Random mutt photos

I don't have a whole lot to say on the horse front right now - Cessa is fat and cooperative for the farrier; Dragon is growing, getting over some sort of bug and choke, and did I mention growing?

So have some random dog stuff, because I can.  :)

Belly.  And toes.

Such a weirdo.

Last caption x2. lol I don't even know on this one.  He stayed sitting up like this for quite a while.

Sun worshipper, with extra tongue

Last year was an odd year in the land of our pittie mutt.

First, he had a persistent yeast infection - you can kind of see the discoloration in his toenails in that last photo.  So we spent March and April and May washing his feet with apple cider vinegar as a way to make sure it didn't get worse until his annual checkup in May.  Vet said "good job, and we suggest washing him with this instead," so then he spent the summer getting very regular baths, alternating antifungal and oatmeal shampoos.  Also, I made the vet techs and vets laugh when I wrote up a two-page document (with pictures!  And jokes!) to describe all my concerns for the annual checkup so they didn't have to hang out by the car while I talked through it all, because pandemic.

Around the same time, we had some AC issues and he ended up finally getting permission to sleep with us (he was too warm, and he's a kennel-escaper - we had a few long nights).  At which point we discovered that a) he takes up a lot more space than our dachshund did (duh), b) he takes up even more space than you'd think because he'll put paws on one of us and his back on the other and push, and c) if you're not careful, he can and will accidentally de-pants you during the night with one well-placed kick-scrape-stretch maneuver.  lol

He also had baaaasically a big fat zit on one ear and a much smaller one on one of his thighs.  Thigh one has vanished.  The ear one... well, it's eventually gone away, but only after it got scratched up (we think) in the middle of the night - "Why is my dog bleeding?" is not a question one wants to ask at 3 AM, particularly in the middle of a pandemic - but thankfully my barn friends talked me off the ledge and a vet exam the next day showed that he was fine.  And hey, it didn't ever burst so he never needed surgery on it.

And in the last, say, three months, he's managed to randomly lacerate his feet twice.  Two different feet, one of them on a pad and one of them right by a joint.  He's healed up from both nicely, thankfully, but the second one required a couple of weeks of babying because it was placed perfectly to tear open every time he went rip-snorting across the yard at top speed... and it had rained several times, so it was varying levels of muddy too.

Don't get me wrong, I 100% appreciate that he didn't manage to make it three years running with August emergency vet visits, but... c'mon, buddy!

Aside from those minor issues, and continued issues with being very reactive to other dogs... he's a good boy.  I mean, he's a bit of a wrecking ball sometimes, but he loves people and he's generally happy as long as he gets pets, loving, and most of all, treats.  (Even if the vet did say he needs to cut back on the peanut butter and training treats, and maybe have some carrots instead, lol.)

The pictures that didn't make it into my last post

So it looks like Blogger is still being a pain, as it was in my last post, but this time I'm much less annoyed with the universe.

One festive Dragon:

Someone did not give a crap that I stuck a hat on her ear.  "Sure, whatever."

 Two comparison photos:

Justice, about 15 months old

Dragon, 9 months old

And some bonus photos!

Dragon's uncle (dam's full brother) doing a holiday event in early December. Most of the other stuff that day was canceled; the second round was two weeks later, very little was canceled, and we opted not to go take pictures, even though it was outside. He did great - stood still for kids and non-horsey people (including a wheelchair), didn't mess with the mares he was in company with, didn't flinch at traffic.  Honestly, the worst thing he did was poop on the sidewalk and get a little fidgety after three hours, and he was not the only one ready to go home and use a restroom by that point!

Giant-ass 9 month old baby.  Who is butt-high because she is growing agaiiiin.

Outtake.  lol This is what happens when everyone forgot halters and decided to do an impromptu photo session... and all the baby wants to do is follow the photographer.

And lastly... the most ridiculous unicorn.  lol I'll have to dig up the mossy unicorn photo; I don't have either one of these on a wall anywhere, because they're frankly weird.

Please excuse the flash on the left-hand side.  I always feel a bit bad making fun of this thing - it looks sad, somehow, and someone clearly put a lot of effort into it.  But... um.  It's... yeah.

Happy Holidays!

Well, I was going to share pictures, but apparently Blogger has decided today that I don't get to upload photos, because "server rejected," and all the suggestions for how to fix this issue are crap like "clear your cache" and "change browsers." And while I have my own webspace and could theoretically upload and link, I'm annoyed, so it can fuck right the fuck off and y'all don't get pictures today.

Happy holidays, everyone - whatever holiday you prefer to celebrate.

