What's that? You want to know how we did?

Mwu haha, you will have to wait until tomorrow!  Sort of.  Because an epic weekend requires some epic blogging, and each phase deserves it's own post.  I do have to say that at times it seemed to be a case of, "If it CAN go wrong, it WILL go wrong ..."

Left on Friday afternoon.  After doing this to myself:

"How?" you ask?  Well, DON'T do barn chores in danskos.  I've "fallen off" of them several times, but it's usually just a quick roll of the ankle.  Friday, I was stepping down and "fell off" my shoe.  As my ankle rolled, I heard a loud 'pop':(  Once the numbness wore off and it quit hurting, I held my breath as I flexed my foot.  I could walk fine on it, so I tried to put it out of my mind and get on to Tennessee.

I had to stop and buy a new plug for my trailer wires because the right side brake lights weren't working consistently.  My husband had rigged up an elastic band to hold the plug steady, but the connection was still spotty and the lights were not working more than they were, so I HOPED a new plug was the answer.  It seemed to work great, so continuing north!

As I crossed the state line, I hit some major, major traffic.  Long story short, a 3 hour drive took 5.  Luckily, I'd left 2 hours early, and arrived at Marisa's barn right on time.  We stuffed the truck and trailer with as much STUFF as we could, the Pony self loaded, and off we went!  (I add on the self loading thing to remind myself that horses that DON'T load make life a literal living hell).

We arrived at the KHP somewhere around 10ish and fumbled around in the dark for almost an hour before we figured out where to go, then how to turn the lights on in the barn!  Got the babies settled in then went to the hotel and fell asleep straight away.

Next morning bright and early we arrived at the horsepark ... where I realized I'd LEFT my BREECHES back at the hotel room.  REALLY?  I dropped Marisa off to feed the horses ... and I'd locked his food in my trunk and the key was in the ignition of the truck.  SIGH.  Drove the 6 miles from one exit to the next, got off, didn't think that was right, then promptly got RIGHT back on the interstate and drove 6 miles BACK to the park.  STUPID!  Turned around and drove the 6 miles BACK to the hotel, got off at the same exit, and utalized the GPS to tell my dumba$$ which road to turn on to get back to the hotel.  Sheesh.

Got back to the park about an hour later than I'd wanted, fed Tiki, and walked the xc course.  (I will show the detailed pics in tomorrow's post!)  Feeling faintly ill, I took him to the washracks and bathed him, where I then stepped in a hole and did this:

Wow.  I was feeling pretty dang stupid and hoped this wasn't an indication of the rest of the weekend.  Got Tiki clean, then headed out to the xc course again to sit on a jump and soak up the atmosphere.  I felt the need to bond with the course, to feel it's rhythm, to get a LITTLE confidence.  Not sure how well it worked, but I feel like I had a good idea of where I was going, so back to the barn to braid the muffin!  15 minutes later, muttering to myself, I ripped out the 3 braids I'd managed to complete, and said screw it!  Braids were NOT happening:(  He needs to be drugged with Dormesodan to get his mane pulled, and I don't have any of that.  Boo hiss!  Tacked up, wept with relief that jackets were waived and gleefully pulled on my white tech fabric polo shirt, then up to warm up!

It was the WORST Tiki has ever behaved.  Ever.  He was horrible!  There was rearing, bucking, rapid backing up, and LOTS of cow kicking and cross cantering.  I could not TOUCH him, and he would NOT walk at all.  Not on the buckle, not on contact, he wouldn't walk.  I've NEVER felt him like that, it scared me a little.  When he backed up, it was such a rapid backing that he almost fell down.  Not good!  I trotted until he quit feeling like he was trying to kill me.  Cantered on an 8m circle for about half a  lap each direction, then called it good.  Walked down to the ring and had a moment of blind panic that I'd forgotten the dressage test.  Sheesh.  As the horse in front of me walked out, I was trotting small circles in front of the ring and I thought I heard the bell.  Maybe?  Did I?  I was watching for the judge to stick the bell out the window to ring it.  Did she?  I don't think so!  HOW long do I have after the bell to get in the ring?  I COULDN'T get eliminated in DRESSAGE, how embarrassing!  Just as I'd decided to bite the bullet and go on into the ring, she stuck the bell out the window and rang it.  WHEW, bullet dodged.  He drifted left on the center line, then proceeded to put in a dretty dang decent test.  It was tense, it was a little dodgy, but it was accurate and after the salute I really did feel ok about it, ESPECIALLY considering how bad the warm up was.  As I put him in his stall to untack him, I checked my phone where my 2 friends had already texted me to say GOOD JOB!  I was like, "huh?"  Turns out we'd received a score of 38.5.  FIRST GOAL ACHIEVED!!!!  Dressage score in the 30's!  I was stoked, SO excited:)  At the end of dressage, we were tied for 8th.  That's ribbon worthy!  To be continued ...