The Ramblings of an Artistic Equestrian

I finished "Pride and Prejudice" the last couple days. I liked it much better than "Sense and Sensibility." Things feel like they actually happened and there was much more character development going on. I looked up the dates and "Pride and Prejudice" was published two years later. Even as I listened to it, it did feel like a more mature book in the writing style.

There were better descriptions for the settings, still not fully realized and you can tell the people and their actions were more important than the places, but there was a slightly better sense of place.

There were several parts that were quite amusing listening (audio book) to the characters interacting and reading between the lines of their actions and words as the scene unfolded. That's good writing and characterization.

Next up is "Mansfield Park." I have 53 hours left of the 86 hour audiobook collection. I'm actually pretty surprised I managed to finish this last book during my week off.

Sunday it rained pretty much all day and totaled just shy of a full inch. The horses are, once again, filthy bog ponies. I ended up cancelling the two lessons I had scheduled for this afternoon. A combination of everything still being muddy and me not really wanting to ...

We took down some of the Christmas stuff. The tree and outside lights are still up, but we'll be waiting for it to be less muddy to pull down the outside lights.

This last week I updated all of the documents and printed fresh copy for Forged by Fire. I gave Fire Forged Key its own notebook. I don't have enough room in the Lemy'es one anymore for it since it is over 225 pages and DotF is over 100 itself.

Tomorrow it's back to the grind. I love my job, but I could use more time to decompress and chill and enjoy my family and herd.

Monday I put Paris in the false shafts and we cruised the neighborhood. She had one vauge bucky thought when I corrected her for arguing about going into someone's driveway, but otherwise did really well. We trotted a distance and came back nicely, had dogs bark at us and a couple cars pass. When we got back to the property I was getting ready to pull out my keys to unlock it (we had hitched at the house) I noticed a car coming and sure enough it ran the stop sign. This is a pet peeve of mine and I lashed the whip at the car, well, Paris thought it was for her and her reaction caught me off guard. I was able to hold her against the fence for a few yards, but that corner is full of bufflegrass and a couple of sapling mesquite trees, which makes navigating difficult when you're not trying to contain a horse who thinks you're about to beat her to death with the whip. I lost my feet and lost her. Jumped up and start running after her and, thankfully, a man in a pick-up paused and let me hop into his truck to go after her. She went down to Happy and turned right, the opposite way we had headed this morning. We got about where I thought we needed to be once, jumped off, got my hands on the lines, but since I was bending forward and over it wasn't a good position to pull her back and I was barely at the tail end of the 35' lines (they go by quick when a horse is cantering!). Jumped on the truck again and away we go! She alternated trotting and cantering, I almost had her at one point hanging off the side of the truck next to her, but my arms were too short to be able to grab the lines.

Second time I jumped off I was able to get my hands on the lines and was able to negotiate her to a stop with the help of a fence. She had a look of "O good, someone else is in charge!" when I got her stopped. I thanked my random sumaritan. He said he wished he could give me a ride back and I thanked him again. I can't say enough how much I appreciate what he did.

I do want to say that jumping on/off a moving vehicle is harder than it looks. I am also feeling all the muscles I used the last two days. I apparently hit the ground pretty hard because I ended up with a abrasion and bruising through my shirt (shirt was fine) on my right arm/elbow and a hand-sized bruise on my right hip. My delts and traps are pretty sore as well, but I'll survive. It was my own fault, but I'd like to also blame the idiot who ran the stop sign. I just need to remember that unless I'm in danger of being run over making angry gestures at people running stop signs is not as important as the horse I'm working. I just didn't think she would have that strong of a reaction to the whip, honestly.

The last two days we worked on desensitizing Paris to the whip noise. First I started at the stand still tied with her halter, that was ok. She was a lot more concerned with the closed bridle on and it took a while for her to settle. She really didn't like it while she was long lining, but she'll get over herself eventually. We repeated the same today just tied to the fence and she settled a lot quicker.

Her right fore seemed off Monday night and I dug a rock out of her lateral sulcus and that seemed to help. She was moving well yesterday except for on the rocks walking to and from, which is understandable. Today she looked off on her left fore, but after I cleaned her feet and threw the boots on she was moving fine. I wouldn't be surprised if she had bruising after her half mile jaunt Mondnay on a combination of asphalt and (aggressive, angular) gravel road. I'll ride her tonight during one of the lessons and see how it goes.

