This morning was the first inaugural trailer towing with the big orange Bomber, and my first trail ride of 2012! The Bomber towed really well, it’s a real bull dog especially when I’m a good girl and remember to turn it on and warm it up for a good 15-20 minutes before driving it. It’s an older diesel and really doesn’t get warmed up and at full power without a good long idle first. I really need to get the O-rings replaced and will hopefully get that done this week, and I also need to install the radio and speakers and I got for Christmas but that’s a more frivolous need. It’s early yet but so far I really like towing with it.

I decided to let Desire blow off some steam in the arena this morning before heading out the to lake, since she hasn’t been out in almost 3 weeks and is usually so tense in the trailer. I know the logic really doesn’t follow that letting her turn and burn in the arena=calm in the trailer but I figured letting her get some of the kinks would be all to the good for the haul and the ride.

She loaded well but as soon as I started easing forward I could hear her banging around like a nutter and when I hopped out to close the gate behind us I peeked in the window at her and she was all jelly-legged and tap dancing around. *sigh* I literally don’t go over 40 mph on our short cruise to the lake and it just doesn’t seem to matter, 9 times out of 10 she comes out of the trailer a sweaty mess. It seemed like she was hauling quieter in December when I was taking her out multiple times a week but she’s never been great in there. Well, these things take time I suppose. She was never hauled by herself at her previous home and certainly wasn’t hauling in a 2 horse straight load at GETC. I’m going to start wrapping/booting her legs before I put her in though because twice now, including today, she came out of the trailer at home with little cuts on her legs from spazzing around in there.

 The ride itself was good fun, we joined N and her grey mare and we only rode the short 6ish mile loop around the horse camp. It was a good little ride to get her back in trail mode. She’s always in trail mode, really, and could have and would have liked to go farther but with the trailer stress and time off I was more comfortable taking it easy with her today. It was a regular zoo at the trail head as it usually is on weekends; the parking lot was full of trailers and horses and riders of all kinds. We passed a couple of groups out on the loop uneventfully, including the horse trainer gal that sold us our property. Back at the trail head I was letting Desire dry/cool out some and rummaging in my trailer and a couple of young men walked up from the bike trail; one guy saw the Bomber and was elbowing his buddy telling him “you should ask if that’s for sale, that’s the kind of truck you want!” Sorry boys, the big orange is not for sale!

It was so great to get back in the saddle! I’m looking forward to my Specialized Eurolight arriving sometime this month and getting Desire back out on the trail as much as possible with the continuing sunny, mild weather. It’s fantastic riding weather but starting to get worrying for the possibly very dry summer ahead. N and I were talking about the potential for winter to just arrive late and Feb/March/April (May?) possibly being very soggy months..which could easily lead to a very snowy Rides of March..we’re both planning on going but agreed that our attendance is pretty weather dependent. As with so very much to do with horses, we’ll just have to wait and see!

Just checking in, I was missing the blog and feel like I haven’t ridden in forever. A best friend I grew up and went to school with is visiting from the Bay Area this week and we are having a great time catching up and getting out on the town. I WILL be back in the saddle this weekend and am greatly looking forward to it!

Hope everyone rang in the 2012 year with fun and safe festivities! Us wild partying folk at Redheaded Endurance were in bed and snoring away when the neighborhood honkies fired off their arsenals at midnight, or we might have joined in 😉   I don’t have any resolutions, per se, but I am looking forward to my first AERC 50s, my first endurance rides with my mare Desire, and more fun times with my redheaded filly sidekick, Sheza. Oh–and my Specialized saddle arriving sometime in the next few weeks! Can’t wait for that.

No rest for the wicked here, there are chores to be done. Wishing everyone a fun, safe, and successful 2012!

As of yesterday the heater is up and running and the house is warm! A week and a half and $2200 later..still no riding getting done, and possible family/friends visiting this weekend/New Years, but hoping to get back in the saddle soon..

