It Was A Ride

Well, I survived the first ride on Cisco after a month off. That's about the only positive thing I've got to say about it.

I hoped that because it was the first warm day of the year that it would've taken some of the wind out of his sails. Most definitely did not happen.

For some reason, he started to do the idiot dance after grooming when I went to grab my saddle. His dinner dish magically appears from the same location, so I'm not sure if he was actually doing the dinner version of the idiot dance. When dinner didn't arrive he continued his dance. I had to make a flying leap towards him at one point to keep my saddle on his back while trying to get the girth attached.

Cisco had a playdate with Blue the day before. I hoped that it would get rid of some excess energy.

When we got into the arena, Cisco had forgotten how to breathe. I dragged him around the ring while I set up my Pixio in the hopes that he would start to take some deep, slow breaths instead of the short quick ones he was taking, but even when I dragged him back around the ring to take the Pixio down since I hadn't charged it in 6 weeks and the robot was dead, he still wasn't. That didn't bode well.

He actually stood really well when I got on. At which point I discovered that I had put my stirrups on the wrong stirrup bar when I had made some adjustments to the Flair panels and they were now jockey length.  And once I was on, Cisco wasn't going to stand still so that I could adjust them.

I had been overly optimistic and set up a pole exercise down the centerline of the arena. I used that as my warmup to keep Cisco's brain doing useful things with lots of turning and changing direction. The hamster still managed to hop on the wheel, and there were a couple of bigs spooks/splats/scoots because of pigeons, and every time we went over a pole in the direction of the open overhead door it was taken with more enthusiasm than required and an attempt to take off.

Not nearly as filthy as I expected her to be after 24 hours of nekkidness.

I knew that the first 10 minutes of trot were going to be a disaster - there was no way that I was going to head down to the scary end. Again, there were lots of changes of direction to keep his brain occupied. There was also lots of tranter whenever we turned towards the door.

But I also know that I just need to wait him out. He usually tires pretty quickly, and the warmth of the day was probably going to help.

Sure enough, after about 8 minutes of trot he was able to come back to walk on a loose rein. We did another 10 minutes or so of trot and he started listening to my leg and improving his turns. Since my ankles were screaming at me from being jammed into too short stirrups, I called it a win and finished the ride.

It was a ride. That was about all I was able to say about it.