Uncategorized · winter

Back in the Saddle

AmandaLeave a comment

Our hideous cold snap finally broke, going from low single digits on Sunday to mid-20s on Monday. It was glorious. It felt like spring. I barely even wanted to put a coat on.

I pulled Tristan’s blankets off and…yeesh. Someone put his several weeks of eating hay to stay warm to good use. He’s 23 this year, and apparently he’s not going to be the type of senior horse that weight melts off. Which is good, I guess! Keep in mind that he gets basically no grain – 1/4 quart, or about a cup and a half – and is fed almost entirely on hay. In the last few weeks, it’s been essentially free choice.

img_1557no really he went up a girth hole. in three weeks.

Since Tris has effectively had three weeks off now, I started Monday and last night with just 30 minutes of work, mostly at the walk. Loads and loads of suppling exercises: asking him to step out smartly and then bend, soften, step into the bridle, take up the bit.

On Monday we did a bazillion leg yields at the walk and then 5 minutes at the trot. Last night, we worked hard on spiraling in and out at the walk, focused on really getting access to his hind end.

img_1559his face says otherwise, but he was actually happy to see me & to get back to work.

The first night back, it was still pretty chilly and people were shoveling snow of the roof, so for Tristan, he was pretty up. He volunteered a few steps of trot and did not want to go into the far corner where the shoveling was happening. He was quite nicely forward in the walk, and relatively – though not catastrophically – tense through his whole body. But that’s it. That’s about as nutty as he gets, even after weeks off. I take that too much for granted sometimes.

img_1569my view when I arrive at the barn after dark. ready for longer days, please.

Tonight, more work at the trot, and then Thursday & Friday it will be into the 40s (!!!) before dropping back for the weekend. I still haven’t clipped, because just when I was getting ready to we had our deep freeze and it was everything we could do to keep them warm. I might clip on Friday, depending on how warm he get for my ride on Thursday.

img_1574despite being fat, he’s still starving. it’s hard to be Tristan.

Somewhat boring, but wow, it felt good to sit in a saddle again on Monday. It always feels like some missing piece of my brain clicks back in place, and I am instantly 20% calmer and happier after a ride when I’ve had a long time off.

cushings · Uncategorized

Pergolide v Prascend

Amanda15 Comments

Longer blog readers will remember that Tristan has Cushing’s disease, or more accurately pituitary pars intermedia dysfunction, PPID. He was diagnosed a number of years ago based on observed symptoms and then a blood test. We started him on 1mg daily of compounded pergolide and he responded beautifully. He’s been on that pergolide for several years now, and is maintaining well. I’ve written regular update posts about that.

Last week, I reached out to my vet to renew Tristan’s pergolide prescription at Wedgewood Pharmacy, since he was running low, and she gave me some bad news.

See, for a long time, the only way to get pergolide was just the way that I was buying it, through a compounding pharmacy. “Compounding” just means that they follow the recipe for mixing up a drug and then make that drug and sell it. The pergolide they were making was actually mixed up for humans and prescribed off-label for horses. As I understand it, the FDA agreed to allow this because there was a demonstrated need.

A few years ago, a company called Boehringer Ingelheim developed, tested, and patented an equine-specific formulation of pergolide. They put it into a pill form and named it Prascend. The new drug offered some good benefits: it could promise a more accurate dosage, in pill form it might be easier to feed, and it had jumped through all the hoops and so on.

Tristan was doing just fine on the compounded pergolide, and I had no intention of moving him to Prascend. It was in the back of my mind but seemingly unnecessary.

Until last week, when my vet filled in the last piece of the puzzle. As soon as Boehringer Ingelheim put Prascend on the market, that meant that technically the off-label use of compounded pergolide was no longer allowed by the FDA. A lot of vets still prescribed it, because it worked just fine and for many, even most horses, there was no medical reason to switch.

