Wanda's 2 Months in Aiken

This past weekend a friend and I made the 10 hour + trip from Fairfax, VA on Friday after work to Aiken, SC (with an overnight pit stop in Florence, SC), and returned on Sunday.

I had originally taken Wanda to Aiken for a few reasons, with the greatest being the fact I have no arena at home and the ground was making it increasingly difficult to ride. Not to mention the fact I had just gotten a new job downtown, and the hour and a half commute to work made it near impossible to get home in time for riding daylight. Wanda and I had been having stops cross-country last year, so I decided it was best to send her to work with Ryan Wood, Jennie Brannigan, and Phillip Dutton, a pretty great threesome of tough event riders. If anyone was going to straighten my mare out, it was going to be them!

I entered Wanda in the Paradise Horse Trials on February 20th with Jennie as the rider (Phillip was unable to take the reins at the time), and she had a chance to compete her at Novice for the first event of Wanda's season. Unfortunately they had a stop xcountry, but Jennie did a great job on the correction and they had a steady finish. I spoke with her after the ride, and we talked about the fact that it is purely a mareish behavioral issue, since Wanda decides to shy left more than 3 strides from the fence. Mares! Jennie assured me she had Wanda's number, and worked with her over fences for a while afterward.

Jennie Brannigan and Wonderbaar, Novice at Paradise Horse Trials 2/20/11


Unfortunately, Wanda became sick with some kind of horsey flu, so she was out about 2 weeks. In that time, Jennie had a horse land on her while schooling and snapped her collarbone, so Ryan took over riding completely.

When Wanda was better, Phillip took her Novice at Pine Top to see if he couldn't work out the kinks. He said she went pretty straight and forward, and they ended 4th. I talked with him for a while and we talked about what I needed to work on with her attitude and how to make her an easier ride xcountry. I've entered her in CDCTA, so hopefully I will be able to try out the new 'shoes' to see how she goes :)

Phillip Dutton on Wonderbaar, Pine Top HT 3/20/11


Saturday I had a great jump lesson with Jennie (she's such a trooper with her broken collarbone!) and Wanda felt fantastic. I'm really looking forward to this competition season. Let's see how it goes!!

Disappointed

In the way a certain organization has been communicating with me about certain things. I am paying a significantly large amount of money from my paycheck each month for a certain service, and that service has not been happening for a few weeks. Today I received a bill for an extra service which was not communicated ahead of time (even though I would have done it anyway), but now that the service is over people are finally communicating with me about the service that already happened. So now I'm extra broke, and extra misinformed, and extra unhappy with the original service I was paying for. End rant. :)

The King's Speech

GO SEE IT!!! NOOWWW!!!! That's all :)

Oh, they're talking about cutting down the language to lower the 'R' rating so youngins can see it. Totally going to ruin the funny parts!! See it quickly! By far the best movie I've seen in a while.

Job & Aiken Adventures

My last update was December 2nd, and boy has a lot gone on since then!

The holidays went without a glitch, and I was lucky to be able to spend Christmas with my family at Millwood this year. Last year I was working in PA, and had to work that morning so I wasn't able to make it in time for the Judy family Christmas.

New Years was by far the best I've ever had. It seems to get talked up so much every year that I end up spending it alone at my house with my own bottle of champagne! (Of course, I usually fall asleep by midnight). This year I was prepared.. with a date! I went ahead and made reservations through OpenTable.com for a place in Arlington called Extra Virgin. We wanted to keep it a pretty low key night since it does seem to get over-hyped, so the plan was to have dinner and return to his apartment to watch the ball drop in NYC. After our AMAZING 4-course meal at Extra Virgin, we decided to stick around the area and ended up hitting a few of the restaurant/bars nearby. Since we were still there by midnight, we ended up at a dive of a place dancing to some goofy music and ordering champagne from a bar to cheers. It ended up being one of those insanely random nights, and we were both exhausted by the end of it!

Post-holidays, I had a few interviews after being recommended to them by my internship job. My first was for an Executive Assistant position at a PAC, and the other was for a Press Assistant position for a House Rep. Unfortunately, I received a callback from the PAC saying they LOVED me, but thought I would hate that job. The House office never called. So, I kept on trucking :)

In January I volunteered at the Republican National Committee Annual Meeting at National Harbor, MD, as a WHIP-runner for (then) Chairman Michael Steele. He was running for re-election, and I thought it would be a great way to get involved in the whole process. It turned out to be SUPER educational, and it was amazing to see how sheisty it can get in politics! It was more interesting because it reminded me of high school elections. Almost a popularity contest at the end of it all. Anyway, Steele didn't win (as you know), Reince Priebus did- my least favorite candidate! Oh well. I was definitely bummed, but it didn't impact me as much as the rest of his team. They were pretty devastated to lose their jobs! Overall, I probably wouldn't do it again, but it was a great learning experience!

Nearing the end of the RNC meeting, I got an email from the PAC. They were interested in interviewing me again for another position with the company, one which they thought I would be perfect for. So I went in, and it was a unanimous decision to hire me on :) Starting January 18th, 2011, I became the Development & Marketing Assistant at a Business PAC in Washington, D.C. My first real life big girl job!! It's been exhausting, but also thrilling to learn new ways of building a department in such an established company. I'm really looking forward to working there!

