update: i've handed it in. i feel like throwing up.

hyacinths, pear trees, horse show, dissertation

27 March 2006 - 11:35 am

flowering: hyacinths (my favorite spring flower, because of the amazing scent) and pear trees.

weekend: horse-showed on saturday. weather was miserable, cold and wet with a light misty rain off and on. ivor (show name: admiral ivor) was freaked out by the whole thing, what with all the people and strange horses and cars and dogs and smells and sounds. he sorta calmed down until i went to school over fences and he just freaked. out. i tried and tried to get him over the jumps, but he was refusing and running out. only having john run up after him as he approached a jump, waving his arms and yelling "git!" was successful in getting him over, but of course it wasn't pretty. john had me get off and another (better) rider get on, to try to get ivor over all the jumps so that he would calm down about them, but he wouldn't go over for her either, no matter how much she tried. in fact, he dumped her, twice, right in front of fences. he'd been cantering up, and ducked his head and stopped without any warning right before the fence. she had no chance. anyway, at that point john decided that maybe doing the over fences classes wasn't such a hot idea, so i scratched from those and added 3 more under saddle (non-jumping) classes.

the first two were in the baby green hunter division, for horses under 7 who were in their first year of showing. it is judged on the horse. this was the division i had intended on entering anyway. we got 5th in the walk/trot class and 4th in the walk/trot /canter. ivor started out a little bunched up, but as we both relaxed and i let go of his mouth he went much better. our next class was the under saddle class in the "schooling hunter" division, also judged on the horse. we won this class! WHOO! so cool to hear my name called first (it happens so rarely). our final two classes were in the adult equitation division, which is judged on the rider rather than the horse. i got a 3rd place in the walk/trot class and a 2nd in walk/trot/canter. ivor makes the equitation classes easy, because his gaits are so comfortable. sitting his trot (a requirement in the equitation classes) is easy to do without looking like a jumping bean. and his canter is also nice and smooth. he was really really good in all those classes, especially after his freakout in the jumping arena. his transitions to the canter were very smooth, which is not always the case (sometimes he does a little crow-hop as he enters the canter), and he got the correct lead every time. his pace was nice, not too fast, not too slow, and he didn't jump at any of the goings-on outside the ring. good boy!

on of my more successful outings, with 5 ribbons in 5 attempts.

in dissertation news, i am currently printing out 3 copies of the 144 page document (that includes all the preliminaries: title page, table of contents, etc., and the references) to give to my committee members. the printer is not so happy about printing out that much stuff, which is why i have time to write this right now. i keep going back to the printer to check on it and seeing that it's printed like 2 more pages or something. feh.