Shout Outs

Another sanctioned event is in the books, and I have a couple messages for those involved:

To Tropical Storm Irene: Thank you for holding off until we were off of cross country. It was plenty slippery enough on the grass with just the light, intermittent showers and I appreciate not having any downpours to add more difficulty to the terrain.

To the jump judge at fence #5: Laughter is good for you, and I'm glad we were able to give you a good belly laugh when my mare saw something off to the right and ran off the track and up the side of that construction site like it was a bank on a motocross course before completing the turn and taking #5 nicely.

To the jump judge at fence #12 and #13: Sorry about dropping the F-bomb between fences, the approach to #13 was a bit out of control and I saw my life flash before my eyes. But fortunately the princess has a healthy dose of self preservation, backed off, and we didn't get to see just how athletic she can be.

To the princess: I'm very sorry about turning into an alien in dressage when you started to key up thinking we were going on cross country. Also, thank you for the amazing runs in stadium and cross country. You were very grown up with balanced roll backs on a slippery stadium round and rocking around a cross country course with a lot of terrain. Glad you had a good time, and I think that's your last Beginner Novice. It would be a nice change if you actually noticed the freaking jumps.

We managed to squeak out an 8th place ribbon and get home before the weather got icky. Next up on her agenda is a week of dressage camp in preparation for next week's dressage show, and also to get us started fixing her dressage scores. She keeps going double clear, but at this level, there really isn't a lot of movement for the leaders after dressage. But considering her clear stadium (there were a lot of rails due to terrain and slippery grass) and rocking cross country? I think her future as an eventer is looking golden.