A Horse By Any Other Color Is.....

Ozzie and I!









Allison, Ozzie and I

The horse with the beautiful bay color is named Ozzie! (I have always wanted a bay!!) She is my friend Lorri's horse and is also an AngloArab like Jackson, but of the mare-ish persuasion--perfect for the plan I have concocted which I will get to here in a bit.

Yesterday, with Jackson's wound looking better, but certainly not ready for a girth, I took a lesson with Allison on Ozzie. I have only ever ridden Oz for the equivalent of 10 minutes, but since Lorri has trained her to be quite the dressage horse, I wasn't worried. And I'm glad I took the opportunity to experience Ozzie! Don't get me wrong. I LOVE MY HORSE and I treasure every ride. But being able to ride an accomplished very well trained horse was sooooo nice. Obviously, when you are a pretty novice rider yourself riding your greenie horse, you are learning BASICS. And basics for TWO gets HARD! Which is fine, I don't mind. But it was really refreshing to be able to concentrate on ME and not be so worried about my horse. We worked on my issues and threw in some new things which will help so much with my riding. I even got PUNCHED! Yep! Allison came up to me while I was on Ozzie and punched me in the gut to demonstrate how tight my abs need to be. I may bruise... LOL! Picture the sweet (well not ALWAYS, at least during a lesson... :) 79 year old lady in the pics coming up and sucker punching you. Well, that worked anyhow! My abs turned to stone. Ok...semi stone, they need quite a bit of work! HEE HEE! Allison has so many cute (but not always cute while you are trying your VERY BEST..) expressions, one of them being, (in her haughty English accent, mind you)"RIDE YOUR HORSE!" I can't count how many times that has been yelled across the arena at me. One day I got, "Mindy, RIDE that damn horse for the love of God!" I love it! The annoying thing is, when I take lessons I give 150% so hearing that during the lessons does make me clench my teeth, (as it does everyone I know who takes lessons from her :) I SO want to shout back, "Well, what the HELL do you think I'm doing?" :) But, I must confess, I always give a bit more after that. I RIDE my horse!

The only thing that made me a little nuts while riding Oz was the fact that EVERY TIME I changed directions my diagonals were wrong!! I have NEVER had this issue on Jackson. I am always on the right diagonal! Not a hard fix since I've been doing that since I was young, but puzzling. The only thing I can think of is that Oz is so much smoother than Jackson that I just didn't feel the change like I do on him. Any ideas anyone? I am so perplexed by that one. And of course humbled...diagonals, wrong, WHAT??? HA! Always, always something!!! But diagonals? Sheesh!
My friend video-taped me yesterday, THAT should be interesting. I hate seeing how bad I can look, but video helps me improve so much, seeing what you look like is always a good thing, and obviously I then have a better picture in my mind of what really needs work. I'll just be adding to the list of course, but I bet I see a few improvements too! Fingers crossed anyway!

OK...NOW for my plan. Let me know what you guys think! I have found a sire for Ozzie. He is also an AngloArab and is...drum roll please.... Jackson's full-blooded brother, Bugsy! I have recently been in contact with Bugsy's owner and she does dressage with him and shows locally. She says he is very mellow and sweet. He also has a red rating with the American Warmblood society, which is an honor, considering he's not, a-hem, a Warmblood. But really. How cool would it be to have a family member of Jackson's in my little horsey circle? I have been in touch with Bugsy's owner and she said she would be up for it...now I have to work on Lorri. She has had lots of babies, started them and trained them..Ozzie being one of them. She also has Kite whom I think she may want to breed more than she does Oz...Kite is a Polish Warmblood/Arab cross. I love how much more filled out Bugsy is than Jackson, I think mainly due to the fact that Bugsy is a stallion. But the face is like looking into Jackson's....



Bugsy standing for the American Warmblood Society where he got a red rating...