Recent Reading: "Riding for the Blue: A Celebration of Horse Shows"

 

Riding for the Blue: A Celebration of Horse Shows

By Cindy Hale

Photographs by Sharon P. Fibelkorn

 

I've had this book for years stashed in the old horse crazy girl stack that seemed more and more a thing of the past, books that seemed like an indulgence that I probably needed to leave behind. But I've had some recent revelations about what was really important in my life and I realized how much I've missed being around horses. Getting back into the saddle has always been something I thought was increasingly unreachable for a number of reasons (for one, the sheer cost of it in L.A.) so that particular realization that I've spent years away from the one thing that was always most important to me growing up was a jolt, hence the refocus.

 

Riding for the Blue is one part gorgeous picture book, and for me, one part nostalgia-fest of the shows I rode in during my younger years. Nothing major, just local stuff, but I still have my ribbons and some horse equipment that I've been unable to part with. Too bad I didn't take the hint sooner, I might be riding right now instead of typing a blog post. This book was published in 2003 and I'm sure shows have changed a lot since then, but even dated, Hale imbues the show life with a love of horses and everything about them, and I got caught up immediately and devoured this in one sitting.

 

Although it's a pretty quick read, Hale covers a lot of ground regarding various types of horses, riders, shows, and everybody involved with them: hunters, jumpers, dressage, western, breed shows, rookie riders, green horses, trainers, judges, show moms, sportsmanship and character building, and much more. Even though showing wasn't a big part of my riding life, it did bring back memories of early mornings, performance jitters, and just the sheer joy of partnering up with a beloved half-ton animal. I also got a kick out of the fact that Hale mentions that over time, blue first-place ribbons will fade to purple, which is ironic because in horse shows purple ribbons denote a seventh-place finish.

 

Cindy Hale is (was?) a long-time contributor to Horse Illustrated magazine (which I recently resubscribed to) and they published the first chapter as an excerpt, which you can read here. 

 

Some of the gorgeous images from the book:

 

 

Look! Up in the sky!

I headed over to Trader Joe's last night (pumpkin cheesecake is back, I'm doomed) and was struck how beautiful the sky was going in, and even more so after I got out of the store and was headed home. We got a few minutes of light rain, which apparently somehow entitled us to a pretty sweet rainbow. Pics from inside the car were taken while at stoplights.

Blue skies, smiling at me...

At the channel, late Thursday afternoon:

 

You so pretty, Marina del Rey 😍

 

Fall in love with the world around you...

Fall in love with the world around you. Fall in love with the sound of birds, with thunderstorms, with the little flowers that grow against odds in random places. Fall in love with the people and places you can build a home in. --Unknown (via wildnsoulss on Instagram)

Scenes from a marina

Went out yesterday to drop off some mail, ended up strolling around part of the marina. I just love looking at the boats.

I also love checking out the boat names. People get really creative.

Dreams Come True

🎶 Just Sit Right Back... 🎶
They even used the Gilligan's Island font!

Rogue Octopus

Socially Distant
A recent purchase, maybe?

The Office
...OF MY DREAMS, AMIRITE?

Someone needed a bigger boat.
What I also thought was funny is that once you've seen a
few bigger ones, the other boats look like wind-up toys. 

Even though live-aboards were banned years ago, apparently actual houseboats are still allowed.

A boat with places to go and people to see:

Words of Wisdom: The Beach

"A beach walk is for stretching your legs and your mind, for looking at life with newfound eyes." --Sandy Gingras

Things are looking up.... :)

Words of Wisdom

"Knowledge isn't free. You have to pay attention." --Richard Feynman

The Scamdemic hits an all-time low

From the Manhattan Village Instagram account:

Just sad.

Missing this

Yep, it's one of those days.

No words, but lots of laughs

Gotta hand it to the Lexington, Kentucky PD - they have a sense of humor about themselves.

A Krispy Kreme trucker escaped without injury when his rig caught fire, but the donuts weren't so lucky, prompting the local PD to take to social media to share their grief over the loss.

Hang in there, fellas.