We've had a few adventures in horse ownership, including Baby's First Choke Episode (hooray...) and the realization that Dragon at 9 months old has probably a foot of height on Justice at 15 months (help, send ladders).  Cessa is so pudgy, she looks pregnant - again - and the vet thinks she probably has some metabolic issues that are gonna mean dry lot in the spring; I'm looking into getting her one of those big balls you fill with hay to keep her entertained.  And our pittie mutt managed to cut his foot on... something (our best guesses are "a broken brick," "a stick," and "thin air").

But my source of great hilarity for the last few days has been Christmas.

Now... I'm an isolated pocket of horsey in my family and in spouse's family.  Like... it's me, and then my mom had a cousin who was into horses, of whom I was fantastically jealous as a teenager (She got to pick between a car and a horse at 16!  So jealous.).  That's it.  That's all of us.  So I generally expect that I'm not gonna get horse stuff for gifts, and if I do, it's going to be somewhere on the spectrum between "bless your heart and the heart of the person responsible for this monstrosity, because apparently only one of the two of you has seen a horse in this lifetime" and "generic horse gift, cool, it's cute," with the odd foray into the land of "oh thank god, you just bought something off my Amazon list and I know you have no idea what it is, but thank you."

My husband did great this year - he got me an LED breastcollar, which I am delighted about because it's blue and it lights up ("Are you ever going to be riding at night?"  "Probably not, but it lights up.").

Aaand then there's my mother.  My mother, for whom I have to color-code my horses because she can't tell the brown horse with the tiny star and big fat snip from the brown horse with the huge-ass star, tiny snip, and big white rear socks.  Past years have included such gifts as:

• A very fancy European ceramic piece... with a donkey on it.  I think.
  
• That horse yoga calendar.
  
• The framed poster of a unicorn that has been nicknamed after a certain little blue pill because while the horse itself is lovely, if a bit overly large-eyed, the horn is... it's sad, y'all.  It's pointing down when it should be pointing up.  And kind of off to one side.  And... yeah.  It's bad and I feel bad making fun of it, but it's so bad that's all I can do.
• Along a similar note, the mossy unicorn framed poster.  It's not really mossy, but that's the best way I've found to describe what appears to be what happens when Lisa Frank tries to do a properly heraldic unicorn and quits after drawing the unicorn, so someone else comes along, takes some mushrooms, and tries to put in an overgrown jungle background - only they were tripping balls and could only find blue and green paints.
• That horse yoga calendar, again.
  
• A pretty generic grooming kit.
• I think every Breyers holiday ornament from 1997 until 2015?
• Another iteration of that horse yoga calendar.
  
• A corrugated metal thing with some... horses?... painted on it.
• A fourth horse yoga calendar.
• A number of random horse statues in various levels of misshapen, including that one rearing horse statue that you see the same horse in different sizes and materials at every freaking truck stop and tourist trap.

So, I mean... my bar is low.  Particularly after this year included a brief discussion about the My Little Ponies on the list (look, they're re-releasing them and there are ones I always wanted, ok) and particularly because although I've provided a horse-specific wishlist, my mother has a tendency to look at your wishlist and then promptly either forget about it or come up with something she (and no one else) views as equivalent.

The bar was evidently not low enough. 

My horsey presents this year included:

• That same freaking horse yoga calendar (I don't think she realizes it's the same photos with different background colors every year...)
• A little horsey first aid kit, which is cute and probably will do great when a human stabs themselves, but is unlikely to be of much use for an actual injured horse just by the quantity of items provided alone
  
• An entire box of vet wrap

Yes, that's right.  A box of vet wrap.  In blue.

That I did not ask for.

Twelve rolls of blue vet wrap.

I think, based on some things she said, that she thought she was buying polo wraps.  She talked about not being sure what width to get, and about being able to wrap my horse's ankles and make them look cute.

Only... she bought... vet wrap.

I just.  I keep thinking about this and laughing, because what else do you do?  She won't get why it's not correct; she might even get kind of offended that I don't like it.  And there's... there's really no tactful way to say, "You do realize you actually bought me a box of bandages, right, Mom?"

I swear to god, I'm gonna be giggling about this for months.

Still hanging in there

Things continue to be pretty quiet here; between the virus and the wacky weather (ah, yes, fall in Texas, where Mother Nature is either drunk or on a roller coaster), I get out every other week or so to check on the beasties.

Cessa has put weight back on in the pasture; literally everyone in the pasture is fat right now, but the vet thinks it's likely she's got a mild metabolic issue going on.  So spring will be dry lot time, much as I'm sure she's going to love that...

But sometimes she's the cuddliest

Dispatches from trainer-land say that Dragon's doing just fine in baby boot camp, and has learned such exciting things as leading, standing tied, standing tied at the trailer, hanging out in the trailer, etc.

