The Wobbleberry Challenge!

I'm almost never ill, but it happens. All week I've been coughing like a chain smoking tramp, and on Friday, I developed a streaming cold and raging fever. All I wanted to do was lie on the sofa and watch back-to-back episodes of Orange Is The New Black (which I've 'discovered' approximately two years after everyone else. It's awesome, although Piper gets on my wick - she has a shower scene every episode so why is her hair always so limp and stringy?) but I have two horses that nobody else in my family has the faintest idea how to look after. So I dragged myself up to the yard yesterday morning, all sweaty and fluey (my hair actually looked a lot like Piper's) and mucked out. I told the horses to behave as I was feeling dreadful. They immediately interpreted this as weakness, towed me over to some grass, stuck their heads down, started grazing, and were generally massive pains. Thanks for the sympathy, bitches.

Once I'd got home and collapsed on the sofa, still covered in mud but feeling too weak to make any effort to be less minging, Ian took the kids out to give me a break. I got stuck into Orange Is The New Black - and naturally, the family managed to return right in the middle of a steamy lesbian sex scene. I didn't get to the remote fast enough. The kids, who can spot trouble from a mile off, lit up with glee.

'What are those ladies DOING, Mummy?' 'Why is that lady taking that other lady's bra off, Mummy?'

My brain was too mangled with flu to come up with any remotely believable excuse, so I just let them put on some ghastly nonsense about evil cats instead wend went to sleep. Mother Of The Year, that's me.

I felt a lot better today, and managed to ride Angel. She and I had our usual argument about working correctly in an outline, but we did some nice trot work at the end, which was good enough for me. We've got a lot of work ahead of us though, given that we've signed up for the Wobbleberry Challenge. Aimed at slightly older riders like myself, whose nerves of steel have weakened a bit along with our pelvic floor, us Wobbleberries have to do a BE 80 level one day event by next autumn.

Eeek! I've always wanted to event, but it's scary. That said, I'm kind of a thrill seeker. I've always liked doing things that scare me. I've got no interest in jumping out of planes or munching on giant insects, but something challenging - yes please.

Me and Roxy did attempt a one day event at the beginning of summer. A baby one, just 60cms. It was a disaster. We did OK in the dressage, but when I turned Roxy into the showjumping arena, she trotted out backwards. It wasn't a good start, and things didn't improve from there. I'd foolishly left my whip in the car -why, WHY? - and she smugly turned in three refusals and that was that. We were eliminated before we even got to the cross-country phase. And the jumps were totally diddy. She could have stepped over them!

A few weeks after that, we did an Eventer's Challenge at Checkendon in Oxfordshire and got round successfully but I missed a jump (totally my own error) so we were eliminated. And a week or so after that, we went back for Combined Training (dressage and showjumping) and won.

And then Roxy went lame. Turned out it was her arthritis - and maybe that's why she was so erratic on the jumping front, forward one week and refusing everything the next. Anyway, I got her hocks medicated, but decided that eventing was asking too much of her, which is why Angel came along.The Wobbleberry Challenge is - hopefully - the start of our eventing career together.

So that's the plan. We're both unfit and don't know what we're doing, but we've got the winter to get to know each other and get into shape. I'll try and kick my addiction to Twirls - actually, that's going too far. One challenge at a time is enough!

Along the way, we're raising money for Wilberry Wonder Pony, a fabulous charity that raises money for bone cancer research. I'm aiming to raise £300 - hopefully more. I'll be banging on about sponsorship over the coming months, and it would be wonderful if anyone reading this would like to bung some cash via JustGiving. Even a couple of quid would be great - it all adds up. Here's a button to help you, look! And please stay tuned to this blog as I'll be posting updates on our progress. If it all goes quiet, then I'm probably having a massive panic, in which case please send me sympathy and Twirls. Thanks!