But the company has been putting pressure on vet boards to remind vets that they’re technically not supposed to prescribe the compounded pergolide, and my vet has decided that she can no longer prescribe it. I totally support her decision. I adore her and she’s saved Tristan’s life on more than one occasion. Reading through the PPID groups, it seems there is a legal basis to challenge and keep him on the pergolide, but it’s not without risks and is a huge pain, and I don’t want my vet to have to deal with any of that. So he’s switching to Prascend.

Here’s the catch. Of course there’s a catch. I wouldn’t be writing a long-winded blog post if there weren’t a catch.

I was paying $0.55/day to keep Tristan on pergolide. Because Prascend has the market cornered, the cheapest I can find it is $1.75/day. That means an increase from $200 a year to about $640 a year. That’s assuming he stays stable on 1mg a day – which is not a safe assumption. Cushing’s is a progressive disease and it could easily – and probably will – require an increased dosage to keep him happy and healthy.

Horses are expensive, and I got this news literally about two hours after writing my first Finance Friday post and scheduling it. I went through all the stages of grief, and landed on acceptance after a few days.

Tristan gets what he needs, always. That’s not in question. I’ll figure out a way to pay for it. But wow, do I feel kind of sucker punched right now. He was doing fine on the compounded pergolide, and the only reason we have to switch now is because of a drug company’s greed.

blog roundup · Uncategorized

Weekly Blog Roundup for January 6, 2018

AmandaLeave a comment

Welcome to the first blog roundup of 2018!

I would be remiss if I did not start by saying that I’ve added a number of new things to my Etsy shop, and will be adding even more in the next few days such as the lovely bag below.

20180101_164817689_iOS

Thoughts on Art2Ride from The Exquisite Equine
I had never heard of this system, which sounds interesting.

Nashville from The Roaming Rider
PONY FOR CHRISTMAS

2017 Equine Expenditures from Hand Gallop
Useful information & good analysis.

Bobby’s #BestNine2017 from Poor Woman Showing
❤

Living with Horses in the City from Horses and Heels
This post broke my brain.

Teaching “flying” lead changes from Wyvern Oaks
Thinky and practical.

Keeping My Day Job from A Enter Spooking
Congratulations to an awesome blogger and please check this out & consider her if you’re looking for a clinic!

That Time Stan Joined the Army from In Omnia Paratus
This was officially the coolest thing on the horse internet this week.

Paging my blogger friends from Contact
This is an absolutely lovely idea; please go give her feedback. (Creating a regional scholarship.)

Waiting To Ride? A Lesson for A Plus Sized Equestrian from If the Saddle Fits
YES x1000.

don’t believe the hype: too cold to ride? from ‘Fraidy Cat Eventing
One POV on the evergreen debate about winter riding.

Dr. Yates on “How Cold is Too Cold to Ride?” from Cob Jockey
And another POV! Both valuable, both sensible, and not opposed to each other – just different facets of the conversation.

finance friday · Uncategorized

Finance Fridays: Goals and Obstacles

Amanda19 Comments

BelJoeorFinanceFridays

Welcome to the first Finance Friday of 2018!

On the first Friday of each month, I’ll post about horses and finances. Sometimes I’ll write the post; sometimes I’ll invite guests to write. We’ll talk about strategies, challenges, successes, failures, and everything in between.

First, my philosophy. We’re horse people; we know that money is a) scarce and b) can actually buy happiness, in the form of horses. I believe strongly that managing your finances thoughtfully, efficiently, and carefully is an essential part of good horsemanship. The only thing predictable about equine emergencies is that they will happen at some point – and we need to be ready. Being able to cope with unexpected bills – vet, farrier, barn, equipment, training, you name it – is hugely important. It’s really hard! I’m not for a second pretending this is easy or simple. But it’s important.

In this first post, I’d like to set the groundwork for future posts. My hope is that people will participate in their own way. Maybe it’s just reading along; maybe it’s setting some private goals; maybe it’s setting some public goals and blogging on your own. Whatever works for you! I just want us all to come out of 2018 in better shape than we started it.

So, in January, this month of resolutions, I have two questions for you. Your answers will help guide me in planning future posts.

