Superglue

Two people, maybe three, slept lying down last night. Tia ate a whole breakfast. Tetley was so sound doing a 10 metre trot circle that he was blowing through his nose and stretching his neck down. Things are looking good today!

It's snowing outside and I can't get the Smart car out and I hate driving the Landrover (cake tin on marbles!) so I'm early because I have nowt else to do.

Tia superglued her forehand to the floor this morning :-). It was a devil of a job to get her to release her back and unglue herself. She was rigid in the neck and had no bend at all right and precious little to the left. I did loads of turns, circles, serpentines and pushed her forwards into a jog, until finally she worked it out and did some really nice stuff. Halt is also an issue. When I tried her she did not know a proper halt at all, just a head in the air, open mouth "OK I'll stop if you pull hard enough" halt. I am working on halting her from my seat instead, and she is getting the message to stop without yawing with her mouth, and to stand up square. She is extremely quiet to handle, slightly lazy if anything to ride. So uncomplicated that I can hardly believe that she looks so like a flat racer. Just what I needed, in fact :-)

Smartie is having some new lessons. He has not progressed in terms of his spookiness since Christmas. So every time I handle him now I am doing little jumps, a couple of inches off the floor. And carrying on until he stops running away in a complete panic and comes to me to see what the devil the village idiot is up to today. I am hoping that by doing this at unexpected times, he will learn to get more immune to sudden movements around him. Avoidance certainly doesn't help, and since he often jumps so badly that he slips and falls over with his legs flailing everywhere, it is a safety issue for him and me that he begins to learn that sudden movements won't kill him.

I have bought Tetley some Namibian Devil's Claw root from eBay. You can brew it by pouring boiling water onto it, but instead I have put it into cider vinegar. One because I have read that the acid with leach out the vital elements in it, and two because cider vinegar is also a treatment for stiff joints, so he may as well have the benefit of both. From the smell of it, NoBute is partly cider vinegar itself. In common with my normal penchant for saving money, it's cheaper than buying it ready made as well of course!

More progress tomorrow I hope.

C