Yesterday was baby's first face wound. Also baby's first fly mask. She is clearly enthusiastic. (I cannot stop giggling at the look on her face...)

Trainer also says that my giant-ass baby is continuing to get taller.  Like... at 8 months old, I have photo proof that she's as tall as a QH/Cream Draft cross.  She is doing a pretty good job of filling a stock trailer, too.

Why are you so big already? Slow down!

So... uh.  Anybody know where to find a good four-step mounting block?  Or... I dunno... ladders suitable for mounting from?

School Photos

Am I allowed to call them school photos when I go up to the barn specifically to take pictures of my baby horse before she goes away to the trainer for 2 months of baby boot camp (aka "please make sure this baby is a Good Citizen and has all the groundwork skills she's gonna need as an adult" training)?

Third time wearing a halter, maybe? She is too big for weanling halters and too small for yearling halters.  (She is six months old, help. lol)

Cannot get over how adult she looks.  Aside from the silly baby mane, that is.

Not impressed with a) being haltered and b) being dewormed.

In other news, Cessa impressed the vet.

With how much weight she'd put back on.

In a pasture that's mostly weeds.

*facepalm*

At least she comes when called...?

Things are otherwise pretty quiet here.  I go up every few weeks and poke at the ponies and my barn friends.  Then I come home and continue my regimen of "not going very many places, because plague."

At least the dog is happy we're home?  And hey, he managed not to damage his face in August, which means he's now gone... one out of three Augusts we've had him without requiring an emergency vet visit...

The summer and the Great Escape

I am about to start week seven of hell at work, and we've been running 75-100 degree temperatures with humidity at over 60% for days.  As of today 40 coronavirus deaths in our county, 2500+ cases, 150 of them new.  I feel like I should be more energetic about going to the barn, but... uh.  Not when it's this miserable and at least one of the BOs has health issues that put her at high risk.

I did go up yesterday, though, because of this mare...

One of us is more impressed than the other...

"I am not a number - I am a free horse!"

I was buried in the middle of crap at work and suddenly get a series of texts.

So minor heart attack at the barn today. I come to feed and Cessa is NOT in the barn. But she was earlier and no one moved her.

Uh oh.

I have to go back to the camera to find out when she actually got out. But I'm looking around trying to find her panicking and see her in the alleyway down to the pasture ...okay no problem. Except Rook is with her!! HOW THE FUCK

Rook is one of the stallions.  Who should be inside a 6' fence.  Oops.

So they are just walking the alleyway munching grass.  She's not cycling for him so not overly worried about that part. But more of a... now to see how did Rook got out. Lol


Yep.  She learned how to lift the latch on the new stall-fronts and escaped. *facepalm*  Good news is, she went for the herd instead of trying to escape the property and was pretty easy to catch.  And we got it all on stall video, so we know exactly what she did and how to stop it happening again.

As for the stallion... we know he can't jump that high, but we think he found a low spot in the fence and just kind of... shimmied over, possibly with a face-plant at the end.  You know, as you do when you're a draft stallion...

Also good news: the medication regimen, ration balancer and shit hay (Dr. B's orders!), and spending her time either in the arena or in the barn has turned Cessa from a hippo to an actual horse, if still not exactly a racing-trim one.  She's hated it - she's super food-oriented, and all reports are that she's been just an absolute ear-pinning bitch at feeding time - but it's worked. We're tapering off the meds now, with an eye towards sending her back out to the pasture soon - just, y'know, not this soon.

...Also, I cut off her mane while I was there.  How the hell she had elflocks after a month and a half in the barn or arena, I do not know, but she was a sweaty mess underneath all that hair.  It wasn't a pretty job, but it was too gross to go fetch a halter when she got fidgety, so I just called it good at that point.  I'll probably tidy it up later, when it's not so godawful out.

As for miss Dragon:

Yes?

She has finally, finally slowed down growing a bit.  I mean, I'm 5'6"-ish and if I throw an arm over her butt, my elbow's slightly higher than my shoulder now - but the last time I saw her, a month ago, she was only just slightly shorter and not a lot shorter. 

She is also fiercely independent, has a surprisingly long and lush tail and a very adult head, loves people, and is just generally the best.  :)  She'll be going to baby boot camp in the fall with the other babies - the trainer that worked with Cessa and a lot of the other horses at the barn will take 'em and make sure that basic manners are fully installed - and she might get entered in a video draft horse show while she's there.  In which case I will have video of her trotting in-hand that doesn't involve me trying to run along with a trotting horse, which I'm excited about. (I am not a runner, unless you are looking for the slowest-motion jog ever, and that was before I gained a lot of weight...)

There is no level of melanin in another human being's skin that makes that human being less.

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