Day 17.

01/02/2013

View from Fe's yard, which may become mine after not too long.

Missed my lecture because I was too slow with the pony. It was behaviour and welfare; it wasn't that interesting last week.. Though that's terrible of me: I've missed a lecture and it's still the first week of term. I came back home though, and have applied for a job at Wetherspoons and blogged to my heart's content and, now that I've finished my lunch (making sure to eat properly because I've felt rough of late), I'm going to write up my notes for Equine Exercise Physiology before continuing with my project for Animal Welfare.

That's a weird project. We have to write about a welfare video and analyse it and all this. It's pretty interesting, the sort of thing I'm interested in, but one of the videos is about racing and it's utterly terrible. I mean, seriously. "370 horses are raced to death in the UK each year" (or words to that effect)... Ignore that there are horses that die naturally, especially thoroughbreds - just drop dead; or the horses that die in British Eventing; or horses that are abused through techniques like rollkur (below - hyperflexion of the horse's neck which is unnatural and painful) in dressage, and instead focus on the one aspect of the equestrian world which keeps it afloat, particularly in the UK. There horses are bred to run and they love it. Passionately. You can see it in any horse: put them in a field and tell them they're allowed to gallop and they will have the time of their life, nine times out of ten. Horses have their ears back because they're competitive and it's their equivalent of telling others to back off, essentially. They're not particularly distressed, not more than any runner who wants to win. Of course, they're housed in a way which could seem like it's not right because it's unnatural for the horse, but that's something that a lot of yards address (I'd know, I've worked on a few of them); and after racing, horses often have a fruitful life of being turned out, exercised casually as either stud stallions or happy hackers. Admittedly it is disgraceful that there is so much wasteage in the racing industry, but that is an entirely separate problem from horses dying in races. Horses die in races because the jockeys and they sometimes get it wrong, as anyone would know if they watched any sport. Horse riding is dangerous, as any rider or jockey knows. And because racing is done more often than any other big event, it's not surprising that it has a high death count.
Shape up.

Rollkur

Now that rant's over, I'll just pop in here one of the highlighs of my day (and it's only 2pm).. The boy texted me earlier telling me to leave Nomad's headcollar somewhere easy to find so that he could sort him out for me tomorrow and Sunday morning, and I could have a day off. God bless him, he is unutterably lovely.

Cait.X

Day 16.

31/01/2013

Despite exhaustion, we have a happy Cait; incomiiiiiiiing...!

Genuinely one of the best days of my life.

I woke up in a simply fantastic mood after sharing what had been on my mind for quite some time. Deri took me to the yard then drove to CKs to get us sausage rolls and bacon baps, bless him. Henrik came up to meet Nomad too, though I probably should have warned him about quite how muddy it is at the yard. My bad. He did bring me Norwegian chocolate too, as promised, the utter genius. I've developed something of an addiction to it (I'm eating it now.. it's better than I remember; who knew that was possible?).

Deri came back and amused Henrik while I lunged Shakie for Kelly (she actually thanked me afterwards, I near had a heart attack) then I sold her my roller for a tenner.  Seeing as I paid £15 for roller, lunge line, side reins and cavesson- I'm pretty chuffed! I've spent half of it now. Ha.. I'm a knob end.
Anyway.

Henrik left and I finished off Nomad's stable and whatnot quickly, so by the time I was done we had 2 hours to spare before I had a lecture. Deri decided to show me some more of Wales. We drove towards PJM then turned right, I can't remember where too but it was utterly spectacular. As Deri pointed out, Wales has a fantastic contrast between light and dark most of the time, so it is inexplicably picturesque. He showed me waterfalls, rivers and an old mill house and promised that we'd go back to explore the building. I can't wait.

We came up with random ideas about travelling, where to go, what to do, and that's just within Wales. The things we come up with would truly be amazing... My favourite at the moment is riding through Wales, knocking on a farmer's door and asking them if we could pitch a tent and leave the horse[s] somewhere. It would be unutterably amazing.

He got me back to campus, dropped right outside Llandinam where my lecture was, with 20 minutes to spare before my lecture. I joked that I would be late because I'd get lost, then got lost, which made it much less amusing. Good thing he kicked me out of the car, to be honest.

