Sly's afternoon activity

Since everything else went berserk with the day, I decided to ride Sly. I should do this way more often, as it is always fun. He is such a sweet boy and God knows, he loves the attention.

He has not been ridden in at least a year, probably more, as this whole year just got away from us and we have been so busy. Needless to say then, this is the first time I have been on him since I started riding his babies. That made it really interesting for me, as I am so fascinated by the similarities among them, and this allowed me to compare them to him, instead of each other.

The most noteworthy thing I noticed is that for all my whining lately about how I have lost my trot, I have not lost it on him. It felt perfectly normal, and even thought there is definite room for improvement, I felt normal and not like I was inches out of the saddle flopping around like I have on the others lately. He also felt to me like a HORSE, instead of the young thing he used to be. He is only 7 now, but he now feels like powerhouse under me, and not just because he is fat as a tick--there is just so much substance there that I never felt with him before. That is similar to what it feels like riding Slygirl---they both just fit me and my legs the right way so I feel more secure on them than I do the boys so far. I guess that is just a matter of our proportions matching, as they all act about the same.

Since we were in the yard, I had to be careful, as we have serious mole issues that I just noticed today and I sure did not need to drop him or Hawk in one of those tracks. I kept the ride short for that reason, but thoroughly enjoyed myself and will try to sneak in some more of them whenever I have a chance.

I do think I will get Jackie over here to give him a massage, and see if that loosens him up in the back a bit. I think he spends too much time breeding without adequate attention to whether it is taking a toll on him. It is easy to overlook because he never complains about anything, but I noticed in all the photos that his tail was up. It is often cocked a little funny, and always has been since he was first started- but there is no reason not to check into it even if he has not complained about any pain anywhere.