1. What is one financial goal that you want to accomplish in 2018? Do you want a new pair of tall boots? To change your boarding situation? To pay off vet bills? To keep better track of your expenses? To start or top off an emergency fund? No goal is too small or too large!

and

2. What is one obstacle in the way of achieving that goal? Is it a habit that you just can’t break? A mistake you keep making over and over again? An emotional block? A tool or strategy you’re lacking? Try to think beyond “not enough money.”

My answers are below; leave your answers in the comments and/or in your own blog. I’ll read through everything and start planning to try and address our shared goals and obstacles.

So, my answers.

  1. In 2018, I want to top off – and keep topped off – Tristan’s emergency fund at $1,500. Right now, it climbs and falls as bills appear. To keep it as a true, full emergency fund I’ll need to build it to $1,500, keep it there, and start building a cash reserve in my horse-specific checking account to cushion the semi-regular bills.
  2. My obstacle that I need to work past in 2018 is that I have a tendency to count my chickens before they hatch. I anticipate funds coming in, get excited, and have them committed in three different places before they arrive, which means I never quite get ahead. I need better patience, better follow-through, and better record-keeping.

What about you?

winter

Casualties of the Cold Snap

Amanda9 Comments

I’m sure you’ve seen in the news that we’re all under some kind of historically awful cold snap, and I’m sure you’ve seen your friends posting about 10F, GASP. Maybe even single digits?!

Yeah, fuck you all.

I say that as lovingly as possible, but God damn I would probably sell my soul to the devil to be complaining about 10 degrees above zero.

It is so fucking cold.

Of course, my car was in the shop last week and the assholes at the rental company dragged their feet on telling me there were no cars available, so I have been walking to work, about 1.5 miles. A perfectly fine and lovely walk above zero. A miserable, dangerous slog below zero.

Arya would like you to know it will probably never be warm again and also it is hard to pee when your feet hurt just from standing in the snow.

 

Tristan is warm and fat and happy, even if he does have permanent whisker icicles. He is wearing two blankets with a total of 440g of fill, and I dropped off brownies and hot chocolate for the barn staff and I hope to do the same again today, because, fuck. Please refer to the forecast above and look more closely at this coming Saturday, if you have not already.

My bank account is not. Please note, these are two separate thermostats. So add them together to get the true number of hours we’ve had to heat the house. Please also note that we keep the house around 60 degrees when we home and awake, and closer to 55 when we are away or asleep. Yeah.

So, an official list of casualties so far, noting that we are not nearly out of the woods:

  1. Two blanket straps. Brand new blanket straps. When metal gets cold, it just shatters, so all Tris had to do was bump against his stall wall. Maybe more to come.
  2. My eating plan. ALL THE CARBS, RIGHT FUCKING NOW.
  3. My bank account. We got an oil delivery last week. Our propane tank lid was fucking frozen solid to the top of the tank and I had to go out and (CAREFULLY) chip away at the 2″ of ice on it to check and see that yes, we need another propane delivery.
  4. My sanity. My last ride was on Christmas day. Enough said.
  5. My peace and quiet. We had people visiting through New Year’s to ski. It is too cold to ski. So I’ve gone into hosting overdrive.

Please make this stop, universe.

Uncategorized

2017 Goals + Year in Review

Amanda2 Comments

So, 2017. What a year. Someone I know took to describing herself in “Trump-adjusted terms” all year, which is to say: overlaying everything was a thick layer of misery, anxiety, and anger. I caught up with a friend recently who confessed to me that she had spent last January having severe anxiety attacks, when she’d never experienced them before. My year was much the same.

Even without the threat of imminent nuclear devastation and/or spiraling into a dictatorship run by some of the worst human beings on earth (yes, I’m including the fuckfaces who voted for this in that group), 2017 was not my best year.

Tristan got really sick, and right on the heels of that, my dog Arya got really sick. I struggled with finances all year; I’d been on a decent but not great track before that, and then laying out thousands of dollars for that dealt me a blow from which I have just barely recovered. Last week, my car went off a road in a snow squall and spent a week at a body shop, maxing out its deductible. I struggled with an escalating work load at the day job, and felt really guilty for not getting enough done on the house.

