So What is Equine Affaire?

Posted on November 12, 2013November 12, 2013 by Dusty Roads

What is this show that’s getting all the buzz? I wasn’t really sure but I sure wasn’t prepared for it to be as huge as it was. 6000 people! There are so many different venues that it wasn’t that crowded. Sure , lots of people but the crowd moved along and I didn’t feel crushed even with a backpack and camera around my neck.

The first thing that hit me was that this looked more like a trade show than a horse show. Every building had stalls filled with horse related products, from feed to grooming, saddles to traces, horse blankets and ribbons for manes and tails. Outside were horse trailers and RV’s all set up for you to tour and put down your deposit.

A midway of sorts was set up with food stands, popcorn, fried dough, onion rings, hot dogs, hamburgers, some salads and sandwiches, even a baked potato stand. I certainly wouldn’t starve!

It was as I was walking through the 2nd building that I spotted the first horse. It was a 20 year old Morgan stallion, a more docile animal you’d never find. Hard to believe he was a stallion, not a gelding. His owners had opened the stall door and let him stick his head out and he was doing just that. He loved the attention and had quite a crowd. With all the little hands trying to pet him I skipped the pictures and moved on.

Most of the horses and ponies were in stalls with bars on top. Easy to see in but prevented much of a touch and photos were hard. I know what horses smell like. I owned two growing up but these horses didn’t seem to have much of an order at all. Not even the ones with steaming piles in their stalls!

The range of breeds was amazing. I always thought I had a good basic knowledge of “horse” but I had never heard of half the horses there. Of course there were the Morgan’s, standardbreds, Percherons, quarter horses and my personal favorite, the Arabian. If there were thoroughbreds I didn’t see them but maybe they were in another building.

There were ponies and miniature horses, pintos and paints and palominos. All of those were familiar, But then I saw some that looked like they had just come from the steppes of Russia, small but hardy, they ran with a funny gait, not a canter or a trot or a gallop.

They were listed in the program as Icelandics.

One horse in particular caught my eye, Norwegian Fjord Horse. This guy wasn’t big and tall, rather compact and solid. The breed standard said his color was dun but he looked gray to me. He had a distinctive black streak down the center of his mane.

Speaking of his mane, it stood up along his neck like a Mohawk. A very unique appearance indeed.

Thank you to Our Veterans and First Responders

Posted on November 11, 2013November 11, 2013 by Dusty Roads

On this Veteran’s Day I want to take a minute to say Thank You to all that serve. To those in the armed forces who keep this country safe.

And to those on the home front, those Police, Firemen, doctors, nurses, ambulance drivers…all those who run toward danger instead of away to keep us safe.

May God Bless you all and may you carry an Angel on your Shoulder each and every day.

Equine Affaire

Posted on November 10, 2013November 10, 2013 by Dusty Roads

I finally got myself out the door to DO SOMETHING. I’ve been sitting at home watching my pennies because we are in the last quarter of the year and I have a bunch of annual bills that come due. I was in pretty good shape with money in the bank to cover them but my car had other ideas.

After several pricey repairs my formerly comfortable bank balance is back to it’s normal level of no reserve. At least I got one of the 3 bills paid (2 more to go ) and my mechanic says my car should last at least until I hit 300,000 miles.

My former job had overtime during the holidays so I usually worked the extra to plug the shortfall but my new job doesn’t have that. Don’t get me wrong, I love not having to “kill myself” and my new job pays about the same as my old job…just no OT which is hitting my purse strings now.

That said I have been playing the hermit, trying not to drive too much (Gas), making a grocery list and sticking to it, cutting coupons etc.; being a good budget minded person (Not my normal way of operating). But eventually that had to give and it did in a sort of big way.

I kept seeing an add on Facebook for Equine Affaire. It was being held at the fairgrounds in Springfield where they hold the “Big E”, Eastern States Exposition . The Big E is a very Big deal out here in the east even though I still haven’t been but a Horsey event… well I might be interested in that so I counted my pennies and bought a ticket for the day and since I was going to be out there anyway…I bought a box seat to the Fantasia Show that evening. (At that point I had no idea what the show would be like but I figured in for a penny in for a pound)

I hadn’t been to a horse show in years and never to one like this. I took over 400 pictures. Not all are worth the paper it would take to print them but there are a few “keepers”. The photography part was challenging because everything was indoors and I was trying not to use the flash. (More on that later). It took me quite awhile to “sort of” figure it out. I never did get the result I wanted but I had fun and over the next few days I want to share my experience and some of the pictures (not all 400).