I got a check from the insurance for $750 less than the body shop quote. I need to call the body shop and ask how they'd like to proceede and maybe ask the Z's what they want to do. They can't get the truck in until early November anyway.

There's other stuff going on, but that was the Big Thing on my brain.

Tomorrrow I'm taking off to enjoy celebrating another successful year of life (i.e. I'm still alive!).

I'm working on sorting my schedule, which is stressful trying to get everyone in and trying not to overschedule myself. I think I have most everyone sorted. Mostly!

I totally overdid it today. Ended up with heatcramps, which eas fun while working on the carts the last hour and riding my last horse.



A wheel on! I had to look up how to put the bearings on properly. They hadn't called me back so I left another message.



Two wheels!



Seat! I got the other seats on, but had trouble with some of the screws not wanting to go all the way through so I might have to back them out and do a guide hole with a drill bit. It was obnoxious and I started cramping up and called it a day after I got the other two seats on.



Vertig!

I also noticed some muscle tremors and I know I really pushed it. There was some cloud cover at the end, which was much nicer. Mindi and Jacob helped me load the cart and I wasn't as useful as I know I could have been, but we got it in and Chris helped me unload it.

Chris suggested just bringing the other carts to the house with the horse trailer tomorrow so I can work under shade and with a fan more at my leisure.

The grand plan was throw the carts together and just walk them down to their destination, but this is taking too long and I don't want to overstay my welcome at the C's house with cart parts everywhere.

Next time I'm going to just load the pallet on the truck and take it home to break down and build.

Today I worked:
Ardberg the Shire colt
Zeke with student on Tru-D
I rode Zeke again during the secobd lesson Tru-D and Chewy for the students
Napoleon was next, false shafts
Kiirin for halter training
Johnny in-hand walked about two miles or so at a pretty good clip
Then I spent like three or four hours putting carts together.

I wasn't hungry, but ate some sausage and butternut squash for lunch at like 4pm, laid down for a bit, played taps flat on my back because it amused me and I was helping Tristan with the trumpet while taking a breather.

I finished out riding April with Heidi, Jason, and Sarah. I seriously considered canceling, and I probably should have because my left hand cramped up pretty good and my legs also got a bit crampy, especially if I had to actually squeeze. I'm glad I had the whip. I had a cramp on the front of my shin, which was a new experience.

So hopefully I have rehydrated and enjoyed my sweet potato curry and half a banana and a bunch of cashews.

Tomorrow should be less taxing, I hope.

I can't belive I didn't have a tag for Johnny

Had a dream last night. Pretty sure it was a stress dream. I wss driving a car through the desert. It was dark and the headlights barely worked. There were hills and brush and mesquite trees. The steering was incredibly sloppy and the brake pedal went to the floor, barely doing anything. I caught glimpsed of black-footed ferrets, which was cool, but I obviously couldn't enjoy iteith the state of the vehicle I was trying to maneuver.

I've been working on my summer schedule and trying to get everyone locked in, working in the order of who was where first and trying to make it as efficient as possible. I had a couple students take off for the summer already and a few others note this would be their last book of four lessons, but I had five new ones start this weeks so....!

Pretty sure the dream is manifesting my feeling of lack of control of my own schedule, even though I'm technically the one making it!

We'll see if the art classes run. I haven't had anyone officially sign up yet. If they don't I won't mind too much. I've started putting part of my afternoons towards editing videos for the Equine Academy driving course. Maybe I could get all the videos done this summer...

Two very different dreams. One consisting of a ski lift in the Swiss Alps. Once you got to the top there was the option of going into this long, skinny train-like thing or settling into a groove that took you down the mountain a little bit before you accessed the actual slopes. I somehow ended up hanging off the outside of the train part and shimmeying down to this weird box. There was a young Swiss woman helping people get into the train thing and we had to get people into the box so I could climb into it and not tip the thing off the cliff as I leveraged myself down. I then had to maneuver through this tiny sliding window to actually get inside.