That said, some good things happened. I loved writing the Black Stallion review series, and you all seemed to really enjoy reading them! I finally got Tristan out to a dressage show, though never recapped it. When I rode, it went pretty darn well. I got to meet a lot of horse bloggers – in Austin, in Nashville, and Boston. I solidified other friendships I’ve made through horses and blogging, emailing and texting for ideas and advice and fun. I switched the blog over to its own domain, a goal several years in contemplation and several months in execution.

One of the best things was one of the most surprising and rewarding, which was that after many months of planning and thinking (shout out to everyone who tests things for me!) I opened the Etsy shop, which did way better than I expected. After taking a short break for the holidays, I’m back at work today making things to stock it, and I have new products coming soon.

So, with that rambling recap over, I’ll do one last quick goals update.

Horse Goals – original post here

1. Put hands on my horse 5x a week – Some weeks yes. More often than not, no. 😦
2. Be less perfunctory – This was a shitty goal, but
3. Aim toward dressage schooling shows
4. Take more lessons – I started strong and then failed on the back end. Thanks, vet bills.
5. Horse-specific income stream / funding emergency fund –
The Etsy shop will be restocked today. Though it may not look like I made much progress on Tristan’s savings, there was an ebb and flow and I was able to pay for new shoes, two vet visits, and some new equipment and still added to savings in the last few months, so that number actually represents success.
Emergency fund: $4,350/$15,000
Tristan’s savings: $710/$1,500
6. Do more thoughtful work – Terrible goal, past me.
7. Get more media – Started off ok, floundered in the middle of the year, picked up at the end.

Life Goals – original post here

1. Pay off car – DONE!
2. Read 75 books – DONE!
3. Revive history blogs – No. I think I learned through this year that this needs to lay fallow until I feel a real need to pick it up.
4. Do better about food – I did really well until the very last week of the year, so overall this was a huge success. Back at it today.
5. Decorate the house – Nope. I’m not sure I hung anything on the walls at all. Sigh.

2018 goals · Uncategorized

2018 Goals Post

Amanda16 Comments

Previously, I explored a new framework for setting goals. I looked at what three areas of my life would be in five years if everything went well, and laid that out. Here, I’ll set the first signposts on that five year journey: measurable, time-specific goals for 2018.

Horse Goals

1. Take 6 lessons through the year.
2. Ride 3 new-to-me horses.
3. Research 3 different retirement situations.
4. Write retirement budget for Tristan.
5. Reach goals for horse-specific income stream. (Primarily through Etsy shop.)
Stretch: 6. Read and review 12 books about riding on the blog.

Financial Goals

1. Fully fund Tristan’s savings account (to $1,500)
2. 50% fund my overall emergency fund savings account (to $7,500)
3. Track every purchase made in 2018.
4. Create 30 day wait list for any purchase over $25 (excluding groceries & emergencies).
5. Pay off 50% of energy improvement debt.
6. Stretch: 75% fund my overall emergency fund savings account (to $11,250)

House Goals

1. Finish dining room (finish wallpaper, skimcoat lower half, plaster upper half, paint).
2. Finish garage in basement (finish strapping, put up drywall, plaster drywall, paint floor, clean out).
3. Finish upstairs guest bedroom (strip wallpaper, plaster, deal with ceiling, repaint).
4. Develop plan & budget for preserving mud room mural.
5. Build second raised bed, start seedlings indoors, can/process results of garden.
6. Stretch: Finish breakfast nook room (strip wallpaper, plaster, figure out heating, repaint)

I’ll do monthly update posts much as I did last year, and in 2018, I am going to go ahead with my Finance Fridays plan, of posting monthly about some kind of financial horse goal for people to share along in.

I would like very much for this year to go better than the last.

goals

2018 Goals Planning

Amanda8 Comments

I’m thinking ahead about the things I want to accomplish in 2018, and they’re kind of big ones.

