Where is november going?

Had a nice weekend. On saturday went out to the barn. Rode Classy in the outdoor arena and she was pretty hot so it took a while to get her going calmly with nice rythm. After she settled down we headed out to the fields. The barn is owner by a couple who trains thoroughbreds but are from England so hack them out the british way, not round and round in circles on a dirt track but on all these wonderfully groomed trails over the surrounding quarter sections. Classy and I went for a nice controlled gallop and good god that girly can move! Ended up by the south saskatchewan river which runs near the barn. Beautiful set of trails along the river valley edge. Lots of dog though but Classy was a very good girl with all the dogs. ALl in all rode over 2 hours which was a little long for Classy, but she wasn't hot or sweated up, just tired. DIdn't even want to eat when she got back, just wanted to sleep in the sun.

Trail ride by the river!!

Some photos from last week in the indoor



I keep trudgin away at the studying, December is going to be a rough month at school so I am trying to get as far ahead as I can.

My mom is coming for a short visit and I am so excited!! It has been so long since I got to see my family. Thusday we head home for a 3 day weekend and will be partaking of the fun known as Bar None with all my friends from undergrad.

Will post when I get back!

Best Day EVER!!

So yesterday there was a really cool surgery in. Last year they attemptd to fix a wry- nosed colt and it actually turned out really well. Now they had to do further surgery to remove a nasal septum in order to allow better air flow. I was running down to large animal surgery between every class to check on the progress. After class was over I went down to the equine ward and was asking one of the surgeons a bunch of questions about the surgery when a degloving laceration came in. De-gloving is when the horse lacerates around a point in its leg and peels all the fascia off down to a lower point. this horses entire leg from its elbow to its carpus was exposed with the huge skin flap hanging off it. The accident happened within an hour ago so It was repairable. Decided to take the horse to table top surgery. I was hanging around outside the surgery doors watching them prep when the surgeon I was talking to previously asked if I would like to come in on the repair. Of course I said yes! Hadn't been in on a surgery yet at school being only in second year. Surgeon lent me some greens so I didn't have to go down to laundry to find a pair and then I was in the surgery suite!!! Interns and residents were super cool, quizzing me on suture patterns, drugs, etc. I had an absolute blast!!

Boarding barn etiquette

Been busy catching up with all my class work that put off during mid terms. Gah there is so much to catch up on.
Classy has been going really well. She has muscled up so much all ready she looks like a different horse. We have been cantering lately and have also been going on trail rides. She has been so good. Learned what a half halt and is learning how to step up underneath herself more and carry herself instead of making me do it. I am sore! Its been a while since I have ridden such a big moving horse with regularity. We had a little accident on Saturday. It was nice out and the pony club was in the indoor arena so we were in the outdoor. She was cross firing into a corner a lost her balance and fell. We were both fine so I got back on and we continued on with our ride.
I have never really ridden in a big boarding facility, I have always ridden at Fern's place. Some of the crazy stupid neurotic things I have seen completely blow my mind. There is one crazy women with 3 very gorgeous horses all super well broke who lunges each of them for an hour every night (right when I am always there riding, and you aren't supposed to lunge when others are in the arena). I have never seen her ride them even though she talks as if she's won every ribbon available in the area. Strangeness number 2 is the electric heating pad under the saddle on the horse for an hour before riding every night which another girl is a fan of.
One last night takes the cake. The barn where we saddle up in is an old Mennonite barn with a fairly low ceiling. I am saddling up in one stall and hear a girl sacking out a young horses with the saddle in a neighboring stall. Okay cool, working with a young horse. She then proceeded to GET ON the horse in the small box stall with the ceiling so low that she couldn't even sit up fully. WTF! She was so proud of herself for getting on this horse for the 2nd time ever. I didn't say anything as I am the new person and don't want to come off as an ass or be somehow liable if she got hurt.
Should I say something?? what is proper boarding barn etiquette?

Camera is not working :( sorry, no pictures yet.

Sleep

Midterms are finally over. FINALLY! Wrote the last one yesterday. It was microbiology and went a lot better then expected but I still managed to get all the silly swine organisms mixed up by then end of the exam as they all end in suis and parasuis! Room mates and I celebrated by going to a nearby all you can eat chinese buffet. YUM!
Then tried to go out riding but forgot that the arena is booked tuesday nights by a dog agility group. So Classy and I just visited and had a snack.
Been getting some grades back. Got 81% in pathology. We have had lots of students falling ill with H1N1 and so it will be a long wait for marks as we have to wait untill everyone has written the exam to know our marks.

Time off??? never!

Well although I made it through the tough week of exams, there were still a couple more to go so I have been hiding out and digging in deep to get through. Write the last one on Tuesday which is Microbiology. It has suffered from "last exam" syndrome up to this point, that is it has been completely ignored so I am a little bit worried. Oh well, we will prevail!
Friday night was the first happy hour of the school of which I was one of the organizers for. Of course it was in celebration of Halloween. It was followed with a pub crawl of which we will say no more.
I went as Dorothy from the wizard of oz...



Spent Saturday recovering and went riding in the evening after pony club was finished. Classy was super distracted by the fact that there were other horses in the arena. Couldn't go more than 5 steps without stopping and when she doesn't want to move she is adamant about it!! Well the other horses eventually left and then it was a 180 degree flip. All of a sudden all she wanted to do was MOVE and do so at a very fast very disorganized trot. not good for hungover rider. No more sweet feed for her!!
Sunday morning went again to the barn. Took a crop with me just in case we had to "i don't want to move argument" again. it was good thinking on my part. We spent this morning ride just working on listening to leg signals and giving to the legs. After a short time with some stick reinforcement she caught onto the idea and we had a great ride. Lots of transition work to get her listening and more responsive.
Then went home and studied all day for microbiology.
I took my camera to the barn to get some pictures but unfortunately it died before I got on...