Close Call

It has been way too long since I did my last post!  Not a lot has changed at the farm, the horses are pleasantly plump and happy as ever.  The snow has been fun to play in too!  Georgia blends in pretty good since she is so white, but her big doe eyes give her away.

The other day it was -6 with a windchill of -25.  After the wind died down, the horses went outside.  Georgia was so excited to get out there she could hardly contain herself.  After getting her outside into her paddock, she let out a long drawn out neigh, threw her head back and reared!  It was magnificent.  She was feeling great and wanted everyone to know.  I chuckled to myself then turned to go back inside to get the next eager horse.

After chores were done, I went to check on Georgia to see if she needed some more water.  I walked past a fellow farm hand, Charlee, and asked if she had noticed if Georgia's tank needed to be filled, she said yes.  I thought that was strange considering the temperature (Horses don't usually drink a lot of water when it is so cold outside).  Charlee then told me Georgia was laying down in the snow, enjoying herself.  Georgia lays down all the time to soak up the sun so I thought nothing of it.

I walked over to her paddock and noticed Georgia was laying down in the snow, sprawled out like a cat.  I called her name but she didn't respond, she didn't even lift her head to look at me.  I opened her gate and walked in, calling to her softly so I wouldn't scare her if she just didn't hear me the first time.

As I got closer she looked at me with her eyes gleaming, a look of distress was written all over her.  I reached for her halter to encourage her to stand.  She finally stood up but started violently shivering all over.  Charlee had ran inside to get a lead rope and brought it to me right away.  I knew something was wrong when all Georgia wanted to do was climb in my pocket, she's not usually so needy.  I held her close, kissed her forehead and started walking as fast as I could to the barn.

Getting her inside was half the battle, now we had to get her blanket on her to warm her up.  She was all wet from the snow she was laying in, chilled right to her skin.  A look of relief came over her as I draped her with a nice warm blanket.  Luckily the barn manager was still there and was able to help me with Georgia.  She looked at her gums, they were a pale pink color and very dry.  I knew then that Georgia was beginning to colic.  Colic happens in different forms but mainly it is a blockage in their intestines that stops the digestive system.   (For more information on Colic go to http://ecrnw.com/colic.php)

Colic is the number one killer of horses.  It is very serious and action should be taken immediately.
I went right to work, walking Georgia briskly around the indoor arena trying to warm her up.  The blanket she had on trapped the heat she created from walking and her body temperature rose to its normal statues.  After she had stopped shivering, the barn manager came out with some  medication she had on hand to relax the abdominal muscles to relieve some of Georgia's pain.

Georgia ate too much too fast, it could have had a weed or something in it to make her sick but we will never know.  When she didn't feel good, she drank as much water as she could then rolled around because her stomach hurt.  I was lucky to find her, otherwise this could have been a very different story...

Tis the Season... For Stinkers!

If you have every worked in retail, you will appreciate how difficult this time of year is.  The mall parking lot is CRAZY so instead of leaving the standard time to get to work on time, tack on 30 extra minutes or even an hour just in case.

It seems like every customer I encounter has the Christmas Spirit, but I still get some stinkers.  The ones who are stinkers are usually the kind of people who think the world owes them something.

We were so busy last Saturday that it wouldn't surprise me one bit that we sold out of a product.  I had a gentleman call the store around 7 p.m. on Saturday asking to purchase something over the phone.  The product he wanted to buy was sold out... but he INSISTED we still had some in our store because there was NO WAY we could have sold all TWO in 6 hours.  I went on to explain to him it was a very popular product and we have always had trouble keeping them in our store.  Not good enough, he went on and on how he spends so much money at our store and how could we do this to him.  He started naming off random names of people who also spend "thousands" of dollars at our store.

Was he trying to get my sympathy?  There was nothing I could do because we had nothing in stock.  After I calmly told him that one more time he got pretty mad and called me a liar... and some other things... nice huh?  I finally got the chance to look up what store in our district did have the product and asked if he wanted me to give him their phone number.  He did take it, then started explaining why he had gotten so mad.  At that point I was done with him so I gave him the phone number, wished him a happy holiday and got the hell off the phone... I had a handful of calls like that on one of our busiest Saturdays so I was pretty beaten when I got home.   What was the "had to have right now" product??? A Truffle Shaver....

I just wish people would take a breath, relax, and try to enjoy Christmas for once.  SO next time you are shopping and are annoyed with the store or the person helping you... take a breath and kill them with kindness.

You don't know if they just had a stinker and are trying to come back down from the anger adrenaline you get when dealing with a person like that.  You may even brighten their day and help them get back their holiday spirit.

Where is my white winter!?

I love snow.  I want snow!  My pet peeve is when people complain about getting snow or when it is getting "cold"...You live in WISCONSIN!  Get over it.

Everything is better when it snows, the ground is much prettier.

So everyone... Think Snow!  SO we can get rid of the mud and have some fun! WooHoo!

Plus, Georgia is super dirty now because of all the mud... I would like that to change.

Dreaming... useless dreaming

When is it time to give up on your dream.  When you have been rejected twice, three times or fifteen?  What if you have never really given it your best try, really given your dream the fighting chance it deserved.

When does a dream become unrealistic or unreasonable, when someone from the outside looking is says it is?