Before I set anything down on paper (pixels?) I wanted to go through a process to make sure they were well-defined. See, one of the reasons I struggled with some of my goals in 2017 was that they weren’t specific and measurable. I know darn well that goals have to be both in order to work out, and I STILL didn’t do the right work to think them through.

In thinking through 2018, I relied heavily on this post from The Simple Dollar: Developing a Real Plan for a Better Life.

One of the first things that post suggests you do is to define roles in your life, and write out what your life would be like in those areas in five years if everything goes just as you would hope.

Obviously I have lots of parts to my life, and not all of them are featured here on this blog. For the purposes of this exercise, I’ll write out paragraphs for three: horses, finances, and house projects.

d2846-cimg0299

we were so young and unfashionable and he took off like a bat out of hell about 10 seconds after this picture was taken ❤

Horses

In five years, if everything goes well, I’ll have figured out a retirement situation for Tristan and a way to fund it. He will be 28. I don’t know for sure whether or not he will be retired. If he is, then he will be in that situation; if not, it will be ready and waiting for him. (The more likely version is that he will be retired.) In that vein, I will have plans ready for a new horse: I’ll know what I want, and be ready to buy when the time is right to retire Tris.

In the intervening years, I will have kept Tristan happy, healthy, and going well. I want him to have confirmed First Level movements and be overall strong and supple. I want my own riding skills to be broader and deeper so that I can expand the pool of what I want to look at for my next horse.

I want to have his savings account fully funded, and to have a line of income dedicated to him that either has funded an initial retirement account OR funds it continually. This may be investments, an ongoing business, or some combination of both.

I want to be ready, by the time I get a new horse, to also purchase a new truck and trailer, because the new horse will be an active showing horse.

20171120_215953185_iOS

this went really well in 2017, and I have high hopes for 2018!

Finances

In five years, I’ll have all my emergency funds fully topped off, have fully saved for a new truck and/or new car, and will generally have an overall more stable financial life. In a perfect five years, I will also have our mortgage paid down 50%. (This would represent a perhaps 50% increase over our current paydown rate, which is already accelerated. )

As mentioned above, I will have a developed side line of income that is horse-specific. I’ll have saved enough to make Tristan’s retirement + a new horse a reality.

img_1153

houses are stupid, the end.

House Projects

In five years, the house will be done, and we will be ready to do a major upgrade of some kind.

What do I mean by done? All wallpaper will be removed. All holes will be patched. All short-term projects will be completed. Landscaping will be sorted. Bathrooms will be renovated. Attic will be finished.

In terms of a major upgrade, we’re probably looking at kitchen upgrades, an exterior paint job, new carpet, and potentially some upgrades in the library. I’ll have this list finessed over the coming years, with quotes etc.

So, next step: break these down into their 5 year component parts, and assign specific, measurable, timely goals for 2018.

blog roundup

Weekly Blog Roundup: Saturday, December 23, 2017

AmandaLeave a comment

Short and sweet this week, which has not been the easiest of my life.

Reminder: you can sign up for these links + more in a newsletter that goes out (usually) on Friday afternoons.

Training Progression Of Bast: Part 2, The Early Rides from Guinness on Tap
Pictures! Commentary! Loads to think about!

Quarantine Nightmare! An Excerpt From ‘World-Class Grooming for Horses’ from Eventing Nation
EEEEEEEEEEP. Reading about this is one of those prime opportunities to consider what you would do. I’d like to think I would have been as resourceful and firm.

Power Trimming and Learning to Slow Down (and Reaping Rewards) from In Omnia Paratus
Liz gets double links this week because she knocked it out of the park with two posts that I devoured from top to bottom in happy fascination.

Honoring and Grieving the Past from Clover Ledge Farm
❤ ❤ ❤

HORSE INSURANCE: BUYING from Go Big or Go Home
Suuuuuuuper important and useful.

usea convention notes: level creep from Zen and the Art of Baby Horse Management
This is something I’ve thought about for some time and it’s good to see it in the spotlight at the USEA convention.