CAMELOT: A Journey- The Beginning of Time

Uh oh. Penis.

Ok. I can't even. I am so so tired. You don't even know. I am going to try and tell you, I haven't even caught up on my recaps, but I figure I better get this out there because CAMELOT.

Ok Bacon. Let's do this.

We had a crew of five horses, four riders, one husband, and three dogs headed out to California early on Wednesday morning. We weren't totally sure how long the drive would take but we estimated it would be around 10 hours. It ended up being about 11.5 hours. The lead truck spent a good chunk of time in first gear through some of Donner Pass, had a brief period of brake anger, a gas emergency, and then we arrived. It took a while to get everyone situated, but the ponies looked content when we left them to get our camp set up.

Maybe if I was less tense in my back, my horse would be less tense in hers?

When we came back, Bacon decided she was no longer calm or happy in her stall. I was trying to hang her grain bucket when she blew past me and bulldozed through her wooden stall door into the night. She ran wild and free, knocking down a panel and hitting her legs on things in the blackness while we tried to catch her feral ass. I was less than amused, but we snagged her. Images of her breaking free danced in my brain as I tried to fall asleep. Around 3am, it started to pour and I shot awake. Being a light sleeper, I was never able to fall back asleep and pouted when I wandered over to our now completely soaked stalls. Bacon was standing in a puddle and was soaked across her back. So much for having a covered stall. The California sun is an asshole to tent top covers, I am guessing.

We canter coming up here, right?

There was not much we could do that morning except dig trenches, so we all went to see Wonder Woman. After that, we bought some mulch for the front of our stalls and headed back to the venue. Fortunately, it had stopped raining, so we got ready to hop on. Bacon was banging her knees so hard into the wooden door from weaving that I had to put her hobbles on. A little later, while I was in the dog pen, I heard "LOOSE HORSE" and knew it was mine. Sure enough, there goes Bacon trotting past me. With one hobble undone. She had somehow managed to get the metal hinge off of the door and undue her hobble and escape. What the crap. The horse next to her managed to get the whole wooden door off of its hinge. They must have been plotting.

Ok, Try not to mess this up Alyssa!

I hopped on for a brief ride and was actually really pleased with the horse under me. I rode her in a waterford pelham without the chain to see if it might work for cross country, but she was waaaaay too heavy in the arena, let alone out galloping at jumps. Still, I thought the ride was a fluke, shook my head, and put her away. I was hoping maybe dressage day would be the same, but wasn't expecting it. The next morning rolled around, a little more rain, and a quick little lunge set our prep for our test. She was a bit more tense than the previous day, but still willing and listening on the lunge, and fairly quiet to tack. Hmmm.

Use that big ol' butt

I hopped on and hoped I wouldn't forget my test. This was our move up to Training, and I was feeling the butterflies. The horse I got on though was chill, able to walk on a loose rein, and ready to go to work when asked. We could bend some, canter politely and even lengthen the canter and bring it back when asked. You know, all things I needed for my test. But these were all things that weren't happening currently for whatever reason at home, so I was floored that I was getting them at a show! We were able to go in early, so I did. The footing was quite uneven and sloppy, so I tried to be conservative with everything. Plus, I was still riding conservatively to try and not piss her off (which happened a lot at the Spokane HT). I haven't quite gotten to that recap for you yet. Spoiler: it was NOT good.

This was our impression of a stretchy trot. Ack.

And our lengthen. Whoopsie.

There is much MUCH to be improved on in our test. But we had no head flipping, balking, total bracing, and I was able to actually ride here and there through it. So, that was kind of cool. I had the most relaxed horse I have ever had for any test. We have NO lengthenings and we had no stretchy trot to be seen, but that is alright. We can work on that. We came out of our test with a 34.3 and a big smile and lots of pats for a very very good girl. And high fives from three awesome bloggers (more about them later)! At least dressage was off on the right foot!

Good good girl!

Look at all of us! Just look!

All the Recaps: Go to a Horse Show, Get a Dog

The face of trouble.

When I knew I had limited time with Moo, I started occupying my mind with other thoughts to help get me through the difficult weeks I had ahead. Some people can't get new friends right away (I was like that when I lost my gelding) but I couldn't bare walking into the house and seeing just Meaty's sad face staring back at me. I knew I either wanted to rescue or wanted to get a pup from a reputable breeder.

The puppy picture I saw!