Second dream had this big, potentially beautiful bathroom with multiple toilets, a shower, sinks, and the like. It had natural stone walls a bit like a slot canyon, but someone(s) had used ir and not flushed any of the toilets and it was disgusting. I was going to use the bathroom, but immediately went, nope! gotta clean this first! So I'm flushing toilets and scrubbing toilets half-naked and the boys try to come in and I yell at them I'm cleaning the bathroom and trying to go potty because someone (boys I assume) left it an absolute mess. Green sludge, brown, just nasty and my dream-brain saw fit to give me a whiff of it too. I generally don't smell in dreams, but I smelled that for a moment!

Yesterday was super busy I worked with:
Ruby, Cordelia, and Joe, all Mustangs. Ruby continues to be awesome, Cordelia is getting more settled in her feet and I can get closer to her both on Ruby and on the ground. Carlyn was quite proud she was able to pet Cordelia's shoulder the other day, which is a huge improvement for the mare!

Joe continues to be a mix of skeptical and terrified of the saddle. He causes his own problems, though, even with carrots and positive rienforcement so we'll be stepping back to the bareback pad again next week.

After them it was loading up Talon to join Alisa and her gelding Oakley for a ride around the farm fields. Does that count as two horses or one? We had a good quarter-mile canter in there, which felt pretty awesome. I took Talon home and then it was Ludo, we had a very nice walk-canter transition to the right, the left needs work, but still fewer trotting steps than before. Ludo is followed by Bess and we played with the cart around her before walking around the neighborhood.



Bess has swagger. She's still gaining confidence long lining out, she prefers the people lead.

After Bess I went over to work the Andalusian mare Miss B. I should know better than to stack multiple high-demand horses in one day. Miss B's canter work started to wear me out (and I was getting hungry). I still had another though! April the welsh cross got a short, but quick ride. She tried to tuck and barge off on me a couple times and we had words, but we did get our left lead canter (finally!) and she was good and sweaty by the end of it.

From there I picked up the boys, had a spoonfull of Nutella for "lunch" before heading out for my final lesson in which I rode Tru-D and the student was on Kash.

So directly I worked with eight horses and a cow. Ruby, Cordelia, Joe, Talon, Ludo, Bess, Miss B, April, and Tru-D.

Today is less busy because Lisa is unwell so instead of loading up Talon I will just go ride Ben and Henna's mare who just came in from Wisconsin has some colic and/or shipping fever going on so I'll work Buddy in her spot. We do have a Grand Adventure planned with Christy and her mare Dolly. We'll be driving from her place to mine and leaving the cart here. Christy will then ride back home. This is partially a Cool Thing to Do and partially a necessity because her son will have her truck and grooming trailer working while we do this so boring hauling stuff over is not an option, or at least would require changing schedules.

Oh! I am also keeping up my word count. Thusfar I've been able to type up everything at raquinn as well.

I'm just dumping all my dreams on you all. Except for Saturday night's dream, that one I wrote down in my physical dream journal because I got to sleep in and just roll over and write it out.

So last night the dream mostly took place at a building right on a dock. The patio/dock was pretty much level with the water. It was myself and two others and we spot this big sailing ship. The ship is launching smaller long boats out and in them are Dark Elves, deathly pale and menacing, drawing their bows and firing at us.

There was much scrambling about, grabbing spent arrows and attempting to return fire while trying to make it unscathed into the glassy buildinf behind us for cover.

Completely unrelated I drove Talon again today! We walked, we trotted, we called it good! Now to just keep this up...

I had two new clients start today, they have a mule each, one of them attended my clinic back in May. I had another woman ask about training a pair of minis to drive. Kadriya may just lose her Friday evening spot. She's canceled way too many times and I think we've done one lesson the last month. Not that I've minded more open Friday evenings, but knowing it's open all week is a lot nicer than finding out the day before....

My schedule is so full I don't know if I could really pack anyone else in!

Today I taught a driving clinic. We had a Belgian, a cob, a medium sized pony, and four minis ranging from halter broke to ADT competitor.

There was one lady with a pair of minis and we talked about how to ger her single harnesses to work for a pair. We long lined them together a bit and talked about how we need them to go before hooking them to a vehicle together. I got to use the new team lines I had Yonie's custom made for me to work with the long lines. They worked great, I love them!

I failed to keep a good eye on the clock and ran terribly over, but we know how to better organize it for next time I think.

