met Kara early today, hoping to ride in the indoor before lessons started. Between grooming, tacking up and mucking out the indoor (which is used as a run-in for the geldings) it was an hour before we could start riding.I had two revelations today... 1, I should invest in a dressage whip. I borrowed Kara's because Daniel was pissing me off, swinging out everytime someone went to mount up. I kept the dressage whip against his right hip, and he didn't move AT ALL... not at all!!!
Revelation 2, I need to have a game plan when I go into the arena to work him. I mounted up, with no plan and Daniel know it. My friend Rhoda stopped to say hi, and he wanted to visit with her. We walked on, and trotted, and he went back and visited again. Ted reminded me that I was LETTING HIM get away with this crap... Once I focused on what I was doing, we both did a little better.
We just walked and trotted... then, "the doctor" as Jill calls him, borrowed him for a lesson. Actually, Rick, the doctor's name, was arriving as I was finishing up and said he had to find a horse to ride for his lesson. I told him that I only walked with him, and he was welcome to borrow Daniel for his lesson. It was good, it gave me some time to clean tack! After the lesson, Rick was kind enough to hose him down, then I put a little citronella oil on him, and put his flysheet and flymask on him.
He was such a good boy today!