My worry with getting a rescue is not knowing what the breeding is. There is a big problem with backyard breeders in all breeds, but especially with Great Danes. Mostly because people think "Hey, I have a Great Dane, I should breed it" and don't do any research on possible health conditions, compare their dog to the breed standard, and they whole fad with creating rare colors is all too appealing. One of these issues is when people breed merle dogs, thus creating double merle pups. These dogs are severely disabled and often blind and/or deaf with many other ailments, and often don't live long. In our valley alone in just the past 8 months, random people thought it was a good idea to breed their shouldn't-be-bred dogs and added 75 FREAKING PUPPIES. And those are just the ones we know of. That is 75 Great Danes that came from parents that weren't health tested (I asked and was ignored or got yelled at for asking) and are creating dogs that are taking steps away from the breed.

This one too! Just look at that face.

Sorry, I got a little side tracked there. Can you tell I am a little passionate about this crap? Anyway...

I checked our rescues in the North West region. They had some lovely dogs, but none that were going to quite work in our family. We are quite equipped to take care of a double merle pup, nor could we take on dogs who were not good for livestock or a dog that wasn't good with other dogs. I knew that there weren't any good breeders in the area (that I had come across) and I didn't even know where to start, so I just googled something along the lines of "mantle Great Dane breeders North West" and came across a website that looked promising. Unfortunately, the breeder didn't breed anymore, but she did say that if anyone needed help finding a reputable breeder that she could certainly do that, and that she knew which ones to stay away from as well. Ding ding ding!

Her dad.

Her mom as a puppy.

I sent her an email and she was quick to reply. I had been picturing a mantle male for a loong long time and was hoping that would be what I could find. She replied that she was a little busy getting her mom situated with hospice, but she would help me when she could, and that she did know of one breeder with a female mantle pup that was a little older looking for a home in Spokane, whose contact info she could share if I was interested. Sure, why not. L, the breeder of the female, emailed me with the info of "Rauri", and 11 month old who had been boarding the last three months because she was in the process of selling her home and moving to Florida. I was intrigued, loved the pictures of the pup, but a little worried about the price, as a dog like her tends to go for $1200 or more.

First truck ride with us. Looking terrified and very very skinny.

A new doggy for me!

I asked her more questions about her and told her my situation as well, and also asked about the price, holding my breath. It turned out that she was just really looking for the right home for her and that a price didn't matter, as long as I got her spayed. I was astonished. I can certainly do that and I was planning on it anyway! We ended up having to put Moo down shortly after, and I told her that I would be up there for a horse show in a couple of weeks and could meet her and see if she would be a good match. She was perfectly happy with that, although I wouldn't be meeting her, just the boarder. That was fine with me.

Loves from Blaker

After XC schooling that weekend, we went to go see her. When the boarder pulled her out, I was a little shocked to see how skinny she was. She had informed me that she just bumped her food up to 6 cups, which I thought was a little less than what a growing Dane should be receiving. She also informed me that she had chronic diarrhea. Rauri was cowering behind her, growling and barking at us and I took over her lead. I just kept petting her and gave her a couple treats and she soon stopped. She came with her medical records, a very nice expensive bag of Acana food, and we shoved her into the truck for her first ride sans kennel. Life was going to be a little wild for her that weekend.

This life is fun!

She got to see lots of people, dogs, horses and jumps that weekend. She had to potty on a leash, ride in a truck for 8 hours, learn to sit still and behave, and not potty on things. A dog bed suffered a terrible fate, but other than that, she did really really well and her personality started to come out quite quickly. But she needed a new name. We all sat in the trailer one cold night watching the only channel that came on. Originally, I was going to call my male Dane "Ichabod Dane", but that wasn't going to happen. I knew I liked the Halloween type theme, so I tried names like VooDoo (hubs said no), Elvira (hubs said no), but we sat there scratching our heads. X-Files was playing while we picked up the discussion again, and Dana Scully sauntered onto the screen. Hmmm. Skully...Yep. That will do!

My two neurotic creatures.

So, Skully now keeps us all on our toes. Various things have come to their death because of her (my most expensive paint brush, some shoes, furniture, holes in the yard, more dog beds, etc). She is a Houdini at pulling things into her kennel to destroy. She is also a klepto, and steals things like gloves, pajama pants, hats, and stuffed animals. I am not even sure where she finds most of it. We still have to tape and post her ears for a bit, as they are still floppy from the crop her breeder had done. Had I gotten her when she was a puppy, I would have not opted for a crop. People don't seem to care though, and I have been told that I am an animal abuser, cruel, selfish and that I should cut my own ears off so far. It is discouraging, even though they can see the clearly happy, healthy puppy in front of them.

