September 13, 2012

I'm Okay

My decision is what it is.  I'm okay with it for now.  Sometime or other I may pick it up as "a" thing I do, not "the" thing I do.  And if I do, it will be somewhere else.  Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky...but as long as we are here, I'm kaput! Internally I still aspire, and hope that if you have the desire, you just get on down the trail!  I'll always be following my peeps, so you need to let me know what you all are doing.  Likewise if I can help, find an article for you, point you in a direction, I'm very happy to do that.  I'm looking into some things for the girls which will depend on if we go into total economic melt-down.   I keep talking about it, because in my 54 years I've never seen times as tough as they are now.  Kind of puts me in lock down mode, or at the very least this or that mode (do we spend on fun, or batten down the hatches).  Instead of the trip to Ohio another truck load of hay went into the barn.  That seemed more logical since we have fed about a fourth of our supply to get us through the drought.

Journey seems to be getting over the back issue.  Still kind of bumpy under the fur, but not painful.  She and Phebes were out racing me while I was mowing the outside of the fence line earlier.  Journey usually doesn't do much other than "mosey" along, or stand and cock a leg with droopy eyelids, so if she has the energy to chase Phebes around she's feeling better.

I wrote someone about Competitive Mounted Orienteering.  We have a few of those each year in Indiana.  That should be fun....me in the woods with a compass and a map (ha!).  They will have to send in reinforcements and a search party.  Hoping to hear from them and see what the people are like.

Four wonderful days off to play with the horses.   ~E.G.

5 comments:

  1. EG: I left a message about orienteering a few posts ago, but haven't seen a response from you, so are you talking about me? I'm going to one this weekend at Tippecanoe in Indiana, and another one at Salamonie also in Indiana (gorgeous place if you haven't been there). I love taking newbies out.. If you could make either one, let me know and I'd love to show you the ropes! It isn't as hard as you think....

    Karen

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  2. Oh! I did read your post but didn't realize you were from / near Indiana. I'm not currently in a position to haul out, let me see when the one is at Salamonie, maybe I can drive up and meet some folks and take the "newbie" drill, get a feel for it before I take Journey. Very excited you do CMO's!

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    1. The Salamonie one is the weekend of September 29/30. Well, I'm off to the CMO at Tippy! Have a nice weekend everyone!

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  3. omg, endurance granny, please give CMO a shot. it is SOOOO fun!!!! it is more challenging than endurance because you have so much thinking to do (the "thinking horse sport") but you will prevail and it will not wipe you out completely because they are usually only 25 miles or so. as always, people new to the sport are given mentors to ride out with, so you won't be totally screwed out there. i've read about it in my newsletter, how it is in your area. they say it's more laid back than in the PNW - i don't knwo this for certain, only that i was lost an awful lot and did have search parties come after me, because i was stubborn and wanted to ride alone.

    it is such an honorable distance sport, tesing mind and endurance, and the great thing is, the community is so much smaller, everyone knows your name and you are welcome to every coffee pot on the fire.

    if i could get CMO started in germany....well, i dream of it.

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  4. oh yah, and then there's the price difference, something that makes CMO great. although i don't know how many rides are in your area, for me it was always about 2 hours to get to a CMO, and about 8 to get to a PNER ride. a couple CMOs were so close i actually rode my horse to the ride: ) and then there was that time i did a CMO and a NATRC at the same time....*lol*

    if you do enough CMO, i promise you endurance will feel easy, because you just look after your horse and follow ribbons. CMO is great training for endurance, but as you said, it demands mental discipline for the horse as he really has to stand still and often be tied up and wait. i'm not gonna pretend baasha was ever good at that.

    i wrote my only Endurance News article about CMO, a "sister sport", which told of my experience comparing endurance to CMO.

    in our state there is a 6 hour time limit for the long course, and teams must be declared at the start of the year. the winners of the long course can complete in 2 hours, whereas i would usually take all 6 if i rode alone. i did have a team, we were called "The Best of the Last" and joked that it should be "Best of the LOST": ) the courses were all between 10 and 25 miles. of course if you get lost, you do more: )

    there is a lot of bushwhacking, off-trail riding in washington state. i wonder if that is the case where you are.

    you know the most fun about CMO? the stealth aspect. have you heard about it yet? when several teams/individuals are in one location searching, and if you find it, you cannot let them know, or else they'll find it too. so you have to pretend to keep looking, mislead them, and then trot away laughing. it's great fun!

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