Busy Saturday

Got started early this morning since I needed to head across town to the vet pharmacy for prescription refills for Niki and Ben before they closed at noon.  Took Joey along to fit him with one of those mesh harness things. 

I want to be able to take him with me everywhere possible and I don't want to take any chances that he might back up and pull out of his collar.  These harnesses are a lot more secure -- and they LOOK a lot more comfortable, too.  Everyone at the vet store thought Joey was gorgeous and he definitely enjoyed all the attention!

Then I headed over to the feed store to pick up more horse feed.  Bug has refused to eat the feed I measured out for her.  I added a "senior supplement" that she apparently HATES.   Sigh.  So I'll just feed all those containers to Lizzie, but in the meantime I needed to package up some more feed for Bug without the supplement.  She's sooo picky.

Once I got the feed and shavings off-loaded at the barn, I went over to the stables down the road where Torri takes her lessons with Phineus.  As it turned out, she didn't have a lesson today because she's on call.  But I hung around and watched Nancy, the instructor, give another woman a lesson.  Nancy is obviously a real pro.  I stayed to talk to her about whether she could help Lizzie and me since we are obviously NOT in the same class as the rest of her (dressage) students!  But no problem.  She said she'd be glad to fit us in and that she will do as she does with Torri's Phineus -- that is, she will ride Lizzie first to make sure Lizzie understands what she's supposed to do, then she will help me learn to give her the cues correctly.

While we talked, I mentioned Bug's anhidrosis to her and she said that in addition to the One AC that I already give her, I should go buy the darkest beer or ale I can find and give her one bottle each day for one week!  She said she will probably like the beer just fine, but if not just to put some feed in it so she'll drink it.  Apparently the beer sometimes helps kick in the sweat mechanism again.  Interesting.  I've never heard of that as a treatment before.  Worth a try, though.  Let's see if Bug likes beer better than she likes that supplement!  But if not, I'm sure some of our friends will take care of the leftovers.

Came home and sat down with Joey and put a heat pack on his hip.   They told me at therapy yesterday that he seems to have some fluid accumulation and that I need to give him a heat treatment a couple times a day this week.  It was a little tricky at first, but then he realized that it felt pretty darned good!  And he curled up in my lap and let me hold it on there for a good hour!

About that time it started to thunder like crazy so I headed back over to the barn to bring Bug in from the cattle pen since it's right under a group of oak trees and I don't like her out there when it storms in case a branch comes down.  It was still sunny when I left the house, but by the time I got two miles down the road to the barn it was pouring so hard I could hardly see the road!  Whew!  I got completely drenched bringing Bug inside but she was REALLY happy to get in. 

Then it was back to the house to change into dry clothes.  Then another two hours later and it was time to go feed the horses.  (Talk about a muddy mess over there after all that rain.)  Then home to change into clean clothes AGAIN.   Guess tomorrow it'll be time to do some laundry.  Oh great.  Something to look forward to.