C-Horse Event Team: bionic flash and his friend andrew

World's worst blogger award goes to - ME!

But in an effort to regain my blogging passion, I'm moving past my guilt and on to bigger and better topics! I keep coming across topics that I think, man, I need to blog about that, but alas, I sit down at the end of a day, and fail to open my computer, and instead I fall asleep on the couch watching my favorite obsession, Newsroom.

So today, I'm kicking off a morning of rescheduled lessons by tapping out an entry before noon, thus unleashing my morning creativity burst.
(momentary pause to fuel up on PB&J, cause typing two paragraph's is hard work!)

So, although I have millions of updates to give and opinions to spout about, I"m going to start with a little Flashy-pants update.

Flash started the season a little bit late due to a heal injury that he, of course, healed wickedly fast like the little bionic horse that he is. :) He was 5th (I think) at LongLeaf in the Novice, won a couple of MacNair's CTs, scored a freaking 16.5 (and finished on it!) at the starter HT, and ran around the tough novice in Maryland with just a little look at the ditch for an otherwise amazing event.

Somewhere in that schedule, Flash came in with a bit of a swollen leg. A few days of ice and hacking and it was as good as new.

The vet had a suspicion that he's actually broken his splint bone and it might be time for a trip to the vet school. I just knew that he was going to be a terror up there - equivalent of a bull in a China shop, only this china shop involves millions of dollars of tech equipment and fragile vet students.

Just getting to the vet school involved a bit of an exercise in patience and creative driving as my truck (Big Booty Judy) got stuck in the driveway at the barn. Flashy then got to travel in style as the only horse in the 5 horse slant load.

From the get-go Flash had everyone bombuselled into thinking he was sweet and innocent. He didn't even run over the vet student during his lameness exam jogs! And not one high kick to show them his hidden talents. We are very lucky to have the NC State Vet School so close and the wonderful doctors there. Even if Redding did give me a hard time about riding a little horse. Kind of was hoping Flash would give him a good strike at that point. :)

As you would expect with a bionic horse, he was a star in recovery - as if someone said, "hey Flash, if you get up really nicely and poop, you get a yummy mash and dinner on time", and so he did just that. I was lucky to have a lot of students and friends who were around him all day and I'd get a bunch of updates throughout of how awesome he was doing - only when I showed up, he'd act like his world was coming to an end and he didn't know if he was going to live through the next hour. I guess he might be a little bit of a momma's boy. Pretty soon he perked up and embraced the spoiled lifestyle that he was getting though - and took to posing for pictures.

Once he got back to Wynnscott, his good behavior continued, and recovery went by the books - two weeks of stall rest with only hand grazing. Two weeks of hand walks, and then eased back into undersaddle work and full turnout. He spent his days perfecting the art of destroying stall toys and convincing everyone at the barn that he was having a severe treat deficiency, cured only by a handful of the good stuff located in a bucket right outside his stall.

During Flash's stall rest time, we started to notice a particular toad who toiled away the hours sitting in front of Flash's stall watching him (and eating the flies on the stall grate). We, naturally, named the frog Andrew and start chronicling his adventures.