Some oversight

So, Max and his buddy Oaklee are staying with my trainer for the next week or so while their owners are away on vacation. Hooray for me because Miss El finally got her own place, and it's right down the street from me. I could bike there if I wanted to; I could probably run there if I really wanted to. I took a lesson yesterday because, well, I need her to understand fully what I'm dealing with so that she can better assist me in the long run. Max is full of resistance, and while he does go, we can go better.

Miss El hopped on before me and basically softened him up so that I could be more successful once I got on. I've never been a big fan of letting a trainer ride my horse before I do because it makes me feel like I'm mooching off of someone else's work rather than putting in my own effort . . . but let's be real, I needed her. My version of getting a horse soft is never touching the reins and hoping that they magically understand the concept of contact through me whispering Phillipe Karl quotes into their ears.

Or I have Oaklee do it

When it was my turn to ride, it was a wow moment. Max felt like a completely different ride, mainly because his ears weren't at my eye level. There was suppleness. I like suppleness. It was mainly trot work with some long breaks; the weather has been brutal lately going back and forth between severe thunder storms and uncomfortably high temps. By 9am, it was probably pushing 80 with 0 cloud coverage.

We had some work at the canter, but it's still pretty rough around the edges. Long story short, I need to get my own whip.

"Say what??"

I also got some shots of Sanibel and Fi, which is always nice.