Two puppers exploring the canyons of Idaho and the Snake River.

Using brother for a better view.

Wat R Dis?

Supermodel. Except for saggy ear.

Skully is stuck to me like glue and has been since she got in our truck. She has gained 15lbs so far, and now has normal poops (yay!) and loves her big brother. He is a little discouraged because he has never met a dog that can defeat him before, but she is so athletic and uses her butt against him. She has been to the pet store, the river, another horse show, and a friend's house. She has learned to sit, down, shake, stay, come, crawl and we are working on spin currently. She will wait patiently for her food with me out of the room until I give her the OK. But we are still working on some separation anxiety, fear of people, and not destroying things. But she has made definite progress. So, here is to future doggy posts with this weirdo in them, and to her helping me heal my heart a little bit too.

Yep, already learning to tolerate my crap.

All the Recaps: Schooling Show in Spokane

Our first show of the year was decided to be the schooling show in Spokane. They offered everything from dressage tests to show jump rounds and cross country schooling on Friday, to a full one day show on Saturday, plus a steeplechase clinic on Sunday. I signed Bacon and I up for xc schooling and a training level show jump round (our first ever) and then the one day. I was nervous, but excited and we rolled on up there with our regular event crew without much issue.

Bacon seemed to enjoy the quiet barn that she got to be stabled in this time. I don't know if it was because she wasn't directly next to all of the parked rigs or if it was the classical music, or Jose the awesome stable hand, but she just seemed all around calmer in the stable. I wish she would have taken that out under the tack. Whenever I would tack her up, or untack her, or graze her, she was as calm as could be. But riding was a different story.

First was xc schooling. The goal was to warm up over some small stuff and then try to tackle some training level questions, since we hope to get there at some point this year. Lord have mercy. I was out in the field first, and all I wanted was for her to go forward. Something she is generally good at. But I had fussing, threats to rear, sideways nonsense and lots and lots of head flipping. I tried to figure out if any of my tack was bothering her, and I just couldn't find anything. I thought she was in heat, but most hos have to work while in heat to, so I kept at it. My friend E finally entered the field and asked if I wanted to try and long trot a lap around the big field to get her mind in the right spot. That seemed to help some, but Bacon did her best to try and rip my arms out of their sockets the whole time.

Bacon, that is the wrong side of the corner!

We popped over some of the smaller stuff. Er, I mean galloped and skipped over it. My attempts at a half halt were either ignored or were the devil and resulted in a tantrum. Maybe the bigger jumps would back her off, I thought. Pah. We strung together a little  training course. E popped over it first. Over the training logs, to the training cabin, over the trakhener, around this training drop log thing into the water with a ditch out and two strides out over a roll top. Have no fear, Bacon doesn't care what the hell I point her at or what she is feeling, she will jump it all. We jumped the water combo a few different times because she continued to haul ass and jump too flat coming in, ignoring me to the ditch and screwing up our distance over the rolltop. Once more over the jump, I used all my strength to SLOW HER ASS DOWN in the water, and we finally had a nice jump out of there. And moved on.

Um, yeah, I think you cleared it horse.

That's better

Dang, my stirrups are long

We played around with the double up bank. And then I went down it. And then made it into an Irish bank. And then jump a skinny prelim house thing for funsies while E schooled her horse. Next we checked out Bacon's chops over the training corner. It was at the top of the hill, where they were also trying to clear out a bunch of debris and trees with multiple construction equipment. Do you think that was a problem for Bacon? No. Neither was jumping the fat side of the corner. Damn horse, it is not a table. Around the back, everything was still bogged down from all of the snow melt, so we skipped that to save legs and land and ended back around to the front.

We came back to the same area that we started and schooled the training level trahkener and brush fence. I let Bacon pick up a little more speed, which I think she thoroughly enjoyed, and then called that good for her because we would be show jumping later that afternoon. She was totally covered in froth and I thought for sure she would be settled down for later. I was wrong. When I got her out again for sj, we basically had free rein of the arena for a good 30 minutes. So we popped around the jumps at novice height first, and then raised them up to training. Horse was blasting through my aids again though, rushing the fences and putting in some very ugly jumps. I was so tired from hanging on for dear life and just trying to get her off of my hand and to use her back end. It was not the pleasant experience I was hoping for.

You are not a mare, are you?

Yeah, this isn't so good.

