Connections: Toastmasters Speech #4

Connections

My three foals will meet hundreds of people as they pursue a career as race horses. In horse racing we call them connections. I thought I would give you a brief description of the adventure they have ahead of them.

As soon as they are weaned, they start their journey to the races every year acquiring more and more connections.
As a weanling life is pretty simple running and jumping around the quiet lush green pastures of a remote farm. Only two humans and one Veterinarian to worry about.

The Breeder and his farm hand feed them grain and vitamins twice a day and provide water, hay, alfalfa and bedding. The Vet provides immunization shots and advise.

As yearlings, the breeder and his farm hand continue feeding them teaching them manners and horseman’s English. The Vet provides booster shots and advise.

Then it's the Terrible Two's

The breeder sends them to a specialized trainer who breaks them to the saddle. In a round pen they learn proper horse English, manners, to wear a saddle, and a rider. Two more humans come into their life.

Next its time to move to the Training Center. More humans; an owner, a groom, a trainer, an exercise rider, a rookie jockey, a real jockey, a starter at the gate, a ferrier nailing horse shoes onto their feet, a tattoo artist to put their number inside the upper lip, a horse dentist, and then gate guards, groundskeepers and a vet.

Yeah! the Terrific Three's have arrived
The owner sends the almost race horse to a real race track. More humans: the owner, a trainer, a new groom, another ferrier, an exercise rider, a pony and rider, a jockey, a hot walker, a starter at the gate, the clocker, along race track fences humans standing watching with binoculars, and a vet giving shots, and another vet taking blood, and another vet for testing urine.

Finally the big day comes for each foal.

THE RACE
The tractors circle the race track smoothing the surface, an announcer calls all the horses and their grooms to walk to the paddock behind the grandstands to get ready for the race.
A bugler plays Call to the Post and humans appear by the thousands. Familiar humans: the owner and his entire family, the trainer, and the groom wish the horse good luck. Then unfamiliar humans arrive: the tattoo checker, the lead pony with rider, the jockey’s valet and trainer put on a saddle, the jockey, the TV cameraman, the announcer, the humans along the paddock fence, the lead pony with rider, the starting gate and crew, more humans along the fence yelling and screaming, the finish line, the photographer, the stewards, the groom, the test barn, the blood sucking vet, and the urine vet.

And behind the scenes The Humans in Charge of Everything Else. The Jockey Club, the state racing board, the legislators, the track owners, the managers, the kiosk owners and crews, the state licensing clerks, the track clerks, the jockey agents, the chaplain, the horseman’s book keeper and clerks, the program printer, the guards, the tote machine clerks, the tote machine repairman, the groundskeepers, the gardener, the backside managers, their guards and grounds keepers, the TV crews, the announcers, the maintenance crew and the official track veterinarian and the emergency vehicle driver.

My three little foals will meet hundreds of people, and hopefully provide great entertainment for all their connections. Swampy the mother of one of the foals ran 20 races before she changed careers.

She's a Bandit racing at the Fairgrounds

She's a Bandit will be #2 in race #2 on March 20 at the Fairgrounds. The Fairground starts later on Friday afternoon and her race will be at about 3:15. Hopefully we hit a Home Run and not only does she win the race, but she is also claimed. Dixie Blaze is training at the Fairgrounds and Judy thinks she will be ready when Evangeline starts racing. It seems she gained a bit to much weight at the Evangeline Training Center. Acadians are just great cooks even for horses.

During the past few weeks I have been posting a blog. The URL is http://horseystories.blogspot.com. cut and paste this URL then stop by to take a peek. You can even sign up for alerts whenever I post a new blog. It is easier to put pictures in the blog and I will archive stories there as well as the text for my speeches to Toastmasters. I'm pretty good at talking to horses, but not so at talking to people about horses.
I'm hoping to do all of my Toastmasters speeches on the topic of thoroughbred horses.

About a week after She's a Bandit ran third, we received a postcard from the Louisiana Breeders association with the amount of the award on the card. Seven weeks later the actual check arrived. Anticipating that this was the routine in their office, I waited and waited and waited for the post card disclosing the amount of the breeders award. After a month I called the office to find out the problem. It seems if there was one bad drug test in any race on the day your horse raced, the racetrack does not send the official results to the Breeders Association. They wait until all appeals have been heard and ajudicated. The post card arrived a week after I complained therefore I probably have wait of seven weeks until the check arrives. Now I have Breeders syndrome. A common complaint among breeders, I'm learning to understand is spending the award check mentally a hundred times before the mailman brings it.

Spreading the News selected High Finance for a sire and she is visiting Pre-K Farm where he stands. The Farm is about 10 miles away along the Bayou Tech which makes it a lovely pastoral setting. She's on the Move and Swamp Scare are still avoiding the gelding we put in their pasture. They jump and play the minute we let them out in the morning, but no sign of going into their cycle.

We finally fixed the broken starter on the tractor then push around a bunch of dirt in the area where we intend to start a garden. We were just about ready to add some sand and some horse fertilizer when it decided to rain. We need the rain, but we should have been faster with the garden. I keep telling Chris that the garden this year is for fun and we will learn a lot from the adventure.

Mittens is hatching seed packets

Mittens loved this basket, but he grew too big for it so I put the seeds in the basket and caught him giving it one last try to be positive that he had really outgrown his former nest.