Chubby

No, not me.  At least not in this particular thread.  I'll rant about my fitness another day.  This rant is about Fi.  Yes, the princess is chubby. 

Somehow, chubby and Thoroughbred just doesn't seem to go together.

I was looking at my mare while tacking her up and just stopped to stare.  Wait a minute, she's always had a broodmare belly but it's not usually quite that . . . large.  My mare has put on weight.  Not a shocker, as she spent a month in very light work while we sorted out her soreness issues.  Even now with being back in regular work, it's not galloping, cross country, competing kind of work.  It's more like 4-5 days a week schools in the ring with cross rails and usually one hack a week for 1-2 hours.  She hasn't been galloping since she got sick and it shows.

The trainer cut back on her grain and we're organizing some additional rides for her.  It's been a rough quarter at work so I'm doing all sorts of extra meetings.  I'm also a half time grad student.  Between the two, it's hard to make sure she gets work six days a week like she's used to with two riders.  No one's stepped up quite like her junior rider from the summer, but there are always teenagers at the barn that are looking for extra time in the saddle.  Fi is a gentle, well schooled horse on the flat so it's easy enough to find her a ride here and there.  She's a vintage that only very particular people enjoy for more than a catch ride.

I miss her junior rider.  I really, really do.

Fall is in the air and the horses are all feeling a bit rowdy.  The ring is also crowded since the sun is down by 6pm these days.  Everyone has to pile in during the few hours between school/work and sunset.  It's a bit of an ugly combination.  There's a horse at the barn that has decided that he hates Fiona.  No, scratch that, detests her.  It doesn't make any sense since they're not stabled near each other, have never trailered together, and have never been turned out near each other.  For whatever reason, this gelding that is usually perfectly friendly flattens his ears and bares his teeth at the princess.  He also actively lunges and will go out of his way to go after her.  Fiona ignores him completely unless he gets too close, then she gets worried.  She gets the stressed ear set and tightness around the eyes.  I think that's a totally valid response.  I've started avoiding the horse like the plague, leaving at least a quarter of the ring between them.

We think she turned him down for the prom.  That's our only guess for why he hates her.  He asked the head cheerleader out and she shot him down.  You know Fi is the head cheerleader.  Pretty, athletic, and she will cut you if you annoy her.

It's a lot of fun to go through the barn and assign them stereotypical high school roles.  Try it some time, it's a riot.  Fi is the head cheerleader, Dorkzilla is on the football team (offensive line), and the hater is the head of the chess club.