Lots of updates

My post shall start off with a whine, I am so fricken tired it isn't funny.  I am sore and exhausted and have both my morning and evenings booked up clear through Friday morning.  Already.  And it is only Monday.  Need me some sleep!  How did I get in this position?

Last week Chip found a staple and thought there wasn't any better place to hold it for me than in his hoof.  That resulted in a week of wrapping, antibiotics and bute.  On Friday he was doing much better so the vet had me stop the antibiotics and wrapping, keeping him on a half gram of bute 2x a day to control any residual swelling.  Saturday he was okay, Sunday he was pretty ouchy so last night I rewrapped his foot with an epsom salt paste and gave him a gram of bute, repeated again this morning.  He is looking better, there isn't any heat or sensitivity but am suspecting an abscess may be forming despite my vigilant attempts at keeping one at bay.  If he isn't better by mid-week I will have the vet come out and take a peek at him.

Saturday was so much fun, I volunteered at the local recognized Horse Trial.  I was a jump judge, sitting in a big field watching horses go over "my" jump and marking down if anyone refused, fell or had issues.  I was paired with a newbie, the father-in-law of someone else and he had tons of questions so I didn't get bored lol.  It was relaxing and entertaining and I had a really good time.  There wasn't any drama or issues at my jump, I had only 4 refusals the entire shift.  It did rain a couple of times but not too badly and I had brought my rain suit so I was prepared.  The only downside is that I really would have preferred to have been stationed at a point where I could see multiple jumps, it was a field behind us and a field in front of us so all I got to see were horses running towards me, a quick jump and horses running away.  Pretty minor complaint in the grand scheme of things. 

After my shift was over at the show I went home and met SO's cousin and we went to the state fair.  It was pretty cool, saw some... interesting... things and watched the demo derby for a couple of heats until a massive thunderstorm moved in and everyone ran home.  I hear the same storm killed 5 people in Indiana at their state fair, it was a very impressive storm.  I was completely thrilled when I got home as I found my boarder cleaned the stalls for me as a surprise.  It was 830p when I finally got home and wasn't looking forward to cleaning stalls, it was such a lovely surprise.

Sunday was a lot of fun as well with lots of networking and such but absolutely exhausting, I had volunteered to be jump crew.  Quick backstory, when I was a teenager I loved to run.  I ran cross country and just loved it.  When I was 16 or 17 I fell wrong and blew my ACL and tore my meniscus.  The doctor refused to fix the ACL in surgery when he cleaned up my meniscus, insisting I had to have a second surgery.  I refused because I had a horrible recovery, almost 10 years later I finally had my ACL and then also the PCL fixed and lost more than half of my meniscus.  As a result I haven't ran since I was a teen, either due to knee instability or (now) trying to save what meniscus I have left.  This year I have started trying to "run" again and can now make it the 300 feet to my mailbox and back without being exhausted. 

Thank goodness I am in condition to run short distances again because that was what I did almost the entire morning on Sunday.  We would set the fences up, a horse would ride the course in 80-90 seconds and at almost every ride a horse would knock a pole and/or entire jump down.  Horse would either finish or stop, I'd run out there with 0-3 other people and we would fix the jumps.  I heard several times that the jump crew was doing a fantastic job and was told personally that the staff appreciated how quick and efficient I was being.  As soon as a pole went down I would jump up and wait for the opportunity to fix the pole.  As a result the owner of the facility, former president and current board member of the local eventing association and a well known trainer in the area now knows my name and face.  I chatted with several people so hopefully people got to know me a little.  I finally left around 1p as the lower levels had started and the need for jump crew had dropped considerably. 

I am very happy with how things have went the past couple of days, though I seriously wish there were a few more hours so I could take a nap.  I am truly exhausted and sore today, though not as sore as I expected with all that running.  By the power and grace of sugar and caffinee I think I can make it through the day but it is going to be hard.  Next Sunday Sinatra has a small, open jumping show so it is riding every morning to hopefully finalize the fixes I have been working on.  Hopefully Chip gets sound soon and a couple of hours magically appear so I can take a nap.