The next time I talk about moving away from the beach, kick me in the ass please

Thank you.

Oh Christmas Tree: Kings vs. Blues

The Brother and I hit Staples Center last night for the fifth game of our ten-pack.  We were treated to another exciting game as the Kings held on to beat the St. Louis Blues, giving us a record of 4-1 so far this season in games attended.  The past couple of years our beloved boys in black have lost most of the games we've attended, so it's nice not to feel like we're bad luck.  The Kings took a 3-0 lead into the third with two goals from rookie Tyler Toffoli and one from Jarret Stoll.  The Blues scored in the third period, then got another one past Ben Scrivens with about fifteen seconds left after pulling their goalie, however they were unable to tie it up and L.A. took the two points in a game that was nowhere near as close as the score.  We were kind of surprised Sutter didn't put Toffoli out when the Blues net was empty to try and get him a hat trick, but the important thing is that we won, and Toffoli got top star of the game.

Interesting factoid: Hockey players like to give each other nicknames, which are usually just a pretty unimaginative play on their actual names (Brownie, Kopi, Quickie, Cliffy, Cartsy, Kinger, Marty, Mitchie, etc) but Toffoli's teammates in Manchester (the Kings minor league team) bestowed a rather unique one on him: Top Titty.  Heh.  Boys will be boys.

On the opposite end of the fun spectrum there were the three guys sitting behind us who talked nearly non-stop throughout the entire game.  It was kind of weird because they did seem to be into the game, but they would not shut up.  I was tempted to turn around and tell them they were missing a good game.  It seemed more civil than SHUT THE FUCK UP.  I could feel a headache coming on in the third period, but the Kings win tempered that.  Some samples of the obnoxiousness:

• Lots of talk about their work (apparently they all work together) including a discussion about an apparent former co-worker who used to be fat but is now thin and might be coming back to the company.
• One of the guys listing off the countries of origin of most of the Kings roster (including states for a lot of the American players).
• During a break in play, the music played apparently reminded them of an AC/DC song, leading to a discussion of what years various AC/DC albums were released and with which lead singer, along with the observation that, "Those guys are in their sixties now."
• Chatting about going to see an upcoming movie.
• And best of all this comment late in the game: "What happened to the Quick guy?"  That does it.  Turn in your fan cards.

It would have been one thing if the game had been boring, but it was a great game.  Imagine how annoying those guys must be in the office.

In other news, L.A. Live lit up their Christmas tree last night and it is beautiful (and huge):

Very sparkly.  I'd like to have the money spent just on electricity for L.A. Live for just one night.  Season tickets for life.

Our seats this season are right next to the tunnel, however the Droid has proven to be less than adept at catching shots of players striding out onto the ice.  This is pretty much the only one that wasn't a total loss:

Mitchie, Cliffy, Slava.

One of these days I need to dig out my camera and see if I can get some decent shots of the players with that.  In the past I've tried getting shots of them skating and they just move so fast most of the time they're a blur, so I'm not sure if tunnel shots will be any better.  Usually I can get some pretty decent shots with the phone (the picture that I have as my header, for example) but it's just not up to action shots.

All in all, a fun and exciting night at the Stape!

Picpost: Kailua-Kona sunsets

Pretty much every night was like this.

Pic post: Marina del Rey

Beautiful morning in the Marina. This is now my wallpaper and Twitter background.

A controversial win is still a win. Also a win: Our seats last night.

The Brother scored tickets to last night's Kings game vs. Columbus and the seats were beyond awesome.  As much as I liked being center ice, we were in the third row behind goal (just a bit to the left of the goalie), right by the glass, and it was an amazing view.  Add to that a thrilling and controversial finish that saw the Kings finally win a game we were at this season (5th time charm!) and we had a great night at Staples Center!  Final score was 3-2; the recap is here.

We were in the end the Kings defend twice, so The Brother and I spent a large chunk of the evening ooohing and aaahing over Jonathan Quick.  For you non-hockey types who don't know who Quick is, you know that expression, "And on the eighth day, God created ___________"?  Well, Quick is what God created on the eighth day, at least for the Kings and their fans.  He wasn't really challenged by Columbus but as squealing fangirls of Quick and his jedi mind-control goaltending it was enough for us just to be near him.

