August (at Hawk Hollow Ranch), I recently discovered. Am happy to hear this. I audited one of his clinics in VA(?) a few years ago. He's from southern California, putting him in the category of sunny bereiters. I recall he told several amusing stories. More later.

 What's wrong with this picture? Aside from the rider's ineffective leg aids (resulting from poor leg placement), waterskiing, collapsing her upper body down into her horse's back, and really strange riding shoes.

This is a picture of me on a lease horse, riding in the lovely (and scorching) Livermore Valley in northern California several years ago.  The mare was a 6 year old draft x Thoroughbred cross, a homebred from the midwest.  She was a pretty giant, at 17'2. She was a gentle good girl 95% of the time, and naughty the other 5% (although I didn't know it at the time). I took dressage lessons on her, we practiced maneuvering her shoulders, we cantered around the vineyards.  She seemed a bit slow but I attributed that to her large size and dinner-plate sized hooves.  I'd only been riding for about 2 years and had never had a truly bad ride.  I remember looking at this picture, admiring the way my ponytail matched her tail mid-swing, and how cool I looked wearing just an orange baseball cap on that warm dry summer afternoon.

Then one day after work, I got on her, went into a time warp, and woke up inside an ambulance. "Am I in an ambulance?" I asked, puzzled.  The tech asked me if I knew what year it was and who the president was.  The president? Of the country. Oh, right. I couldn't remember, nor could I figure out the answers.  So I relaxed my mind and fell back asleep.

The concussion left me on the living room couch for weeks. I nearly started watching daytime tv.  I couldn't drive because turning my head caused the world to swirl from side-to-side. My ribs ached, and I couldn't concentrate.  I'll never know exactly what happened that day.  One.  I mounted the mare.  Two.  I woke up in an ambulance.  People speculated she must have bucked me off as I was in the act of getting on her.  The only thing I do know is that I was lucky to have been wearing a helmet on one of her 5% naughty days.  She's the last horse I ever rode without a helmet.

Ah, show season is upon us.  My horse is in New Jersey and I am in Los Angeles, and while I bide away my time before our happy reunion later (this month? next month?), so that we may launch our starry-eyed selves smack-dab into show season, I am keeping the "dressage show" fire alive within by uploading Prize Lists and Rider Schedules for show secretaries on their websites.

In addition, I search the local blogosphere and webosphere for fun, interesting, highly illustrative dressage-related stuff to read ... you know, fodder for my brain for "unmounted dressage practice".

Here the amusing writing from the blog "Growing Up Belotti". Nice writing style and what a cute horse.