I had much less fun after the lecture because we did Stats until it was time to see the horse, then came back for lecture, and then did Stats again. On the good side; I won't feel bad about skipping the lecture as it's utter balls; and stats is now completely done. Well, until we get going on the next assignment.

I was completely exhausted and drained by the time I got home: I went straight upstairs and lay down before coming downstairs again so that I could have something to eat (solely because I felt so unhealthy that I felt the need to put something vegetable and tuna related into my system. Neat trick.)
I went to Deri's afterwards and fell asleep on him almost immediately; he realised how serious I was when I said I was tired and immediately insisted that I would get straight into bed. He put a movie on to keep himself amused and I just about made it to the opening credits before falling asleep. Just what the doctor ordered.

Cait.X

Day 15.

30/01/2013

Tired and haggard may not be my best look.

Wednesdays are pretty decent from a timetable perspective. I rock up to the yard for about half 8, have Nomad done by half 9, then toddle onto Penglais so that I can go to lecture. It's my favourite lecture on Wednesdays: Equine Performance Science. It's all about training and how the body reacts to it and everything related, which is amazing! It's exactly what I'm interested in and taught by a lecturer that I really like. Couldn't ask for it to be better!

After that I did Statistics (near done, at last, wahoo) before sorting out Noey and going to bed. Felt like death, so it was a relatively early night... Not early enough, though. I need to give myself a chance before I make myself ill.

But in other news.. I told him today. Yeah, really. I can't believe I did that, but I did. "Walk don't run" has kinda gone out of the window... But I don't think I'll ever forget his reaction.

I caught him completely off guard. He was lying down but snapped his head up and looked at me, right in the eyes, as always. He said it back then lay back down slowly.
"I wasn't expecting that."
Made me smile.

Later I ask him what he's thinking. "I believe you."

I think we're on to something here. I just need to rein it in: I said it when it had been less than a month that we'd been seeing each other. I told myself I wouldn't but I felt like I physically wouldn't be able to hold it in. Sure that's showing something?
We're both in deep. But I think we're in deep on the same boat and it's staying afloat. (Heheh rhymes).
Fingers crossed.
Head first, fearless.

Cait.X

Day 14.

29/01/2013

A Tuesday in paradise. But my flowers died; boo.

I can't remember if I even mentioned the flowers. I got home from Colchester, where I had been with Becca for her birthday, and there were white and red roses waiting on my pillow for me with a note from Deri saying that he had missed me. I loved it. ... May they rest in a flowery type of peace.

Double business in the morning. I didn't realise quite how wrecked I am until I physically couldn't keep my eyes open through this. It's not the most interesting lecture but I usually make a decent effort at some notes... This time I made myself feel sick because I was trying so hard to use sugar to keep me awake, and didn't do much else. After the lecture I went to PJM lounge where I literally fell asleep trying to do Stats. Early night that night.

I think I might need a break.. The Sunday off near missed the mark.

Cait.X

Day 13.

28/01/2013

Ooh, look, Panorama.

I must confess - I actually took this at the same time as the one of Becca yesterday. I've not been in much of a photographic mood, so there's a level of improvisation going on at the moment, it must be said.

Anyway... Lucky 13.


Lectures started again which meant 11 - 5pm with a one hour break.  Luckily we end on Llanbadarn which means that I can go straight up to sort out young Nomad.

He's going to have to move house: I really can't afford Lluest any more. I couldn't to begin with, but I was hoping to have got somewhere with a job by now.

Cait.X

Day 12.

27/01/2013

I tried playing with the settings on my camera. I am yet to discover the point of this one. It's just made me kitchen look almost but not quite backwards.

I spent all day in bed. I read a bit of To Kill A Mockingbird, then cuddled up with the boy, then went downstairs and had a massive fuck off roast.. Then went back to bed. Fantastic day; just what the doctor ordered.

Cait.X

Day 11.

26/01/2013

Dirty socks.

I've been keeping up to date with the photos (mostly), just haven't posted them... Oops. Though I confess, today I didn't take it because I was hungover and grumpy most of the day. Standard Saturday.. (well, sort of. Something tells me I should be doing this differently).

Cait.X