Fencing
This morning was spent at the fencing studio officiating at our first tournament of the season. It wasn’t a huge turnout, but we had enough fencers to make it fun, including Sandy from High Desert Fencing Club in Bend and our newest member, Nan, who just moved her from Tennessee.
David and Jill shared directing duties for AFL Novice foil, David and I shared directing duties for USFA Division 3 epee, and David directed AFL Novice sabre on his own. Results can be found on AskFRED on Monday (if they aren’t already up).
The foil and sabre events were unrated events, but epee was an E1. For epee, we had six veteran fencers and one teenager, which led to a lot of wisecracking. But the big news is that Cristina Ford earned her E10 today by winning the epee event! She has been so close to earning a rating so many times, but today was her day. She fenced really well, too….
I left just as the sabre event was getting going. It sure was nice to not be essential today—a really big change from six years ago when we opened.
Horses
I didn’t have to go catch the boys today, as I got there just as Jenn was getting ready to bring the herd in for the night. Boulder and Bob each got their Freedom Feeders hung up and filled today for suppertime. We hung Boulder’s on the back of his stall door, which has the added benefit of making the door self-closing. We hung Bob’s on the wall. By the time I left the barn, neither of them had eaten from them yet, as they still had hay on the floor.
The boys’ feet continue to recover from their thrush infections. Boulder’s feet showed especially good progress today, with two of them being basically normal. I medicated both of them in-stall today at dinnertime. Boy, was that easy!
In the Department of Fly Masks, I found one big enough for Boulder, at long last. The Cashel draft size mask (biggest they make) fits Boulder nicely. He wasn’t entirely sure about it at first, as I think that was the first time he had worn a fly mask in a long time. I need to get more EquiSpot, though, as fly season isn’t quite over and the freakin’ botflies love Boulder’s feathers (and bot eggs are almost impossible to see on a grey horse).
I spent some quality time with Boulder in his stall. I think we may actually be approaching the expression of some affection from Boulder! After some pleasant chatting about horses with Jenn and Leslie (one of the new boarders), it was time to head home.