If someone tells you over and over again that it is impossible, it becomes impossible.  That should make you chase your dream even more.  Push you to chase it down and hold it in your hands so tight so it would never escape you.

Not a lot of people ever catch their dreams... the reasons for that may not be the same but the outcome is.  Broken hearts and broken dreams litter the ground.  The let down is always the same, huge, no matter how big or small the dream was.

So now what, now the the dream has left you in the dust.  You have outgrown your dream, even though you are only 24.  Past your prime, some people say, to have a dream like that.  Its time to find a new one, one that is "realistic" for who you are or where you are in your life.

Thats stupid...the point of having a dream is to make the impossible become possible.

Remember, having hope is different than having a dream.  Even though they walk hand in hand, they are still two very different concepts.

My dream was never to graduate with a bachelors degree or to work my ass off at a store in the mall just so people can assume I am stupid.  The fact is I am smarter than most of the customers who walk through those doors and the only comfort I get from their arrogance is the fact that I know I will be more successful than they ever will be.

It was to have a career that completely revolved around horses.  Some people think that is stupid, that I am just a crazy horse girl.  The truth of the matter is that you need to be tough as nails to be successful in the equine world.  I know I'm tough enough, I just don't have the funds to make it happen.

I altered that dream so I could get married and someday have a family.  I fill the emptiness of never reaching that dream with school, work, and time with my own horse.  Slowly I am realizing I will never really fill that empty feeling with anything but what is suppose to be there, a career with horses.

Its too late now.  I am "too old" to be starting a career as a trainer and I don't have the money to fund that kind of operation.  I've poured too much money into school to back out now... So what now?

School, work, and Georgia will have to be my substitute... My husband will always support me in whatever I want to do but my feeling to do "what is best" will always overcome my overwhelming feeling to follow my dream.

Its not going to happen for me... I can only blame myself.

I guess I will just have to put my whole heart into something I never really wanted, a career that never even crossed my mind until this last year.

My only hope now, not dream, is that my career will help me make enough money so I can feed my need to keep horses in my life.  I will forever Work to Live and will never Live to Work...

Great

Winter Coats

Georgia is getting her winter coat.  She now looks like a dirty marshmallow.

Surprisingly she has stayed out of the mud for the most part unlike ALL the other horses at the farm.

migraines and a fun fact

Migraines are awful.  I currently have one, so this posting will be short and sweet.  I get them all the time and they last for at least 2 days.  I try to function when I have one, but today it was really hard.  I could feel my headache getting worse and worse with every annoying customer that came into the store.

It is starting to get better but that is just because I had to take my hardcore medicine tonight, so my head is in a fog.  I went to go fill my prescription at Walgreens so I could shake this migraine and usually it takes at least 30 min to fill but I think the pharmacist took pity on me and did it right away.

Nothing interesting to write about Georgia tonight.  I didn't get a chance to see her today but I will be out there tomorrow morning when I do chores.


Fun Fact:  The reason firehouses have circular stairways is from the days when the engines were pulled by horses. The horses were stabled on the ground floor and figured out how to walk up straight staircases. 

Blessed are those who are flexible.....

Blessed are those who are flexible, for they will never get bent out of shape...

I thrive on a structures schedule, but that doesn't mean I can't roll with the punches.  Every week I worry about whether or not I will get all  my homework done, whether I will be able to pay all my bills along with the constant worry of the unexpected.

Georgia has had so many unexpected accidents that I get anxious when she hasn't had one for awhile.  She has either gotten cut, pulled a shoe, gotten bit, or has had a terrible allergy attack.  

Having a horse is defiantly an adventure.  The weather plays a huge role every morning we do chores.  Today it was too wet, cold, and windy for them to go outside.  Whenever it is windy outside, horses always act a little more skittish than usual just because they can hear so much going on.  Even though we have an indoor arena the wind still finds its way into the barn and the rain sneaks through the cracks.  As we cleaned the stalls this morning, we let two or three horses into the arena so they could still move around for awhile.

When it was finally Georgia's turn to go play, she was ready.  She has gotten into the habit of shooting out of her stall door to go play, whenever someone opens the door.  I had not witnessed this, but I was told that is how she has been acting.

I walked into her stall, put her halter on and opened the door.  She must behave differently around me because I didn't have a problem with her taking off.  As soon as I let go of her, thats when it happened.  She lunged forward towards the other end of the arena, bucking all the way down.  I though for sure she was going to peel one of her brand new shoes off her front feet.  "Be careful!" I yelled to her, but that didn't slow her down.

She turned the corner to come back towards me at full speed.  At moments like that I am always glad I hashed out an exit route just in case it was necessary.  I jumped into her stall and slid the door shut just enough so she would realize she was way to big to get through.

Being the kind of girl she is, she stopped just in time to blow dirt all over me then looked into my eyes and blow a cloud of air out of her heaving body right in my face.  I couldn't help but laugh out loud because I knew she was playing with me.  Little does she know that I am much more breakable not to mention smaller than her, and she would have crushed me.

Its good to be flexible when you are a horse owner, otherwise your blood pressure would be very high.  There are only two feelings are allowed when your around horses, patience and a sense of humor (and the occasional feeling of overwhelming love ;)  ).