I am mentally drained this week to the point where I’m probably going to take next week off of the blog and social media entirely, so… here’s your pre-Christmas content. It’s the best I can do. Thanks to Anxiety at A for the fodder.
Spooky or Steady:
- For their own sake, not spooky. No one wants a horse to be stressed and worried on a regular basis or have a horse that is reactive and could hurt themselves or a rider. That said, I don’t mind taking a spooky one and making it more steady, which is why I tend to do a lot of desensitizing with my young horses.
Matchy Matchy or Mismatched
- Not really either? I’m not a fan of mismatched but I prefer fairly boring colors, not like… everything pink or turquoise or yellow or whatever. If I had to pick one I guess matchy.
Tall boots or Half chaps
- Tall boots. No contest.
Indoor or outdoor
- Outdoor, always. This is one of myriad reasons why I can’t live somewhere cold.
Bay or chestnut
- A nice rich dark bay is always my favorite.
Hard shell boots or sport medicine boots?
- SMB’s are death traps of heat, hard pass. I wouldn’t really choose hard shell boots either unless they’re well ventilated, but not much is worse to me than SMB’s.
Free Board for a Year or 20k for a shopping spree?
- Easy choice, 20k please. Even that “relatively small” amount of money would be life-changing for me.
Long or short mane or roached mane?
- Short, first choice, roached, second choice. I like having something to grab if I need to but I don’t like how a long mane looks so I’d still pick roached over long.
Lazy or hot horse?
- Hot. I’d prefer them to not be bordering on belligerence, but something responsive to seat and leg that’s light and forward-thinking is always my choice.
Private barn or a boarding barn?
- Private barn, 100%. Way way way 10000000x better than the whole boarding experience.
Create your dream barn or own your dream horse?
- Dream barn, but I did have to sit here and think about it for a second.
Roman nose or dished face?
- Roman. It looks noble to me, I’ve never minded a roman nose. My brain reads dishy as delicate for whatever reason.
Ride an Olympic-level horse or take a lesson with an Olympian?
- Depends entirely on what horse or what rider we’re talking about. I’d kill for a lesson on Tullabeg Flamenco, but I’d also kill for a lesson from Ingrid Klimke. How do you choose?
Own a miniature horse or a donkey?
- Gosh I love mini donkeys but for the sake of practicality and things I could do with it, I guess I’d pick a mini horse.
breedrideevent.com 
Over here straight calling me out on the matchy matchy 😒🙄🙃
🤣🤣
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Hey man, other people are allowed to wear whatever the hell makes them happy and they get no judgment from me. I’m just not inclined to participate lol. I will also not attempt to force them into boring navy and black.. somebody’s gotta buy all that Le Mieux and PS of Sweden shit after all.
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Haha no PSOS here (not my tax bracket) although their turquoise Christmas drop was definitely calling my name! Unfortunately I did a big peacock Ogilvy order right before it dropped so I’m full up on saddle pads 🤣
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My dished-faced Arab definitely LOOKS dainty, but she’s a whole lot tougher than she looks….a recent example, we were whipping in with my hunt, and the hounds took off a direction they were not supposed to go. My horse got caught up in some wire and ripped her leg, shook herself free (meanwhile I’m praying she didn’t nick anything important, eek!), and took off at a gallop after the hounds. I had to tell her to stop so I could check her legs….all she wanted to do was her job in that moment! (She was mostly ok, just ripped off a bunch of skin. Nothing important, but of course I still felt like a terrible human!)
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Agree with you on just about everything, although I prefer a steady eddy and I want a responsive horse, that doesn’t get hot. So, like that ultimate horse that is trained following Littauer – goes the pace/direction I want until given other input.
I like to be ‘coordinated’ rather than matchy-matchy. I hate clashing, but honestly, if my pad doesn’t match what I’m wearing I will notice it, but it won’t bother me. I love me some fun gloves, so while I do look for something that blends, sometimes I just go with whatever (and the black and white skulls go with everything, right?) I do feel silly if every single thing matches.
I have found my dream barn. It is Karlwood. Way to go, Cian O’Connor. It’s a total dream (although I feel bad saying it: I would have bigger turnouts…they only have little grazing corrals.I would want legit pastures and some smaller (1 acre?) turnouts).
I’ve ridden with 2 Olympians (Joe Fargis and Greg Best) and both were AH-mazing experiences. I would probably get yeeted off an olympic level horse anyway. They’d be like, ‘WTF is this?’ and send me flying. I think my steady eddy thinks that more often than not, so I have no hope on the olypmic horse. Know your lane. 😀
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Agreed on most things…except I love my half chaps and paddock boots. Probably because I’ve never truly had a pair of tall boots fit me well and I’m too poor for custom.
And I really want a mini donk. Those ears.
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