This is better

The next day was the show. We were signed up for novice. When I got up in the morning to hand graze the Bacon, I saw that her knee was quite large. My heart sunk. She had hit one of the jumps pretty hard the day before, but I did not realize it was with her knee. I took her out and walked and jogged her. She was totally sound. I consulted with those around me about what to do. They said to throw the dressage saddle on early and see what we had. Her knee went down significantly when I rode her and the on site vet did not seem alarmed, so I continued with out dressage test. It was very conservative and tense, but she did all of the right moves in the right spots. I cannot remember my exact score, but I want to say it was probably a 38 or something.  I was fine with that.

First time riding in this saddle. I liked it a lot.

It doesn't fix everything thoug.

I went and iced the pony and tried her out for show jumping. Still totally happy and fine, and a little less exhubherant (finally) than the day prior, but still not great. The course was a little tricky, in that it had a sharp 90 degree left hand turn in one spot, and a one stride to seven stride, but Bacon got it done easily. We quickly got changed for xc and headed out for warm up, minus my watch. I am pretty sure they got my time wrong, as they got a bunch of people's times wrong, but there was no way to protest and it was just a schooling show, so I just shrugged my shoulders at that part. I did my best to pick up speed this time, and Bacon and I had a pretty good xc ride. She was still tossing her head a lot, and speedy at the jumps, but never hesitated at a thing. It is always a good feeling knowing she is going to jump everything.

Cleared this one too

We got 8th overall, but I was happy we made it through the weekend and first show/outing. There was definitely something weird about Bacon, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I thought maybe it was just first outingitis or hormones. I still don't really know. But I know she is a xc machine.

Looking like a marshmallow

All the Recaps: Goodbye My Moo

Oh, how I hate that I have to write this post. I cannot tell you how much I was dreading that day. I had been watching my girl decline over the past year and knew that the last few months of her life were, indeed, her last. I tried to soak up the days, but watching her struggle to get up and to walk were heartbreaking.

My husband kept thinking that she wasn't ready to go. She still had her Moo sparkle in her eye, still ate her food and still tried to make a playful move at you (even though she would fall down). I tried to warn him that I am with her all day long, and that he only sees a snippet of it all. I would have to help her stand up, and sometimes she would fall right back down on the hard surface. She never moved from her spot for fear she would fall. She began to lose control of her bladder and bowels, and never knew it had happened because she couldn't feel anything back there. Her appetite dwindled, even with the addition of all kinds of flavors of canned foods.

Picking up her 90lbs was also hard on me, but I did the best I could. Giving her a bath was especially hard, but was needed frequently because of her accidents. One day, she had an accident in the kitchen, so I was able to put her outside while I cleaned it up before bringing her back in for a bath. When I went to call her in, I did not realize that she had fallen, twisted like a pretzel stuck in the pouring rain. I shrieked and somehow was able to carry her inside. She looked up at me in the tub and I knew that she was ready. I just needed to have Blake on the same page.

I expressed my heartbreaking decision to him and he agreed. I felt sick to my stomach, scheduling her appointment a week from that day. I knew I wanted to take her to the park one last time, so we took her on a sunny day. She struggled to make the short walk to the awakening rose garden. But, she posed beautifully, as she always did. The sun warmed her and she looked happy to be out once more. But by the end of our visit, she was very visibly tired and ready to go back home.

On her last day, I laid on the floor with her until it was time to go. She adored it and wrapped her head around to keep it on my lap. I just didn't want to forgot the feeling of petting her or her soft short fur fluffing through my fingers. Hubs met us at the clinic with a hamburger and a ice cream cone. Never allowed to have people food, she was thoroughly pleased to have these all to herself. She was not able to finish the cone, but that was ok. I was welcomed with hugs from all of my old coworkers and held my girl tight and told her that I loved her. I do believe that she also had some heart issues going on after the procedure happened. She looked at peace, but I kept stroking her arm as hubs and I hugged and bawled. I had forgotten that he had never seen a euthanasia before and I don't think he knew what to expect. But I do believe that was the most I had ever seen him cry, and that does not happen often.

My home still feels empty without her here. I just keep waiting to turn around and see her watchful eye. She always knew when I need a cuddle and she was the best and sneaking a kiss in. Meaty is still sad, too. I did have her cremated and hope to take her ashes up to a mountain meadow to spread them soon. I miss you, my Roxy-Moo.

My flower girl

The best at loving your brother

My smiling runner

My sun soaker

My goat protector

My heavy metal dog

My lounger

My face maker

My girl