It didn't help that the first person to show up other than the guy who organized and was hosting it didn't arrive until almost 30 minutes after our start time.

It seems everyone had a good time and learnes a lot. There's talk of making it a regular thing so we'll see.

I dropped by and worked with Sherry and Rider on some ground work before making a pit stop at Alisa S to try saddles on her new guy. I finally got home about 3pm, what a long day! Did I mention I got up about 4:20am? I'm pretty much ready for bed.

Saturday I had rode both Jasper and Tru-D during lessons. Jasper was first. Our sheep neighbor was lungeing her gelding Wall-E since he had a couple weeks off. Jasper was very fascinated with what was going on and alternated between wanting to trot off towards them and standing and gawking. I lunged him briefly as the student warmed up and then climbed on. He was distracted, but not bad until it was too much. He jumped forward into a canter, did a little head toss and then was trotting. I responded by insisting he KEEP trotting and we cruised around for several minutes as the student worked on trotting and steering herself. He finally started asking about slowing down maybe? and we trotted a little bit more before calling it good.

Once that was out of his system he did really well. He is coming along nicely for a three year-old. It did get my adrenaline going a bit and my right leg was a little shaky when I adjusted my foot at one point. I worked through it and we survived. I still really trust him. He does tell you when something is starting to get overwhelming.

He also has a pretty nice trot even if he is a bit of a giant doofus and not the most gracefully athletic creature. The little bit of canter I felt was pretty good too!

My third lesson canceled so I gave everyone their good stuff and got Tru-D ready a smidge early before the last one at 10am.

I took her into the roundpen to start. I was determined we were going to work on the canter. I haven't cantered her since the middle of last year. It was possibly a year ago, actually. Winter was just busy and riding during lessons she wasn't feeling good enough to ask for it with a student around and my own nerves were at play too.

Her five yar-old year she had some recalcitrance that we had to work through, which mostly ended when she did that flying leap and I hopped off of her mid-shenanigans and then got back on. She's been doing really good the last few months though.

Anyway, we were in the roundpen and I had the dressage whip so I didn't have to disrupt my leg position to insist on the "go." She actually really surprised me. She eye-balled the jumps a bit, but other than that she came off my seat for the canter pretty much every time after her first "you want me to WHAT?!" She did lean towards the inside a bit on occasion, but did start to sit up a bit.

She does have a nice canter. It isn't super springy yet, but I think it is a good base that covers ground and is smooth and easy to sit. Aubrey was a bit late so Tru-D got a good amount of work in and was able to mostly chill as I worked with Aubrey and her mare Dot. Aubrey is a decent rider and she may put some rides on Tru-D for me in exchange for lessons. I just don't have time right now to put even three rides a week on Tru-D and she needs more than just a weekly ride from me. She isn't doing bad but I would like her to move forward a bit faster than I can manage to do with my limited time.

Monday after I finished with Moonie and Jolene went home we hooked up to the trailer and loaded Talon up. We took her down to Horseshoe Park and had the public arena all to ourselves. She was looky and aware, but quietly so.

After tacking up we took a walk around the arena in each direction before I climbed on. She wasn't fond of the trail course area and was a little suspiscious of the little substation thing that occasionally kicks on its A/C and makes a good amount of noise.

Once her head dropped a little we picked up a trot and cruised. She was occasionally backed of, especially towards the scary parts and then a couple of times she was a little strong, but stayed containable. Were I a little braver I might have suggested a canter, but not quite in a bit, open arena that she's never been in before!



It is a gorgeous arena with lovely footing. It also makes her look like a regular-sized horse. Ha!



Sunday we pulled out Zeke and we long-lined him a bit. He got to wear the new training breastcollar. I need to find some more hame straps and secure it better. It looks so cockeyed here. He did good walk and trot and he had a little attitude here and there, but not bad and well, he's a yearling and I think this was the second or third time long lining him.

I was quite proud of myself all four young horses got worked over the course of three days. Success!

I am oing to enjoy this week minus a training horse. The one who was next in line needs to hold off for a month or so as she just bought a house. I'll contact the next in line the end of the week and see if she's ready to go or needs to wait longer and then I need to check with the NEXT one in line. Holy cow! We'll see if they pan out or not.

