Aside from running myself over with my car, I did have some great fun this weekend when awesome blogger friend Tracy from Fly On Over came to Austin for vacation!  Now I’m not sure you’re aware, but no trip to the Lone Star state is complete without a visit to nerd horse and yours truly.  Lucky for me, Tracy and her awesome husband agreed to trek outside of Austin for a bit of a horsey adventure.

When I finally managed to back out of my driveway while keeping all car doors attached, I picked up Tracy and hubby to start with a pre-ride brunch at Threadgills.  This was partially because I wanted to make up for all the transportation drama the day before, partially because husbands always enjoy horse outings more when they’re not hungry and partially because I have a deep rooted love of garlic cheese grits.  Anyway, there is no photographic proof of brunch so I’ll just move right along.

After grits, we headed to the barn.  I’d like to say that Tracy is just as fun, bubbly and awesome as she appears to be on the internet.  I had a great time chatting on the way to greet my pony, who I hadn’t seen in a week due to rain/weather/work events/tearing my car door off.

So while I told Tracy that she wouldn’t be the first person to ride Simon in over a week, I did say that she’d be the second.  I knew my ponykins wouldn’t do anything naughty like buck or take off, but I was hoping he wasn’t going to start off as freshy McFresherson.

I shouldn’t have worried.

Folks, let me be the first to tell you that Tracy is a much better rider than she gives herself credit for on her blog.  Many of us are adult amateurs who have things to work on, but she did a really nice job hacking my quite sensitive horse who basically had a week off.

Simon kind of has two trots – a “la la la happy hunter” slow trot and a more engaged, dressagy trot.  Tracy and Simon stayed in happy hunter land for a few laps, and then she got him to engage and round a bit more.  Awesome!

Then I was all “canter!  canter!” except I forgot to warn her that his trot to canter transitions are less than desirable.  Whoops me.

After they cantered each way, we chatted a bit about my creature.  How he takes more leg than she thought (true), how he likes go to at the canter (also true) and how he almost wants you to hold him up at the canter, but they gets heavy and quick if you aren’t soft (true true).  Tracy was all “This is fun!” and I was all “Okay now we will jump all the things.”

She said sure, she would jump the small things.  I nodded but thought, ‘Nah we’ll jump all the things she just doesn’t know it yet’.

We started with trotting the micro logs.

Simon was all “ooo this is getting interesting” and Tracy wasn’t screaming stop yet, so I was like ‘go canter bigger logs.’

Which, let me tell you, Tracy has a much better eye than I do.  She didn’t miss a single distance on Simon.  Me?  I feel like I miss distances each ride on him… multiple times.

After all the small to medium size jumps were achieved, we chatted some about the nerd horse.  How much he likes jumping.  How he locks onto things.  How he is pretty adjustable and listened to her.  At this point, Tracy still didn’t seem terrified and Simon was like a small kid excited for new toys so I said, “Let’s jump the bigger jumps”.

And they did.

And it was awesome.

After all this success, we took this person for L. Williams to quell the rumors that we are the same person.

See internet?  Two people.  I promise!

Sunday at the barn with Tracy was definitely the bright spot on my weekend.  So glad we got to meet and I could the joy of jumping the nerd horse!

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