinking what I'm thinking bud?!". So... I climbed up the fence and hopped on. At first I had a moment of panic... no halter... no helmet... and he pinned his ears at me! But then he walked off and put his ears forward. We walked to the gate at Jean's side and stood there. I could not steer him with my seat and legs to save my life. Doh. But I did manage to get him moving and we walked back towards my side and got almost to the gate. Then we stopped and I did a little bit of fascial work on his withers, which made him very happy. Then he turned around and walked back to Jean's gate. And then stood there. And then kicked it hard!! He was screaming at me "I WANT TO GO OUT AND PLAY AND DO THINGS"!. Fine, buddy, fine. You win! BUT... you must at least wear a halter and lead line! So I got off and put the halter on and made reins with it and then walked him outside of her fence. I hopped on bareback and we walked down her driveway and into the culdesac. And I let him graze. And then it was getting chilly and later in the day so we walked back to the house. I hopped off at the driveway and let him grab another snack before we headed in.
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