Today I had Dolly and we were just going to do a loop around the neighborhood with the tire. She did alright for the first portion, but as we got closer to home she was jiggy and did not want to stand and I even dropped her bit to the curb setting instead of the snaffle to get her to back off my hands. There were so many circles and we passed her house a few dozen times until she felt somewhat reasonable so we swung in. Then she was jigging in the arena (the arena has a gate off property) and I finally was feeling done because sand is a pain in the butt to walk it. If she had the energy to be a goober hauling the tire she could haul my butt. I sat on the tire until she walked nicely, got off the tire, gave her the chance to walk nicely, got on the tire again, rinse and repeat. She was being so heavy my right ring finger went a bit numb. It's about back to normal now. I ended up working her over an hour and a half. I'm hoping she is a bit more humble for her second hook in the cart tomorrow.

I admit I hadn't believed Christy when she said Dolly could be a bit of a pill sometimes as I had never run into such a persistent streak of resistance with her in the year or so that I have been working with her off and on and the last six months of consistent work. No idea what was going on with her. She even did pretty good passing the herd of horses and ponies (about 8 from 10 hands to 16) that were galloping back and forth and snorting and calling to her.

I have a former client who does videography and might have some old equipment they are looking to move on. I finally finished editing the first video last week and sent it off. I need to shoot another one and need to try and get that done this week.

I also picked up another Scottsdale/Phoenix client. She was thinking of full training, but we'll try weekly sessions to start and go from there. Full training is typically faster and cheaper, but if she can put in the inbetween work it might work out in her favor. He is completely green and just lunges. I'll have my work cut out for me getting him driving. He's also still intact. I have another young mini stud I just started working with last week too.

Anyway, things to do!

Using the idea from clevortrevor and kudosirony.

Bold I have read completely.
Italics I started, but didn't finish
Plain text, haven't read

1 Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
6 The Bible King James version at least.
7 Wuthering Heights Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty-Four George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations Charles Dickens
11 Little Women Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the d'Urbervilles Thomas Hardy
13 Catch-22 Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare William Shakespeare
15 Rebecca Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler's Wife Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia CS Lewis
34 Emma Jane Austen
35 Persuasion Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin Louis de Bernières
39 Memoirs of a Geisha Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh AA Milne
41 Animal Farm George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney John Irving
45 The Woman in White Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies William Golding
50 Atonement Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi Yann Martel
52 Dune Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men John Steinbeck
62 Lolita Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist Charles Dickens
72 Dracula Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince Antoine de Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory Iain Banks
94 Watership Down Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Roald Dahl
100 Les Misérables Victor Hugo

Number read: 20
Number partially read: 4

Not as well as I would like, alas! Let's see how I do with the BBC List.


1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

Number read: 22
Number partially read: 3

Just a touch better. I actually own some of the books I haven't read, just need to get around to doing it.

Five AM is starting to get early tonwake up as the sun delays rising. The 6-7am commute to Scottsdale also sucks, but we managed some good work with Coors and Trinket both and I was able to get to Christine on time.

The woman that wanted the free assessment didn't pan out. She told me she had found someone, which is fine by me. I had scheduled her two weeks out from initial contact as I was unthrilled with a free assessment, but willing to add another person to my Scottsdale day. Her Finding someone else was a win-win for me.

I am falling asleep typing ...

Today was so long.

Had oatmeal for breakfast around 7am, headed out for Scottsdale a little before 8am. Two lessons and then Cindy asked if I could catch and load Paparazzi for her so she could move in to the new place (paid, obviously). Apparently Cindy hasn't been able to get near her for almost two weeks.

So I worked for an hour and a half on catching a HackneyxAmerican Shetland pony. What a sensitive, flighty little creature! Once caught she had a few thoughts about whether leading was allowed, but then she came right along and only eyeballed the trailer briefly before hopping in.

Cindy reported that Papi allowed herself to be caught this evening, success!

From there it was to the bank, costco, and home, at which point I had enough time to eat a banana and unload the car before heading out to my last two lessons. Feed the herd, but had to go and pick up food for Chewy as she was OUT and I was supposed to hit the feedstore, but didn't have time before the lessons.

Finally had dinner a little after 7pm and got cleaned up. I'm ready to sit down.