Merry Christmas!

One year of Tucker Bunny! 

Hah this year I am quite behind in Xmas- I didn’t do cookies this year! 

Ian and Gidget last Christmas! 

Face down in the gutter of your love

Wow, this week definitely got derailed. I caught this weird creeping sickness- notably from people on the airplane last week, I’m sure. After I crashed hard this weekend and had to nap instead of run (the horrors!!) I thought I’d licked it. A big NOPE on that front. I came in to work this week and felt distinctly blah and unwell, but shrugged it off because quite frankly the only indicator to me that something wasn’t right was constant light-headedness at the gym. And I can get through that.

Photo is from Global News. This is near my place! 

What I can’t get through? Coming in to work, sweating profusely and feeling light-headed sitting at my desk. Yep that was me yesterday. I was at work for 2 hours, felt just terrible…faint, dizzy, super weak and just like someone had pulled the plug on my body. It was burned out, spent, done. (I really like that saying, my colleague had similar symptoms and she described it that way).

I crept home, sweating and feeling awful.

I then spent the entire day in bed.

I never do that! I can’t even recall the last time I was forced back into bed?? It’s been years I think. I dozed on and off, feeling miserable. Read for awhile, napped, lay there staring at the ceiling. Couldn’t muster the energy to read my phone until about 2pm. Wowza. Gidget was in dog heaven though, her favourite: Daytime sleeping!!

I cancelled my riding lesson (thank god, because I was in no shape to do anything), and as it turns out, it was the right call anyways because there was a terrific windstorm and trees were blowing down right, left and centre! It was nuts!!

So, I guess all things happen for a reason, or at least they did yesterday.

Back at work, and a dentist appointment to greet me in the morning (lovely). My stomach is still funny, but I don’t feel this crushing exhaustion so that’s good! It helps I guess that I spent the entire day in bed yesterday.

Here is hoping this weird sickness goes away!!

Cross you off my list

After completing an arduous three-day week coming back from my holiday (exaggeration obviously), I actually wasn’t feeling well at all. I felt tired, weak, run-down and kind of unwell. This manifested in a Friday of feeling terrible, and a nap (the horrors!!) on Saturday. A nap instead of a run? Wha? In what world do I need to do this? Clearly, I did though.

Tucker is not so sure about what happened this weekend…Crazy windstorm! 

Gidget loved it, she loves naps so much. We got a Christmas tree on Saturday morning before I left for the barn, and they only had 4-5 left, kind of all scrawny rejects, haha. Ours is short, but not scrawny. So, like half a tree? Weird they didn’t have any. I guess there was a Christmas tree shortage this year?

We left the tree to put it up officially on Sunday, and I took it easy with a nap and some baking in preparation for our riding stable’s annual Christmas holiday party. We had a lovely time! I ate wayyy too much good food and we did a gift exchange and I loved my gifts from my secret santa, they were fantastic! (Reese’s clusters, yummm, a new mystery novel that I had actually gotten from the library to read myself but hadn’t yet, and a very cute fox mug ‘For Fox Sake!’).

Oats got Friday off, and then was ridden by moi both Sat/Sun. And he was such a good boy! I feel so glad when I ride him, he’s my favourite. We worked on some flatwork/lateral work on Saturday, and Sunday I decided to do some strength work for me- two point intervals. Good, except that my foot kept slipping wildly out of my stirrup- something was wrong with the grip pad on it. Ugh. I checked the pad after and it looks like it has worn away and is now totally slick? Frick!! It’s actually kind of hazardous now, outright slippery and my foot slips straight out if I try to get leverage on my heels. Shit!

Oh well, Oats was a saint! The weather, not so much. It poured on and off allll day. I packed my run clothes though and out I went! It…kind of sucked. I got soaked. Oh well!

Home time, and we put up our tree and decorated it that evening 🙂

You’ll never get to heaven: Jump lesson recap!

Had my regular jump lesson last night, and not gonna lie, I was dragging ass all day. Turns out I’m probably getting sick, dammit! Had crushing waves of exhaustion in the afternoon and just felt super blahh. I wasn’t really looking forward to my lesson, which bummed me out because I was looking forward to riding Oats on a regular schedule so badly!

Oats says oxers are no biggie! Wish it was summer…

But, I sucked it up and went anyways. And I am so glad that I did. Oats, while not perfect, was a great ‘trier’ and showed me that we can indeed be competent jumpers together even after he has a week off from riding and lessons. Yes!!! And with an audience too! We worked over a circle jump exercise with a x-rail and Oats wasn’t really respecting it…He was making big ‘bids’ at it, to my great annoyance. My legs felt weak and tired, so I was relying more strongly on my heel to anchor, rather than my thigh. Whoops!