This past weekend a friend and I loaded Wanda up in the trailer (after my parents and I spent 3 hours in the snow digging out bamboo so we could free the driveway back to the barn!) and drove the 9 hours South to Aiken, South Carolina. I haven't been able to ride Wanda very much since the ground has been so terrible and I've been so busy with work, so I talked the guys at Phillip Dutton's Aiken barn, Red Oak, in to conditioning her for me where the weather is much better! When we arrived there, it was about 65 degrees!! A pretty nice change from the 30 degree weather we've been having here in VA. Wanda was SOOO excited to be there. When I turned her out, she ran off bucking and prancing like a stallion. I hope she's not too much of a handful!!

My friend and I stayed at the Hotel Aiken, which I have ALWAYS wanted to do. It is a historic hotel in the center of the city, so we could just walk downstairs to the super popular bar, the Polo Tavern, and the Hotel Aiken's restaurant, 100 Laurens. We ate at the restaurant, where they only serve Tapas but they're amazing, and met up with all my horsey friends afterward at the Polo Tavern. It was so great to see all the people I worked with last year and it definitely made me miss being there!

Sunday morning we packed up and headed back up toward VA. We made a quick stop in Cary, NC to visit my friend's parents (and his giant rottweiler!). They made us lunch, which was a much-needed rest stop since we were pretty tired of driving, and we got back on the road. We arrived home at about 7:30pm, and  after I made some Easy Mac, I'm pretty sure I fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow!! I slept like an absolute rock. Now it's back to my real life job!!

Morning Excitement

This morning at the barn we had a bit of excitement! I let Wanda & Dublin out in to their field, forgetting I had pinned open a gate on the other side of the paddock because the manure pile is there and they hadn't been allowed out because of the rain these past couple days. So, with Wanda leading, the two went trotting down the gravel driveway towards the house and towards the neighborhood. When I noticed it, I BOOKED it across the field parallel to them on the lane, throwing off my jacket in the process (it was slowing me down!) and intercepted them before the lane opened up to our backyard. Waving my hands in the windmill motion, I deterred them both and then turned back towards the barn. Thinking all had been saved, I shut the gate to the lane and proceeded towards the barn to grab some halters so I could corral them back in to the field. As I turned from the gate, Wanda trotted past me and jumped over the 4 foot gate and back towards the lane. I think I muttered something like "you have GOT to be kidding me". Luckily Dublin's lameness prevented him from making the leap after her, and she missed him too much to continue on, so she turned back and I opened the gate for her. Of course she went trotting right in to the open field, and Dublin stood in the driveway paddock trying to point his back legs at me for about 10 minutes until I gave him the stinkeye. This all happened before 8am and I still made it to work on time :)

Year End Awards

In other news,
Brittanie Hardy & Wonderbaar are Open Novice Champions for the United States Eventing Association Area II!

http://www.usea2.net/competitions/points/190-2010-year-end-points-participant-photos

Brittanie Hardy & Wonderbaar ended 4th for Novice from the United States Equestrian Federation for their zone, and 13th nationally!

What a weekend!

It was an absolute whirlwind of a 4-day weekend, with a super successful ending to a great start.

Fridays I usually don't work so I can get my weekly errands done, so I took the day to get the barn cleaned up and rearranged for winter. Friday night a friend and I went to dinner at the Daily Grill and then to the 10:30pm show at the DC Improv. The comedian's name was Bob Marley, and he is best known for setting the World Record for longest standup comedy. The guy is absolutely hilarious, though I will admit when he first came on stage we were thinking he was a bit out of control! Overall it was an awesome show.

Saturday I had a lesson in the morning with Cathy Fredrickson, and we had an extremely productive lesson working on Wanda's movement and my body position. By the end of the lesson I was feeling much more comfortable with the tools I had to control the horse. Saturday afternoon I went wine tasting with some new friends at Paradise Springs Winery in Clifton, VA. I had never realized there was a winery so close to my house! The wine wasn't my favorite. Plus they only grow one type of grape there, so their red wines are all imported-grapes. Still a fun time. Afterward, I met up with my best girl friend, and we made stops at Fat Tuesdays, Red Lobster, and Patriots Cafe before calling it a night.

Sunday was a relaxing day, and I was able to hang out and watch TV in the morning. Mom and I took a trip to Dover Saddlery to pick up a few horsey things, and I bought a new pair of body clippers to take off some of Wanda's winter coat. When we got home, I gave her a quick bath and trimmed her up as much as I could before it got too dark.

Monday morning I loaded Wanda and mom up in the truck & trailer and drove the 3 hours to True Prospect Farm for a lesson with Phillip Dutton. I hadn't been back there since I stopped working for him in April, so I was a bit nervous! Definitely had no idea what to expect, and was pleasantly surprised. It was awesome to see the old co-workers (Jennie, Ryan, Susanna, Emma, Silva, Sara, Phillip and Evie!) and great to get a one-hour lesson with Phillip for the first time in a few months! He had me working on a lot of the same things Cathy did, and helped me get over our little 'down-bank' issue. We also did a few more complicated x-country obstacles, like a coffin, road-crossing, and prelim log down in to water. I was surprised at how well Wanda adapted to the new questions, and felt so much better about the work I've done this summer. I was definitely not riding well when I left True Prospect last Spring, and finishing this lesson without hearing 'terrible!' or 'do this again' or 'we'll come back to it another day' made it that much more rewarding. I can thank Cathy for that one :)