Keeping up

And here it is several weeks since my last post. It has been very busy, and as always, my life has centered around work and horses. Rajiyyah has continued to fill out and looks very good now. She is at a good weight and her feet are coming back to the appropriate angles. The farrier will be out today to do her feet. Her front feet are mostly at the correct angle now....

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Update on the Grey Wonder Mare

The farrier came out today and trimmed Rajiyyah’s feet. They are finally looking better. Her front feet seem to be just about normal now, and her hind feet are coming along. Her back heels are under-run, a condition where the heels start growing underneath the foot. It can be relatively easily corrected with persistent trimming, and possibly shoeing. Rajiyyah is on a four week trim cycle. This was her second trim since she...

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Happy New Year!

Here it is a new year and I’ve been bad about posting for the past few months. Last year saw many opportunities and disappointments. For a while, I was so despressed about the riding accident and then the subsequent recovery for Isis and me. We did finally get her in shape, and it has seemed that every time I was ready to start riding again, we ran into a snag. Here is hoping...

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New Kid in the Barn

The bay wonder mare has a new companion: Cedars Rajiyyah, the grey wonder mare. I am leasing her from my mom for two years or so. We’ll be working undersaddle, possibly dressage or over fences (if she likes that). Rajiyyah is a bold-moving mare with a gentle, inquisitive disposition. She is a real people horse. The people who had Rajiyyah before me fell in love with her and I’ve promised them I’ll take...

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Strange things…

Have you ever joined a Web site like Reunion.com? You can search for, and sometimes find, people you knew in college or high school. Some times this is a good thing, other times it just brings flashbacks to preferably-forgotten memories. When I was in middle school, I met a wonderful person who lived across the street from me. We met on track team in the fall of our eighth grade. We had the...

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Making Progress

The Bay Wonder Mare(tm) strikes again! It has been well over a month since I’ve written and a lot has happened. I baby-sat my neighbor’s horses for a month and that took up a lot of time so my posting time was greatly reduced. Let’s see… during September I started riding Isis again after we got her front shoes to stay on with some glue and nails this time. The shoes definitely helped...

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Frustrating feet

I think I should expand my consulting business to include “horse health specialist.” With all of the special requirements Isis has for managing laminitis and insulin resistance, I’ve learned more with her than all of the years I’ve had horses. Low carb grain. Grazing muzzles. For months, last year through the beginning of this year, we struggled with keeping the grazing muzzle on her. Finally after we get that to stay on no...

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Sport Shoes 2, Bare Feet 3

The Amazing Bay Mare(tm) appears to have figured out how to not only get her grazing muzzle off, but also how to pull shoes off within 72 hours of them being glued to her feet. My farrier has applied the shoes twice, and both times she has gotten them off. Best guess is that she is over-reaching, hitting the back of the shoe, and eventually ripping them off. The first set of shoes...

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Nerdcore! Geeksta rap!

Finally, a genre of hip-hop I can relate to: Geeksta Rap. Apparently, some comp sci and math students have decided to wrap about Geekly topics. Wired has a feature article talking about the genre and the major musicians. This is just too cool! Thanks to Slashdot for carrying the article. Related Images:

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Reebox for her little feet…

Isis’ new shoes arrived today. They were more expensive than the last pair of shoes I bought for me. Regular steel horse shoes cost about $4 each; these were $14.50 each. When you are used to the burnished silver of regular horse shoes, seeing translucent green and yellow shoes is a bit of a shock. Isis has Easy Walker horse shoes for her spiffy feet. Think sneakers for horses. Horse shoes even have...

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James Doohan died this morning

James Doohan died this morning at 5:30 AM from pneumonia and Alzheimer’s. Doohan played the beloved Chief Energineer Montgomery “Scotty” Scott of the Star Trek TV series, which aired form 1966-1969, and subsequent 7 movies. When over 50% of engineering students listed Scotty as their inspiration for studying engineering, the Milwaukee School of Engineering awarded Doohan an honorary doctorate of engineering. In addition to being one of the best known starship engineers, Doohan...

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Trippage

Isis has been steadily recovering from her fall in the spring. We both have been. My knee and ankle are doing better. She is losing weight and back in regular workouts. She still periodically trips. The chiropractor pointed out that Isis probably trips when she steps on a pointed object, even a small stone would be enough. Most of the time when I’ve noticed Isis mis-stepping, there is a stone in a hoof-print....

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Update on Isis

We found the swelling on Isis’ legs on Sunday, 6/12. When I cleaned her back hooves, she held her leg at an odd angle — rather like a dog lifting its leg on a water hydrant. She has never done that before. Two days later, she was still sore and was holding her leg a little out, but not nearly as much. By 6/16, she was holding her legs normally when her feet...

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Rest in Peace, Grey Gentleman

Have you ever lost a family member? A family member whose impact and friendship was felt most keenly once he or she was no longer there. The same is true when a horse at a boarding stable dies. My mare’s pasture-mate, Zargo, died early Saturday morning. He was fine, and then 30 minutes later, he was down… His owner did everything she could. Here’s to the big Grey Gentleman, the stately senior gelding...

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