I was pretty amazed. When I pulled into the parking “field” (Only $5.00 for the whole day) one of the attendants said the event had sold over 6000 tickets each day. (A 4 day run!) (That’s $30,000 per day in parking fees only) There were cars from all over… New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Canada, Georgia, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island and of course, Massachusetts.

So welcome to Equine Affaire!

Bucket List of the States

Posted on November 9, 2013November 9, 2013 by Dusty Roads

Well my little exercise of reviewing the 50 states was interesting. It took so many posts and so much research that I think it needs a summary list just so it’s all in one place.

Visited To Be Visited

Alaska Alabama

Arizona Arkansas

California Colorado

Connecticut Delaware

Florida Idaho

Georgia Illinois

Hawaii Indiana

Maine Iowa

Massachusetts Kansas

Nevada Kentucky

New Hampshire Louisiana

New Jersey Maryland

New York Michigan

Rhode Island Minnesota

South Carolina Mississippi

South Dakota Missouri

Texas Montana

Vermont Nebraska

Virginia New Mexico

Washington North Carolina

Wisconsin North Dakota

. Ohio

. Oklahoma

. Oregon

. Pennsylvania

. South Carolina

. Tennessee

. Utah

. West Virginia

. Wyoming

So there’s the bucket list. I will be in San Diego, CA for a few days in January for a business meeting so I’ll have another notch on the California side but that doesn’t work off the pending list.

I was thinking about a visit to Williamsburgh, VA for my vacation in 2014 but now I wonder if I should “rethink” that and aim to go to one of the remaining states. I will have to think on this .

Thanks for taking this journey through the States with me. 🙂

Quick Trip to The Massachusetts Registry

Posted on November 8, 2013November 8, 2013 by Dusty Roads

Mass Pass, Easy Pass, Fast Pass….all names for the High speed , don’t stop, toll lane. You all know the one, it’s supposed to be more efficient, no need for humans and you can’t avoid paying the toll with this system.

On my last vacation in Florida I ran afoul of the Sun Pass lane.

I was in a rental and didn’t have a transponder. My GPS was repeating keep right, keep right so I was hugging the right hand lane…oops, that was a little too far right. I was stuck in the Sun Pass lane. This happened a few times and when I reported it to the car rental company they just laughed. I was assured that I would get a bill. Well, no bill just a series of automatic charges to my credit card, each one carrying an additional “administrative fee”.

I don’t drive too many toll roads. Except for mishaps like in Florida I seldom have a need to pay tolls. I bet I don’t spend $10 on tolls in any given year so I just pay the old fashioned way, with cash. Well Massachusetts announced it is taking down the toll booths. Everyone needs a transponder because paying cash will soon be obsolete. Without a transponder you will have your license plate photographed and run through the registry so they can bill you, after adding on that pesky administration fee. If they think you are trying to be a “Toll Evader” the fine can get hefty.

Needless to say, I found this incentive enough to decide to bite the bullet and get a transponder. The equipment is free but you have to set up an account so they can automatically take the toll out of your bank account or charge a credit card. You can enroll online and they will mail you a transponder or you can pick one up at designated locations and registries.

Silly me. I thought that I could just drop in and get my transponder, like a store. Ha! I was handed paperwork to fill out about me, about my car. When I returned the paperwork I was given a number. It said only 19 ahead of me. Since the registry was filled to overflowing I was directed to the “overflow” waiting room. It was only 49 degrees outside and the registry didn’t bother to turn on the heat. That might be ok for a short wait but as 15 minutes turned to 20 and then 30 I began to get a little chilled. Worse, I was in “A” queue and that wasn’t being called at all.

I sat next to a young man from the “I” queue and we began a friendly competition to see who would get called first. We were “neck and neck” as the elapsed time rolled into the 2nd hour. Finally I was 1 number away. I moved into the main room where there was wonderful heat. My number came up right after that. As I was standing at the window going through all the information on the form for the clerk I heard the “I” numbers get called and there was my young friend. He’d made it to the window next to me.