I Guess it’s About Time I Posted Here…

I’ve been doing a lot lately.  Last week, I launched a new website, ReadGoodBooks.com.  It’s a book review site, and I’ve been pretty busy typing them up.  It’s fun though!  I’ve been having a good time on the computer too, since I was able to purchase a Dell Latitude Laptop of my own with Christmas money!  I’ve been wanting a computer ever since I started ScreaminCutie.com a while back.

I’m also learning Web Design right now from W3Schools.com.  It’s all free, and very helpful!  I’ve also been working with The Gold, lunging him and helping my siblings with their balance.  They’ll sit on him bareback while I lunge Gold ’round the round pen.

Recently, while I was doing this, Gold would stop when I hadn’t told him to.  This puzzled me, especially because of the look on his face when he’d stop.  He would turn and “face up” to me, in other words, halt and turn so he was facing me head on.  That’s a good thing, because it means that he’s attentive and obedient to my will.  But he would stop and turn with that attentive and submissive expression on his face when he was disobeying.  It’s easy to tell when he’s trying to be ornery, because of the sullen expression and the way he holds his ears, but he wasn’t doing that.  My first thought was that, since I’ve only just started lunging and have really never done it before, it was my fault, so I paid close attention to what I did and what he did.  I could find no connection between my behavior and his stopping.  I also noticed (though totally unrelated, I thought), that his rope halter’s knot was slowly coming undone, so that it was falling very low in his nose.  The last thing that I noticed was that The Gold was getting breathless faster than usual, and coughing and sneezing as he trotted in the circle.  He would stop and be blowing like a bellows when I came up.  Ridiculous that I didn’t put two and two together, I know.  But finally, I stopped him myself and walked up to look at him.  He was heaving with exertion, very strange for The Gold after just a breezy trot.

Looking at his halter, I said aloud to Bethany, who was riding at the moment, “You know, it looks like his halter is so loose, it’s cutting off his breath through his nose.  See?  When I drop the halter back on his nose, the halter compresses the nostrils down because it’s so low it rests on them,”  so I began to tighten his halter up as Gold stood mildly and waited.

“Well,” said Bethany, “Maybe that’s what he was trying to tell you by stopping like that.”

I stopped and stared at her incredulously, then at Gold, who just looked at me with his great, expressive dark eyes.  “I bet you’re right!” I cried, “Poor Gold!” and I finished tightening his halter.

Lo and behold, as soon as I fixed his halter Gold was stepping out briskly, without blowing and without stopping.  I laughed pretty hard at The Gold’s gentle way of asking me to fix his uncomfortable halter.  LOL LOL LOL!  Smart boy! rofl!