man, time goes fast.

we've had some HUGE wind storms the past couple of weeks in this area. one in perticular, was wednesday night. after going to bed at nearly 10 pm, i was awoken in the middle of the night by the wind. i had left my kitchen window cracked, and the wind was so strong that it was banging against the frame. moreover, my front door was blown open- quite a feat, constidering that the door is built into the side of a hill and is protected by a 14 ft cement wall directly in front of it. (this door like most german doors, can only be opened from the outside by a key... and i hadn't dead bolted it). it also blew the door to my main living space open (down the hallway and right from the front door). i felt smaller than an ant. like i was nothing more than a grain of sand on the beach. and i am, in the grand scheme of things. bebos words came back to me- the description of teh storm he experienced for Great Light of the world and the smallness he felt for Cover Me. the next morning i heard on the radio that over 100 good sized trees were felled in the wind.

speaking of german radio, i listen to a lot, a lot of it. its a pretty good mix of german, us and gb music, with some french and italian thrown in. as for christian radio, i dont think they have that over here, but there is def. christian music over here (imported from the us and non), and its mixed in to the other pop/rock music on the normal radio. good stuff.

well im off to go ride a couple horses. had a wonderful dinner last night at a boarder's house. much fun. SO much fun. and you gotta watch out when wiebke and i are together now. i think we're beginning to spell trouble. (and i gotta watch it when im around wiebke... otherwise i wont know quite what all shes getting me to do- apparently im her next hair cutter )

tata for now

hmm... not a whole lot going on. everything's been pretty quite since Nadine left on Sat. Went up to Ettligenen on Sun and got to look at a couple of churches and a palace. ... have i ever mentioned how much i love it here and the german hospitality?

sheesh. been awhile since i last blogged. what a week though. entirely chaotic. something like from an agatha christi novel- first there were 8, then 7, then 6, then 4, then 4... (almost 3) people left working... the others have been 'weeded' out through injury or travel of some sort.

nadine remained in the hospital until friday noon. she ended up having a broken vertebra (first lumbar) [read as compression fracture]. i think her time in the hospital went something like this: monday- go to hospital wait nearly 7 hours before cause of pain was discovered. be forced to lie on side/back, and fed though IVs. tuesday- receive corset #1, which made her look 6months pregnate when she had it on and her pulli zipped up over it. BUT she could stand/sit. wed- more of the same. BORDOM. thurs- receive corset #2 (smaller and now she only looks 3 months ;)). friday- after being slopply juggled around with nurses, doctors and the xray lab, she was able to leave at noon. cannot sit or stand though for more than an hour. must wear corset for next 3 months and cannot ride for the next 6 months.

my week day looked like this: wake up, get to the barn at 7, work 5 or 6 horses before lunch (many times before the church clock struck noon) or groom, quick bite to eat then out to the hospital (15 minutes away) spend next hour or two with Nadine, then come back, work more horses, groom more, then home for dinner and to pick up whatever nadine needed/wanted from the house, then back out to the hospital for another hour or so (20 minutes drive from house). if im not extreamly exhaused or its past 11, take a quick shower and go to bed.

naturally, my horse list has shifted some. Havent ridden Cabaret in a while due to a knee bump. I ride Luna Lisa once or twice a week now. While a barn worker is out with injury, i ride her 2nd level gray every other day. since Nadine is gone now (and was in the hospital), i rode her two- Savilliano (really nice and fun youngster, for sale... very talented and reasonably priced) and Sterntanzer (4th level stallion, also a really enjoyable ride), and of course, theres my own two- Dornenfee and Lambada's Girl.

Note on Sterntanzer: after spending the last year riding training and first level dressage, i cant even begin to describe how nice it is to be able to get on a horse and ride changes and half passes. while riding him yesterday, i think he discovered his first impressions of me were wrong, and i actually do know how to push his buttons pretty effectivly. In the half-pass, tanzi perfers just to sweep sideways and not bend his body (sound familiar? ahem, Starr)...so when i started making him half-pass, then go forward in shoulder-in or hounches in or do a 10m circle, he was quite taken aback, to say the least. i think he tried pulling a snit or two...

