If you work for me, you should NOT

Tell me you fixed the hotwire, and then leave it to me to see babies walking through the fence---such that they can get hurt by bossy mares and requiring me to find the problem, when it is raining and cold and I have a meeting to get to. That problem is that your "fixing" involved wrapping the hotwire around a steel T-post. Especially if you already had the basics of electric fence explained to you, which should have been unnecessary had you really had the 2.5 years of experiece on a horse farm that you claimed to have. If I am going to spend hours doing the work, why did I just pay you?


You should not fix a ground hog hole by covering it with "straw" (we don't have straw, it was $250/ton alfalfa)--especially after you were told that it required being filled with rock and that your fix was not acceptable. This is especially true if the hole is smack in the middle of a stall.

You should not continue to tell me that you fed Grandpa and Lucky a total of 20 pounds of senior feed a day when we have had one 50-pound bag of it for 14 days. Can you add? I can. I promise. You are not Jesus, you did not split the Senior Feed into multiple bags. If you were and you had, I would never have let go of you.

You should not blatantly tell me that you doctored the eyes of Rock every day when she is not in the house. Really, I am on to that shit. And I, who have owned her for more than 8 years and can handle her like no other, have a fight on my hands every time--so when you say you do it with no halter and no issue--I will believe that when I see that.

Do not tell me you fixed all the fence then let me come home from vacation and find the expensive wood I bought you to do so laying in standing water--and the same corral panels set up at problem points still standing there. That is not fixed sister--that is how Barry fixes it and that is why I hired help in the first place.


Do not get a plan about what to do first---I am the planner here, you need to be the direction follower. When I want your idea of how to handle my animals and my property, I will ask you. And that will happen--it just has not yet. If you are told 14 times to do X first---how bout you do that first?


When told to your face that the stall a newborn cold wet baby was just put into (even though it was NOT the one I told you to put it into and you did it anyway) must be gutted and bedded well before you leave, do not leave me a note saying that you will do it tomorrow. You have cleaned your last stall for me---I gave you a job, emphasized its importance, looked you in the eye and that should be enough---not that I should have to justify my instructions, I should just have to give them, but with all that, there should not be a problem getting it done. I came home to a shivering baby because the stall had not been bedded and the floor was damp. Not cool.


When left a message and a note about for the 100th time that if a stall has a horse in it, it must be cleaned every day--do that. Do not under any circumstances call Barry and tell him you cleaned every stall and when I come to pay you, let me find that the two stalls with mamas and babies have not been touched since the night before when we did them. Beyond that, do not swear you did it---I know Xanadu does not poop 12 times in the hour since you said you did it. I am not the uninformed one here.

Do not tell Madison not-sos about horse behavior--like a resting foot is a warning of a kick. This kid is busting her butt to learn about horses and has a knack for them, we have worked hard at this--this scared her. And is not true. That pisses me off.

I have so many things you should not do when you work for me, but I am running dry right now. So many things are just funny-- like calling horses by the wrong name--Lucky has never been called Grandma, Xanadu's name is not Honeydew, Nita is not Nina, Melody is not Melanie, etc. I realize these things are not that important but when you hear me say their name repeatedly, how quick do you have to be to realize you are saying it wrong?