Monday, February 26, 2018

his majesty's royal dingdom

Yea, he's lame again.

No, it's probably not serious.

Yes, it's a different leg this time.

And no, I'm not amused.

all dressed up and nowhere to go
Backing up a little bit (again). Charlie's abscess blew out Sunday a week ago. And he got his feet done last Tuesday - a full trim and reset all around, replacing the right hind shoe that had been pulled for the abscess, and replacing the left hind shoe that Charlie lost in turnout.

we put him in a "stall" for time out while i jump crewed
By Wednesday evening, he was sound enough for me to hop on for a quick w-t-c ride followed by an easy hack through some fields. Thursday and Friday we schooled some more - nothing intense, and not super long, but good solid to-the-point flat work.

Charlie honestly felt pretty great too. I mean, I couldn't slow him down or steer him, but other than that he felt great. Like it would have been really easy to overdo it if I wasn't careful. I was careful tho and we kept things light and fluffy.

working him out a little bit under saddle first, trying to assess what was up
Saturday we came out dressed for the typical weekly jump lesson with trainer P, complete with our big-boy jump bridle. Tho I honestly wasn't really sure how much we would do, given the horse's recent time off from the nail + abscess (two weeks, not that I'm counting or anything....) and my worries about pushing the hoof before it was fully healed.

plenty of fine steps in there, but enough not-fine steps to bow out from a serious ride
It ended up not really mattering tho, bc after walking around for a while chatting with Brita and half joking about us not doing anything in the ride bc maybe Charlie would be crippled.... Well, we picked up a trot and yea Charlie was lame. Boooooo Charlie, boo.

And naturally Brita confirmed for me that it was the left hind too, as opposed to the right hind of recent nail impalement-turned-abscess fame.

i'm a meanie and made him trot some poles first tho (which he did perfectly fine)
Trainer P arrived in the arena soon after, and we jogged around a little bit for her. Charlie would mostly trot kinda ok, but very very tight. Almost (almost) just felt like his standard stiff weakness behind, except not quite. And he'd be going fine enough, but would then take like four really bad steps in a row.

he got steadily worse tho, sigh
We determined that I would skip any jumping, but maybe try to work him out a little bit on the flat. A little canter, which always improves his trot anyway, a few ground poles to ask him to push a bit more.... And again, he'd be fine but then not fine. And the "not fine" was progressively worsening.

so i just hopped off and parked him at a jump standard to hang out. he honestly seemed happy as a clam lol
Basically, seemed like we had ourselves a pretty classically ouchie hoof. And I mean, it *is* abscess weather out. Plus Charlie had spent a few days unintentionally barefoot on that hoof, and definitely made it sore from constantly resting the other abscessing hoof. So it's not really shocking that maybe his left hind is presenting as bruised or possibly also abscessing.

whoa somebody better go catch that wild loose runaway horse tho..... ugh charlie
It just kinda sucks tho. As it was, I figured I'd at least make myself useful up in the arena. So I hopped off Charlie, loosened his girth, and tucked away all his many loose straps, then parked him in a "stall" made of ground poles at one of the standards so I could help set fences and take video for my friends.

lesson mate C had to go wrangle the runaway lol
Wouldn't ya know Charlie basically stayed put too? He's such a ham, I swear. I'm convinced that he likes being part of the action, likes being up in that ring with all the horses. Especially when the jumping starts and everyone is hanging out in the center while one person jumps at a time.

bella did some wranglin too
He almost acts as if he's just taking a very long break haha. Just hangs out, watches the other horses go. Accepts whatever scratches and pets might come his way from passing grounds people. But otherwise just.... lounges around.

mostly tho, charlie just chilled
Tho naturally after standing around stationary for a while, he was suuuuuuper crippled. As evidenced in the earlier gif. Blargh. Except he walked back to the barn afterward just fine. And also walked out to the field yesterday morning just fine too when I checked on him.

he found my hairnet to be quite entertaining (helmet was hangin on other side of the standard)
In fact, it's entirely possible that it isn't even an abscess or hoof bruise. It's possibly even just some random fungus on a small inconsequential wound Charlie inflicted on himself by somehow (?!?) catching his left hind on the bucket his right hind was soaking in about two weeks ago. Because obviously Charlie would do a thing like that. And now that scab is looking sore and irritated by all the wet mud.

oh charlie. what are we gonna do with you buddy??
Who knows tho, ya know? Like, all I could muster after watching my horse come in from the field fine, walk up to the arena fine, and then quickly devolve into three legged lameness was.... a shrug. Idk. He's lame again. He'll probably be fine. Probably.

And at least this time I had already bowed out of our planned dressage show this past weekend bc he wasn't quite ready after the last abscess. So technically it doesn't count as another missed outing... or does it? Idk I'm losing track.

Charlie, for his part, certainly seems to enjoy playing the part of "pampered pasture pet." Hopefully he doesn't get too used to it tho! C'mon, buddy! We got stuff to do!!

48 comments:

  1. Connect on Charlie there’s running and jumping to do!!

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    1. i keep trying to tell him that, but he's not listening :(

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  2. Oh Charlie... He does seem perfectly happy though...