I sure wish I was starting a new post on this blog to glory in my toasty warm house and talk about the ride I went on yesterday. Instead my house is still an ice cave and yesterday was spent sitting around (yet again) waiting for the heater guy. He had assured me, I had assured myself, the difficult parts were done and he would return with the new flue and pop the heater in–viola, the house would be livable again! It was not to be. Heater guy, who I had been planning to give a glowing recommendation but who can now go suck eggs, forgot to check the flue when he picked it up. So he drove 30 minutes to Chico to the supplier, picked it up without checking, drove +- 1hr back to Bangor, put the heater in, went to drop the flue in and……”well..huh…umm…it looks about..12 inches short.”  Calls the supply place, tries to blame it on the new guy who misinformed him that the flue would extend to 140″ inches…while it says on the box, in clear view, “Extends up to 120 inches.” Sure the new guy probably did misinform him, but come the eff on, a heater guy with 25 years experience doesn’t CHECK the part before heading back up into the hills for a day two attempt at a simple heater fix? Apparently not. I really hope he was embarrassed, because he should be. And so, my blog-reading friends, I get to sit around yet another day and wait for him to show, and hope and pray that today we do in fact get heat restored to the house. Or else..

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas with their friends and families. I sure did. My husband finally got home from visiting his family in southern California on Saturday night. He had been gone since Tuesday and I was enjoying all the heating and repair drama by myself. Plus a crowd of animal spectators. Sometimes I think about the great variety of behavior our animals see from us. We spend a great deal of time with all of our animals and they see us at our worst and at our best. You wonder if any of that sinks in, don’t you? Anyhow, it was great to see my (very tired) husband and we had a lovely little Christmas morning in the cozy cabin, wood stove stocked to the brim. I got EXACTLY what I wanted, which was a radio and speakers for the Bomber. I enjoy me some NPR and ipod usage, and not having that option was surprisingly irritating to me. I can only sing to my chihuahua for so long. My trusty husband had the radio and speakers under the tree. He also upgraded our phones, so Redheaded Endurance has officially joined the current technology phase. I went from my basic military grade flip phone to a Samsung Galaxy Something or Other. An Android smart phone. Needless to say I went bonkers on it on the drive over to the coast yesterday. I planned to do the driving since the husband had just gone 800+ miles over the week but he insisted on taking the wheel so I got to veg out on the smart phone. First things first: install free Scrabble and Words with Friends applications. I must confess. I love word games. My family often played the board game Scrabble at nights growing up and I’ve followed it lovingly into the digital age. It’s kinda awesome to have my dorky word game habits available at my fingertips, at lightning speeds. It scares me that my phone is more efficient and capable than my desktop computer at home. But that’s the way things seem to be going!

We had a very nice time at my parent’s house for Christmas dinner and present opening. The gathering consisted of myself, my husband, my sister, her husband, and their 4 kids (new baby in tow!), along with my granny, my step-granny, my brother, and my parents. The only portion of the immediate family missing was my brother and his wife and baby, who were celebrating in their hometown down south. My step-granny hadn’t been to a holiday gathering in years so it was very nice to see her. She has a hard time figuring out where she is and who people are sometimes. I have truly never been around this is an older person before and it was a bit of a shock. She is very healthy and physically well though, which is a blessing. My husband is so good with kids, he was telling riddles to my nieces and nephews and granny was getting in on the action. We had a delicious home-grown roast beef dinner (Yorkshire pudding–heaven!) and an entertaining round of opening presents. I must say my parents instilled the orderly, one person at a time, present unwrapping tradition very strongly in me. It’s so funny to go to Christmas with kids and see the unbridled enthusiasm and impatience. I almost remember that feeling! It was good fun and my husband and I got an awesome awesome present from my brother and his girlfriend: A BBQ! We love to BBQ all summer long our cheesy cheap BBQ is about on it’s last legs. What a fantastic present and we can’t wait to put it use. We had drawn my sister’s kids in the Secret Santa drawing so brought along a little pile of goodies for them. I loved hearing my niece exclaim “Oh it’s JUST what I wanted!” when she opened her doll.

We were supposed to spend the night at my brother’s house but to do so we of course had to pack everything into the car, and then drive right past our turning to head for home. The anxiety dog, aka Wilbur the wiener dog, had barfed and whined his way over to the coast. Now, getting gas, fully packed, on the road, Wilbur and his chihuahua sidekick were peacefully passed out. With freezing nights at home, the heater-less house, all the animals, and already being on the road, we just decided to go for the 4 1/2 hour drive home. We cleared it with my brother and off we went. I wanted to spend some time with my brother but we had a lot to take care of at home and avoiding the holiday traffic and another miserable ride with a whining wiener dog was too tempting. We made it home about 12:45 and mercifully slept in this morning. Now it’s time to do some chores around here, need to get in some more firewood before the possible rain comes. And some day soon..ride?