chairlift lad

Happy Friday, y'all!! Hope you're looking forward to a fun and festive New Years weekend!! I know I am :)

furious charles is furious

Anyway, tho, this isn't a fun or a festive post haha, just a bunch more pictures of Charlie (gradually descending into madness) and his hoof wound (progressively healing). 

things are getting serious now that the staples are out!!!

But ya know. Some of us are into wound pics haha, so here they are! 

furious charles made some poor choices and ended up with a boot full of mud... nbd, tho, we just cleaned it up again

Poor Charles, tho, he's really pretty fed up with his confinement. It doesn't help that our current shipment of hay bales doesn't seem to be super palatable, so it doesn't really occupy his interest even when he's a bit hangry.

released into the indoor to hopefully make better choices but still get his roll in

You might also recall I found a small paddock that wasn't too muddy for Charlie to spend some time in unsupervised. 

cute even when mad <3

Unfortunately... Even tho there's double fence with a broad gap to the next paddock, Charlie took his flirting with barbie dream horse Pride too far, and legitimately destroyed the fence, reducing multiple sections to matchsticks with kicking.... 

oh charles!

Ugh, naughty horse!! We heard the commotion from inside the barn (he'd only been out for like 15min, I was cleaning his stall), and when I ran out to investigate he was prancing around, neck arched like a stallion. Charles!

he's so lonely, he kept trying to make friends with the handsome gelding in the mirrors

Obvi we didn't want to repeat that mistake again, but paddock options are limited right now. And the indoor is nice enough for a roll, but the novelty wears off pretty quickly --- esp without food or neighbors.

helped me wipe dust off the mirrors too!

I tried putting Charlie in the little shetland stud paddock, but he didn't seem super settled out there either, womp.

more hand grazing... it's honestly never enough

Confinement is just so hard for a horse who basically feels completely hale and hearty, and who is generally used to spending half of his life loose in large group turnout.... 

damn tho, doesn't that look good?

But we're getting so so SO close with the wound healing, I just need him to be a little more patient, ya know? 

such a stud haha, at least he didn't kick this particular fence to smithereens!! 

I'm trying to be a little more zen about him getting the foot muddy, tho. Like, I have to change the bandage daily anyway bc his steel shoe wears through the wrap's toe that fast.

charles! this is why we can't have nice things!

So, might as well let him frolic a little bit, and then just change the wrap right after, right? And finally a paddock became available that he hasn't tried to destroy -- tho it's definitely quite a bit muddier.

that's better, hon

Given the horse's increasing misery, tho, we'll take it. And ya know, I also reached out to the vet to ask about whether there might be any advantage to going ahead with his hock injections right at the tail end of this stall rest stint. 

same shit, different day

She agreed that it might be nice to minimize the torture by not requiring Charlie to come back in for stall rest again in the near future. So we set a date for that too, yay!

making progress!

And I ended up buying a few bales of nicer high quality hay from a barn mate so that Charlie wouldn't break my heart crying at me about his sadness every time he sees me lol.

most recent pic

Gotta say, he GREATLY APPRECIATES our efforts at appeasing his appetite with the hay!! Not quite so much appreciation about our clever plans re: the hock injections, tho. 

actual photo sent to the vet. this fucking horse. 

Bc obvi the morning of his planned appointment, he had some new scrapes -- presumably from the rock wall in his stall. The scrapes aren't serious.... but his aim was killer..... 

vet asked for a new angle --- bc, yep, turns out that's the EXACT injection site for his intended hock injections. sir, WHY?

I shot the pics off to the vet bc... Eh, I just kinda had a feeling she wasn't going to want to stick a needle into the joint capsule in such close proximity to fresh wounds. And turns out, she agreed! 

found a super nice leather halter in good condition at the consignment shop. odd name***, but pretty sure charles will eventually need some sort of special motorized chair or conveyance to get around if we don't get his hocks done soon!!! ugh haha 

So. Eh, we canceled the appt and at least managed to save my vet the trip... It's not really a huge deal in the grand scheme of things, and certainly not worth the risk of joint injections going badly. Tho it does mean Charlie will have to do time in his stall again whenever we reschedule lol. 

In the meantime, his heel wound is healing so much better than I expected, and we're hopeful that it'll only be a matter of days before he can go back out again. Cross your fingers for us haha!

It'll feel good to close the books on Charlie's 2023, that's for sure. So ya know, here's to a Happy New Year!!

(***Obvi I googled the name "Chairlift Lad" and turns out he was a fixture on the eventing circuit c.15yrs ago, including running at the same events as my friend Scott and Freebee (remember that lovely retiree**** I got to ride during the Covid lockdown?), and Allison Springer and a young up-and-coming Arthur, AND running at the farm where Charlie lives now! It's a small horse world here in Maryland haha. Rest in peace, Lad, Charlie will wear your lovely halter with pride!)

((****Both Freebee and That Red Horse continue to enjoy their retirement, now down in South Carolina <3 ))