Note on Savilliano: he's the one that threw nadine; before monday reputed to be the most 'bomb proof' in the barn. Nadine and i joked he was the gay one since his 'other job'(apart from training) is being stallion bait. (the horse presented to the stallions to arouse them). for the most part, hes a very smart and kind horse (not overly smart like Ferg, but learns quickly... i taught him lenghtenings yesterday). But, as we at the barn are discovering, can have a flare for bucking (he bucked with me yesterday, and he bucked me off today when i showed him to some potential buyers... it was a text book perfect fall though: tuck and roll- not at all like the last time i fell off/was bucked off, which as Miari readers probably remember was my accident with Fergus.)

None of the stallions here are especially bad (or King-like), though there is one- Wolkengold- who you have to be pretty on top of.. he rears nearly ever day when walking to the arean (we have to go though the mares barn, and as soon as he sees a mare, hes all 'big tough breeding stallion'.

well im outta here... gotta go grab lunch and maybe do a little shopping in Pforzheim

I dont know quite how to begin this post. The past couple days have been good, busy and stressful. Two nights ago while in Pforzheim, Nadine and I happened across a town carnival, not unlike Olympia's Lakefair. After bartering at local merchandice booths, eating cotton candy and walking around, we hit a couple of rides (SO MUCH FUN!!) and then went home...

I went to church here on Sunday... it was really small (only about 25 in attendance, and the sanctuary was about the size of the Jones' Library in Amherst.) But it was fun adn I understood 80% of it!!!

Horse-wise, I've been catch riding some lately, riding one of other groom's jumpers while she was away, and today i rode a gray gelding for another worker who is on crutches cuz a big young stallion jumped on her foot two days ago.

But all that doesnt matter in light of what happened today. After Katrin had left with Day Dream for a clinic, Nadine got on Saviliano, one of the young horses shes been riding ever since we got here. While riding him, he bucked, and she came off, landing on her side. Her back really hurt her, so while she laid there, Sandra (the morning phone anserwer)called the ambulance. That was around 10:30am. Now as I write this, it is nearly 7pm, and the latest we've heard from the hospital is that one of the vertabra in her lower back is chipped or fractured. This was deduced from a CAT scan around 3:30pm. The doctors who talked to Mrs Burger (Katrin's wonderful mother) who went to the hospital with Nadine said that Nadine might have to spend 2-3 nights in the hospital, and it is uncertain if Nadine will be well enough to fly back to the US on Saturday, as planned. I just ask that all who are reading this will just pray for Nadine... shes had many difficulties the past couple months (and year).

hmm... compared to the last couple of days things aren't all that exciting. My german's gotten much better and im riding the young green horses with instruction in german now.

I got a new young one to ride yesterday- 4 year old liver chestnut mare. Really sweet and much easier to ride than Lambada's Girl (the bay 4 yo ive been riding). Although as I discovered yesterday, you have to keep Dornenfee's head up. As soon as I got on, she started trotting then cantering, then bucking (twice around the entire area.) No need to worry though- it was more of a humpy canter than anything else, especially compared to Fergus' MEAN bucks. And this mare would MAYBE stick out at 13.2 or 13.3 hands. (Def. small Fjord-sized).

Katrin and Achim are off at some horse show in Niedersachsen... home baby show this weekend. Its been busy getting all 30-ish horses done, but at the same time, things are pretty quiet around the place.

Well, here I am again. I basically had a three day weekend, thanks to horse shows and national holidays. We moved into our apartment Saturday afternoon, and by last night, it started to feel like 'home'. I cant even begin to describe how wonderful it is to have a kitchen to cook in and a refridgrator.

Not wanting to waste free time, Nadine and I took off Sunday to the heart of the black forest to check out some castles and Baden-Baden. The drive was around an hour on very senic backroads and the whole area was well worth the trip. Going to one of the castles, Nadine and I took a walk through the forest, and discovered several types of flower, and a couple main types of tree: elm, douglas fir, pine, another sort of fir(name excapes me right now) and maple.

The next day, we took another trip, this time southeast, to the Elm area, where Nadine grew up. Its beautiful down there, very agricultural, with hits of the alps rising in the background. Its a ways away, so we drove on the autobahn. Ad, Lynds, I hope you get to drive on it one day.... I wont state how fast I was driving, but it was a very nice clip. Its actually a lot of fun and very easy to drive on. (Nadine drove down, but due to a headache, I drove back).

So yeah, thus goes my life.