Problems of the Cheering Section

The biking world is on a roll (sorry) over the elimination of Ted King from the Tour de France. He missed Tuesday’s cut-off by 7 seconds. As if watching his team compete without him for the next 3 weeks isn’t enough, his parents had flown over to the finish of the next day’s stage to see him ride. Ouch.

There are real-life details to upper-level competing that aren’t obvious from the worm’s-eye view. At Rolex one year, I overheard two parents talking. Both of their kids were hot favorites to make that year’s team, but the selection trials were not over. They were comparing notes on whether on not to book their international flights. Get a low rate now and lose the money if kid does not make the team? Wait and spend more? Were they jinxing it by buying? Showing a lack of faith by waiting? Such dilemmas had never occurred to me.

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Been There, Done That will be commenting on Tour de France 2013. So far Episode I & Ep I, Part II.

Our Tour 2012 in LEGO.

Shop ‘Til You Drop

More whining. If I can’t whine at y’all, who else is there?

Several kind folks have found potential new horses. For this I am grateful. However, the idea of looking at prospects fills me with dread and ennui. Because:

1) I have already looked at nine horses this go round. Between WTF lamenesses and nice horses totally unsuited to my activities of choice, none were even close. I have not seen one worth a trial ride yet. In the beginning, I rode if the horse was even a remote possibility. These days I’m a lot quicker to say thank you for playing [Part II]. Every deadend makes me that much more reluctant to bark up another tree.

B) Previous Horse died in summer of 2009. That means I have been looking for a regular ride for four years. My optimism tanks runneth dry. I consider giving it all up and taking up … what? I have proven spectacularly unmotivated in the areas of charity work or productive industry. Given unoccupied time, I am likely to watch Castle reruns and eat cookie dough. Yet, wave a horse show under my nose and watch the fire return. [Lessons From BrickFair]

3 or C) I have already identified the horse I want to ride and show: a sharp-looking, talented, 17-hand Thoroughbred who takes our breath away when he canters across the pasture. Sigh.

I know, I know. Big world, small problem. I need look no further than yesterday’s post. Plus, I’m sure I will eventually fish or get off the pot. Right now, it’s wearing me down.

Donation Strategies

Two recent horse-related misfortunes are using the Web to raise money.

In the first, a young lady was badly injured by a drunk driver. She will be away from the barn for a while. Supporters have set up a charity site specifically to cover the cost of caring for her horse: board, feed, farrier bills, etc. The thinking is that she has enough on her mind right now. Knowing that her horse will be taken care of will be one less worry for her as she recovers.

In the second, a farm lost many. many horses in a barn fire, including several breeding stallions. The word is being spread by Facebook. Individual tack shops have set up accounts for donations. When the time comes to replace bridles and buckets, the credit will be waiting for them.

Crowd-funding encourages small donations from many people. Both campaigns have tangible, limited goals. It will be interesting to see where this trend leads. Will friends, associates, and even strangers be willing to donate a bit here and a bit there? Or, as these become more common, will we start feeling nibbled to death, leading eventually to crowd-funding burn-out?

I have omitted specific details to avoid the appearance of advocating for either cause. I’ve donated. I assume the best of folks and try not to talk myself out of a kind gesture [Random Acts]. Since I do not know either situation personally, I don’t feel comfortable recommending what other folks do. If you are interested in the details, neither story is hard to find online.

At Least I Got A Blog Post Out Of It

End of the month = a post about blogging.
Prior posts here.

Good day at the horse show? Bad day with Rodney? The more important question is how many blog posts can I spin from it? In all areas of endeavor, I have found myself using the title phrase more often than is healthy. Life ought to be for living, not for making blog posts.

Names
Folks have asked why I mention their contribution to my life but do not give them credit. One reason – paranoia. Part of it is newspaper training. Mostly it comes from underlying obsessiveness. If I fail to mention names, the owners of those names might be miffed. If I mention names that do not wish to appear, there is a far greater potential for the owners to go ballistic. Nor is there any way to predict possible storms. It’s never the ones you expect that bite you in the a$$. In my professional life, I have been on the receiving end of a handful of rants, the causes of which baffle me to this day.

If I wish to use a name in a post, I ask first. Plus, I give the option to read the text before it is published. This requires more forward planning than I can usually manage in a daily blog.

Update. Text preview applies to guest posts.  Name usage for lessons, clinics, etc. is discussed in advance or omitted.

Titles
For regularly-appearing guest stars, I use titles instead of names to maintain the flow. If I where to say that Miss Courtney did X, a reader might have to pause for a moment to recall who Miss Courtney is and where she fits into the scheme of things. If I say that my instructor did X, readers can simply nod and keep going. Rodney & Mathilda are names I expect you to remember, the rest I try to explain.

(Miss First Name is an informal Southern courtesy halfway between First Name and Mrs. Last Name. It sounds odd to my Yankee ears, but it is meant with a combination of respect and affection, so I roll with it.)

In Sum
The effect of these policies is that the blog is all about meeeeee. This is not the intention as much as the result of not wanting the world to come crashing down around my head.

I have no idea if this will make the people I omit feel any better, but at least I got a blog post out of it.

Welcome Summer

When I was young and spry, I took a hard line with air conditioning. I wasn’t about to waste money & energy on a little discomfort. Then one of our dogs got old. As a big, furry German Shepherd, she took the heat badly. So I would cool the house down to perk her up. After that, we had a series of geriatric dogs as the next one in line got older and more delicate. Now we have Dash. At less than a year old, he can impersonate a melting dog puddle even when the house is coolish. So, that’s why the AC is on these days. For the dogs.

I can’t help but prefer the house at a pleasant temperature. However, it makes it ever so much harder to leave my cool, dark cave to tromp up to the barn in bright, hot sunlight to voluntarily cover myself with dirt and sweat and horsehair.

How do you cope with summer? (Those of you living in Canada & New England are invited not to gloat.)