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    1. he seems wayyyyy too happy. like maybe he enjoys being fussed over and coddled a little bit too much. pretty sure he's too much of a delicate flower to stand up to tough love tho....

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  3. charles. stop this nonsense immediately. especially the crippled gimping.

    maybe he got an abscess in the OTHER foot???

    CADAVER LEGS ALL AROUND

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    1. seriously. i'm about ready to transplant wooden peg legs all around, honestly. not like it would detract much from his current level of fancy anyway lol.... and hey, it might even help! ;P

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  4. Pull it together Charlie! There's helmet cam footage to be made!

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  5. Just one thing after another... C'mon Charlie!!

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    1. there are a lot of vices i can deal with but being constantly crippled is not one of them!

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  6. Irish spent a year trying to cut off one leg or another- I swear to god. I thought I would lose my mind. His step was kind of interesting. I wonder if he has a close nail?

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    1. yea the timing seems right for a close nail, but there is literally ZERO heat in the foot, at all. not ruling it out (you can't rule out literally anything with charlie) but the only actual suspicious thing on the leg is the fungus scab on his poor widdle boo boo on that heal bulb....

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  7. CHARLES. You have THINGS TO JUMP. CIRCLES TO BEND. LADIES TO FLIRT WITH that you can't find at your own barn. Srsly, dude. Buck up and get back out there. Swear its more fun!

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    1. can my people get in touch with your people to schedule a time for you to shout that over the phone directly into charlie's ears plz????

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  8. Aw. I just read that with a sad tone in my head. Get your s*** together Charlie. Get it, put in a backpack. And if you gotta take it some where, take it somewhere, you know, take it to the s*** store and sell it, or put it in the s*** museum. I don't care what you do, you just gotta get it together. Get your s*** together Charlie.

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    1. yes. this. all of this. we've donated enough exhibits to the shit museum to last a lifetime already, c'mon buddy!

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  9. OK Charlie, enough is enough, please get better soon!

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  10. Wow, Charlie's really milking this, isn't he?

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    1. well... that's hard to say. it's a different leg from the nail/abscess injury... so is it still technically milking that? or just starting off again with something new?

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  11. That is pretty cool that he just hung out. Gem would have left. He didn't even bat an eye when the horse jumped right in front of him. Maybe he wants to be a coach? Who knows, it could become a thing! Seriously though, he needs to give you a solid 15 years of no issues after all of this.

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    1. ha he hung out watching horses jump through that grid for a while too - i think he liked being right up in the action. at one point he was playing with the pole resting in the cup and actually wiggling it as horses jumped it haha.... so. ya know. at least he's cute i guess?

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  12. i literally couldn't believe my eyes when i saw this blog post today! LOL BUT NOT LOL! OMG Charles.

    I hope he is better today but this mud. IS SO BAD. I took Remus bell boots off yesterday and told them to leave them off, the mud is rubbing inside and he is getting sores (tiny ones but sores none the less). And his feet will NOT DRY UP because they are always wet. I just feel that my luck is going to run out on my very sound horse with this damn weather). Sending good positive vibes toward Charlie!!

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  13. CHARLIE! Bad Charlie! Ugh, I am so sorry, this sucks. I hope he gets off the struggle bus like yesterday :{ On the flip side, maybe he's telling you he hates the new browband? :P or maybe I should have used some "stay healthy dammit" stones.

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    1. ha well he was great schooling during the week wearing his dressage tack, complete with new browband. it wasn't until he wore his jumping clothes that he was lame, so it must be that he hated that he *wasn't* wearing the new browband lol

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  14. Oh man no way would I do that jump with a loose horse next to it! Even if he was being good.
    I hope this blows over quick and you can get back to riding!

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    1. ha then you would hate cross country schooling with us when we go jumping through a field full of turned out horses!

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    2. Yikes! I pretty much hold my breath just riding next to horses in pasture, hoping they don't decide to play!

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    3. i admit.... sometimes they do decide to play haha. we got a pretty hilarious video of exactly that a few months ago....

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1Q--C7KHwQ

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  15. No Charlie! Don't you know it's about time to start doing all the fun stuff! Ugh. Here's hoping it is something that resolves quickly and easily!

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    1. i'm sure it will resolve just quickly enough for the next thing to befall this poor accident prone poneh..... sigh.

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  16. Charlie, noooo!!! Ugh, this means you can't jump now!

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  17. Charlie, what are you doing mate?! You're missing out on fun things. I hope he gets better real quick.

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    1. thanks i hope so too!! i keep tryin to tell him about all the fun stuff we could be doing, but he seems pretty satisfied to just hang out while the other horses do stuff...

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  18. Awww man. I hope you catch a break soon! :-(

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  19. God dammit Charlie! Quit qorrying your Mom! We're currently dealing with a fat leg and a scab that won't heal and it's SO frustrating with the mud, like I want him out to move around as much as possible, but mud = more leg problems! Spring is right around the corner, yes?

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    1. ugh yea this mud is seriously awful. but of course next up comes all that fresh grass and i'm fully anticipating charlie to start stepping out of his shoes like they're going out of style.....

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  20. :( :( This sucks!! I'm really sorry!

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  21. OMg. CHARLIEEEEEEE
    You do have the best media though for someone who didn't ride in the lesson...

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