When I arrived at the showgrounds to feed Harley, I found him the only horse in the barn aisle laying down, curled up snoozing. He got up for his breakfast, and ate eagerly. I also found his water bucket near empty, so that was delightful. I cleaned his stall, then headed back to the hotel to pack up, and find some human breakfast with R.
We got back to the showgrounds, and with a general sense of schedule, got Harley saddled and me in my showdress pretties just in time. His longing warmup was lazy but good. Warmup ride was an adventure. Arena cluttered with riders heading every which direction. At one point, a higher level rider was galloping down the diagonal straight towards us, and nearly smashed into me & Harley. Frightening! Harley did well, and stayed calm. I found him a bit lazy in the warmup ride, and hoped I could shake his motivation as we headed into the show ring.
I didn't hear a bell ring or a whistle blow, but wasn't sure if it was my "turn" in the ring or not. I darted into the ring, saw the judge & scribe watching us intently. I trotted right up the centerline, and halted at "X". It felt and probably looked like a hurried halt. The judge laughed. "We are ready for you, but you can let him look around a bit first before we'll blow the whistle for you to start. Go take your time, let him see everything."
I laughed myself. Told Harley, "Good job dear, but let's go look. Hey, look! There's people up there that weren't there yesterday! Let's hope they don't cheer like it's a football game, and they sit real still-like." (I hoped the audience was listening at that point, and heeded my request.)
The judge blew her whistle when we were at "B", so I turned down the rail, picked up a trot, and headed down the centerline. This was a class of 3 total riders, and in my mind, the "warm up ride" to our championship test.
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