We worked on more of a half-halt after kind of a disastrous long spot to a small vertical that almost ended up with Oats’ nose in the dirt. Yikes! And I asked for it! He jumped really flat, and almost bailed. Sheesh.

Jumping a fan jump in the summer- so fun! We literally never got the right spot to it, haha. 

So, I smartened up and rode a better, more ‘bouncy’ canter to the fences rather than asking him for a dumb flat long spot. We then moved to a small course that ended up being quite ‘loopy’ with lots of changing directions and…dun dun dun…OXERS! All the jumps (3) out of 5 were oxers. Gulp?! We started small and then rode the course at 2’6”.

But you know what? We dug deep and just …did it! I felt slightly anxious but more tired, and so I was just ok with riding and not thinking that much, hahah. Oats did get fairly surprised by one jump that went up a bigger oxer, and was like, whaa??? But he figured it out and was a good boy! We did get some awkward spots, nobody’s perfect and I was getting tired, as was Oats. However there were no big crash-and-burns, we didn’t give up, and I just felt so glad with how my pony was, and grateful to have him on my side.

I missed him soooo much, and I just love riding him, being around him. I’m so lucky with my Oats!

Light upon the lake: Mexico vacation update!

Ah yes, I managed to escape the dreary rain/cold/wind of Christmas in Vancouver Island and went to the incredibly hot, beautiful climate of Huatulco Mexico, in the Oxaca province. It was HOT!!! And so so so sunny all day, every day. The sky was this limitless blue, sky blue that went on forever, each day.

We stayed at the Dreams resort, on Tagoluna Bay. There were a few other smaller resorts in that bay, and the area is known for its 7 famous bays, all good for swimming, snorkeling and goofing off.

It was about 30-35 degrees everyday, which meant we didn’t do a ton of walking around/exploring (sooo hot) but we did a lot of swimming, snorkeling and laying under the palapa. The resort was really nice, had 5 different swimming pools, two were adults-only which is awesome and made them much quieter.

The service at the resort was fantastic, the employees were all lovely and nice and super responsive. The food was really good too, I enjoyed sushi TWICE! And steak, ceviche, seafood salad, pasta, guacamole, crickets (yes I ate those too) and really good cotija cheese. Yum!! They also had decent sparkling wine and Baileys too, and made some good margaritas, haha.

So, I ate, drank, swam, snorkeled, paddle-boarded and kayaked for a week. We also went into town twice, to Las Cruceitas. It was smoking hot, holy god. We didn’t last that long in town that’s for sure, it was stifling and about 40 deg. We did buy and drink two coconuts though! Yum.

For an all-inclusive, this was a fabulous option and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to folks, particularly if you’re doing what we did and meeting up with family at the resort. It’s pretty hassel-free, easy way to hang out with family and not want to kill each other by the end of the trip! (wink wink).

🙂

Back to reality, sadly. And basically monsoon season right now too. The bright spot is that I missed Oats like CRAZY!! I couldn’t wait to get back riding. Oh and my husband, dog and bun bun too 😉

A place I’ll always go

I had a lovely weekend, and while it did end up being fairly busy it was also very low-key, which is my favourite! Saturday I rode, cleaned my tack (oh god, it was so gross), chatted with friends and went on a mega long run (so cold, so long). And then went to a friend’s housewarming part- a surprise because I didn’t even know he was back in town! Yay! I’m really happy that he is back, so maybe I might have a running buddy again.

Last winter was very snowy. Maybe this year?

We got back laaaaaaaate from the party, and then on Sunday my husband kindly came to the barn and even got up on old Oats for a ride! I am trying to work more on Oats’ canter-  one of his weakest gaits, and something that I’m trying to address by using lateral work in the canter to strengthen. Mixed results, but each ride he is coming through better, I think.

We rode, and then my husband even rode Oats up the hill back to the barn. Ha, my friends were a bit concerned but Oats was as good as gold and he did fine.

We had our dog with us too, and decided on a nice-but-increasingly chilly walk around Thetis Lake with her.

Back home -brrrr- and I went on a quickie run before dinner, after desperately trying to stave off the magnetic pull of my couch. It only won partially, hahah. Brrr it was cold, and here we are entering a week of deep-freeze, just in time for me to jet set off to Mexico on holidays for a week! Good timing!