charlie thee stallion

Oooooh my goodness, the fall friskies roared in this past weekend. In a big way. And guys, Spooky Charlie is a sight to behold, lemme tell ya. 

there's something about late fall / early winter's austere landscape that i just love <3

Add in the #FreshClip plus a wind gusting directly up Charlie's butt.... And, yea haha. Excitement abounded!

grateful that charlie's clip distinguishes him from twinsy iggy. esp since iggy's ears are too small to see from a distance LOL

First of all -- the construction happening on one of the farm's oldest buildings (right outside Charlie's barn!) is definitely not helping. Homeboy is straight up convinced that they must certainly be building some manner of equine crematorium up in there. 

always together <3 <3 missed literally every single nose to nose shot tho... sorry!

Which.... Is challenging, because poor long-suffering Charlie has to walk past that very same construction site every time he goes to and from his field.... or up to the rings.... or, ya know, like... anywhere haha. 

oh. my. gawd. sir, rly? also.... how is it still SO GREEN?!?

And not coincidentally, on the weekends when we can actually be at the farm during daylight, **everywhere** is exactly where I want to go lol. 

how the fuck does a CLIPPED horse get this filthy?!?

But ya know, it's ok haha. Spooky Charlie is still like.... Charlie, ya know? His patented go-to spook move is to just stop and stare and become very very tall, periscope-up style. Naturally, with his heart pounding straight through the saddle flaps. 

And when he's very very sad about the spook, he'll ask --- pretty please with a cherry on top --- if we could please just turn right the fuck around and leave.

hoof update! november is when we transition from full leather pads to rim pads, before ditching the pads altogether come (wet) winter. that sole doesn't look half bad for having been covered up for six months! fwiw.... i'd personally prefer to always do rim pads, but charlie's farrier feels like they squish out the sides too badly so he doesn't like doing them. tho, he amuses me during what i call "this transition period." and, go figure, the pads really don't squish out much. the farrier does such a nice job on every other aspect of charlie's feet that i'm fine with taking his advice on this part... but maybe one day he'll be like, "yea ok, let's give rim pads a real shot for a while!"

Back in my earliest uninitiated days with Charlie, this moment of frozen-in-ice heart pounding rigidity.... scared the ever loving shit out of me, I'm not gonna lie. 

That's an enormous volume of flight animal sitting under you. You can really just feel the energy coursing through his body, amplified in some massively alarming way by his stillness. 

gosh the colors are pretty, even without a filter <3

But.... Charlie's a very good boy, and so far, has never really opted for a full blown explosion haha. So far. 

Tho, he definitely kinda pushed it this weekend haha. Many random scoots and skitters, much snorting and farting. And one little synchronized spin-bolt move (and I mean that in the absolute gentlest way possible) that I'm positive he and Punky planned in advance lol.... 

Which also naturally left me and Amy giggling at our ridiculous hot blooded goons...

sharing a birthday cupcake -- where charlie's like, "what in the ever loving fresh fuck is this fluffy sweet goodness?!?"
easily my new favorite picture with chuck <3 <3 <3

So ya know. It's been exciting haha <3 

Charlie and I are still plugging away at our hybrid equine/human couch-to-5K fitness schedule --- we're up to like a whopping 8min of full work at this point. And esp in the darkness of weekday evenings.... It's not exactly the most scintillating material haha.

such a good dude, wearing our typical weekday outfit
(illumiseen breast collar - literally EVERYBODY at my farm has one now...)

That's winter for ya! Tho I'm excited that Charlie's feeling so fresh and feisty haha --- he feels like a horse who wants to go running and jumping. Which, not coincidentally, is exactly how I like my horses to feel!

Anyone else dealing with bi-polar, ridiculous animals during this absurd season of change??