Weekend Plans
Saturday: Horsemanship Challenge. The inward-looking, obsessive side of me wants to know why on earth I ever agreed to hop on strange saddlebred. The outward-looking, perky side of me thinks this will be an adventure. I am trying to dial up the volume on the latter.
Sunday: Awards banquet for Winter Tournament shows [one, two, three]. Perhaps one day I will be sufficiently evolved to be interested in achievement for its own sake rather than for the lure of big, gaudy ribbons. That day is not yet.
Monday: Tooth extraction which I hope will be a good thing [Hi].
I’ll be back to report on the first two when I have recovered from the third. Meanwhile enjoy a few days of horse photos and gratuitous animal pictures. If I have not returned before the photo posts run out, not to worry. It means I’m swanning about the house being catered to. Why does that always happen when I am too sick to enjoy it?
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Foto Friday: Carrot’s Eye View
The Sunday Stills challenge for this week is “Fruits and Vegetables.” At our barn, f&v means one thing: carrots, carrots, and more carrots.
I have prior carrot pics (including gratuitous kitten with carrots) but elected to stay with the spirit of the thing and take new. Further carrot commentary.
Social Media Footprint
End of the Month post on blogging [other such].
I am expanding my social media empire.
Established
Blog: http://www.rodneyssaga.wordpress.com
Rodney’s Saga has spawned two subsidiary blogs: Rodney’s Storage for administrative clutter and Rodney’s Sock Drawer for testing posts. If you add the monthly previous incarnations, Back to Eventing & Back to Riding, that’s five blogs for one horse. Not bad for a pasture ornament.
Update: Make that 6 blogs. I forgot about the Blogger version. A while back Blogger wouldn’t let me comment with a WordPress blog, so I created this as a redirect.
Gmail: rodneyssaga@gmail.com.
To provide a contact without hanging up my real email as a spam target.
Facebook: Rodney’s Saga
Daily links for those who prefer to follow on their newsfeed. The second monthly blog, Back to Riding, had its own Facebook page with additional weekly updates. A new page was the easiest way to shed the show name on the Facebook page. Last year, I just posted links. This year, I’ve added on-topic Facebook shares.
Blog posts can be crossposted automatically, but it always seems to chose the wrong picture. Plus, Haynet does not allow autoposting. Since I have to manually post the link at Haynet each day, I do Facebook & Twitter at the same time. The phrase you are reaching for is “time sink.”
New
Flickr: Rodney’s Saga Blog
A place to store Gratuitous Kitten and Foto Friday Photos.
It took me two tries to sign up. The first time, I got cute and put December 22, 2011 as a the birthdate, since that was the date of the first post. Of course, that made “Rodney’s Saga” a minor. I was required to supply parental permission and 50 cents. I was tempted agree so I could keep the name but decided it might introduce future limitations. When I changed the year, and tried again, it just laughed at me. I waited a few days and registered as RSB with my own well-over-minor year.
Twitter: @RodneysSaga
For daily links and pithy aphorisms as they occur. Of course as soon as I started, the aphorism well dried up. I don’t think I’m the intended Twitter audience. Perhaps because I lack the phone as constant companion. Deep down, I can’t imagine anyone wants to hear from me that often. Is my 20thC showing?
Blogging Community
Blogging friends, friends who blog, the list grows. A Rodney’s Saga guest poster has started her own blog Life, the Universe, and Everything with a commentary on how we look at others In the shadows of my mind. I expect horse stories will follow.
How do you work across platforms?
Playing with Poop
Does anyone else score themselves when picking up manure piles? A strike for getting it all in one go. A spare for needing two passes. Then there is the tactical question of scooping conservatively or trying for a strike but being left with the 7-10 split.
I have a 10-tine, metal manure fork, which is slightly narrower than the average pile. The plastic forks are wider and have that lovely basket shape, but I’ve always found the tines to have the penetrating power of cooked spaghetti.
I’m willing to bet that non-horse folks out there are wondering why all this time and attention on pitchforks & shoveling; whereas the horse folks are nodding along, thinking, ‘Yeah, could see doing that.’
Horsefolks see things differently.
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Lunching With Lola
Logic dictates that knowing a horse on the ground would help riding the horse, no? However, there are certainly elite grooms who do not ride at the level of their uber-talented charges. Also, a rider can compete successfully out of a valet-service barn, without having the slightest clue of what happens under the hood. I read about a Big Name Horse whose rider described him one way, yet his groom described a completely different horse.
In my own life, I successfully groomed Crazy Jumper Mare for years before I was able to pilot her. With Previous Horse, I was sufficiently assertive on the ground but melted into a push-over in the saddle.
Still, it can’t hurt.
The biggest problem? Having “Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets … ” from Damn Yankees and “Her name was Lola, she was a showgirl …” from Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana” cavorting in my head as dueling earworms.
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Remember This?
Does Rodney remember what a bridle is all about? Why yes he does. Peppermints helped him over the shock.
Virtual Brush Box 