For reasons I cannot fathom, Dustin Penner was not only in the starting lineup, but also took up space on the power play.  He probably heard me tossing out words like "pylon" and "useless" to describe his play, because he scored a goal right in front of us during the second period, just to be obnoxious.  The appearance of a Penner goal, a rare, almost extinct creature, kind of freaked us out.  We just couldn't wrap our heads around the idea that that just happened.  I don't care if he has a great sense of humor about hurting his back while wolfing down pancakes, the guy has done virtually nothing since we got him from Edmonton last year and I can't wait until he's gone.  Total waste of a spot in the lineup.

Another highlight of the evening was a kid in the row behind us.  He was just a little slip of a thing, but he had a big voice and an even bigger attitude and provided us with non-stop entertainment as he bellowed increasingly vindictive orders at the players like a miniature Mike Keenan.  "Shoot the puck!" and "Fight, fight, fight!" were his favorites (he really, really wanted to see some punches thrown) but my favorite moment was when he singled out Anze Kopitar for abuse.  Kopi had the puck and Future Keenan commanded him (LOUDLY) to shoot it.  Anze disappointed him greatly by passing it instead, prompting the Little Dictator to mockingly wail, "REEEEALLY KOPI????" at him, like Kopitar is some sort of complete moron when it comes to the sport compared to the kid.  Hilarious.

And then there was the "clock controversy".  As regulation was winding down, the game was tied 2-2 and it looked like yet another OT game and possible shootout.  We've had way too many of these this season.  Even if you win in OT, the losing team still gets a point, and the Kings have been giving away a lot of OT points and losing regulation win points, something which could bite us in the ass in terms of making the playoffs if the standings are tight when the season winds down, which is probably exactly what is going to happen.  Luckily this was not to be, as Drew Doughty dramatically scored with .04 seconds left in regulation.  The place went wild.

Then the play was reviewed.  And it stood, which was awesome because the Kings are notorious for getting screwed on reviews.  The replay bore this out.  At least on the clip we saw, which started with something like 1.6 seconds left.

But then there's this, which shows the clock from six seconds out and sure enough, it sticks at 1.8 seconds before resuming the countdown.

The league is investigating, but bottom line is it sucks to be you, Columbus Blue Jackets.  We win.

All I have to say about that is that like any fan of any team, I know my team has been victimized by officiating and circumstance, therefore this is payback.  Earlier in the game, one of the zebras blew play dead because he lost track of the puck at the CBJ goal.  Turns out the puck was still in play and Brad Richardson popped it into the net, but we lost that goal due to the early whistle.  So pick one or the other, either way it's a 3-2 victory for the Kings.

Now back to our awesome seats.  One of the best things about them was that I was able to actually get some decent pictures.  We don't usually show for the warmups, but if we get these seats again I'm going early.  The players are moving almost constantly during the game, which made it hard for me to get clear shots of them, but they do stand around during warmup drills and I think I could have gotten a lot more shots of a lot more players.

Most of my pictures are of Quick.  Big surprise there.

This one is now my wallpaper.  Best shot of the night.

At one point something required Quick's helmet-less attention.  Needless to say, The Brother and I were riveted.

We were also pathetically fascinated by the sight of him hitting the water bottle.

Stay thirsty, my friend!

In going over my pics, I noticed a peculiar trend - I got some really good shots of the guys from the back, nice shots of the names and numbers.  Their faces not so much.  Not sure why, but enjoy.

Tried to get a good shot of The Brother's latest favorite, but Kyle Clifford was camera-shy.  Or possibly avoiding us like the plague.

The third star was some random Columbus Blue Jackets player we didn't care about.  Williams was second star and Doughty was first.

The Brother and I are scoping out the schedule for the rest of the season for more games and we're definitely spoiled by the great seats we've had, so it's not going to be cheap.  But it will be worth every penny someday when our boys hoist the Stanley Cup.  Until then, GO KINGS GO!!!