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glenatronI have been up to a broad selection of things lately, I shall endeavour to share some with you:
Last weekend we spent four days recording some new songs for the next release from The Patient Wild. In fact they will probably go onto a CD with the existing tracks ( people at gigs are often asking whether we have a CD to sell ) and we will endeavour to put them onto the usual services so you should be able to find them easily if you want to. I won't lie, this is really awesome music- complicated, intense and catchy all at once. It won't be for everyone but I feel that this band is the one that has been closest to my musical vision of any I have been part of and it is always a pleasure to be around musicians this talented. I will doubtless post more about this once we have the mixes back and they are out where people can find them.
My contract comes up at the end of the month ( which is Thursday, by this point ) and I don't yet have anything else lined up. This means that my poor abandoned mare will get some work to do while I sort something else out. Hopefully another contract will be forthcoming reasonably soon because if I don't find anything in November, the market tends to go dead in December as everyone in HR goes skiing and then with the spin up time after Christmas it would probably be February before anything much turns up, unless I want to go to London, and nobody wants to go to London. I do have a mobile phone project I've been working on for a while, so I guess if I'm not in a full time job I can concentrate on that in between horses and maybe get enough done to get it out in some app stores and make a few quid. It would be nice to be running my own stuff, but at the same time I prefer not to put too long of a break between contracts and my bank manager likes me not to as well.
Iris has been somewhat underworked lately, between recording and the growing dark of an English autumn, but I am planning to combine intensive teaching with one of my students with working Iris by driving her over to my student's yard ( which has a really nice arena, unlike our own muddy swamp ) and teaching from horseback. We tested travelling there and back today as it was sunny but too blustery for riding out with Iris as she is at the moment and although she was very sweaty after the journey, the wind gave her a chance to dry off and she offered some really nice work. This horse is so amazing - she just gives and keeps on giving. I feel so much responsibility to be as generous in my training and care of her as she is in her work with me.
Iris anxious upon arriving at the yard.
Doing a little groundwork in blustery wind, the air fluttering with falling leaves.
Backlit and autumnal.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
herecirm is a heck of a pictureographer.
Not our finest trot, but the picture conveys a hint of our briskness.
Weathered and windblown.
Also a couple of pictures from yesterday, when we went out for a walk at Waggoners Wells, a local nature reserve consisting of a series of man-made lakes among beechwoods which is the ideal place for autumn colours:
Oops! Someone didn't switch off Ben's pretension filter quick enough.
Trying to capture leaves floating downstream makes for intriguing abstract patterns.
This one is about the dwindling of the sun, almost certainly.
Also I read The Book Of The New Sun recently and if you haven't read it you could probably put it on the "to read" list. It is unlike most of the books.
Last weekend we spent four days recording some new songs for the next release from The Patient Wild. In fact they will probably go onto a CD with the existing tracks ( people at gigs are often asking whether we have a CD to sell ) and we will endeavour to put them onto the usual services so you should be able to find them easily if you want to. I won't lie, this is really awesome music- complicated, intense and catchy all at once. It won't be for everyone but I feel that this band is the one that has been closest to my musical vision of any I have been part of and it is always a pleasure to be around musicians this talented. I will doubtless post more about this once we have the mixes back and they are out where people can find them.
My contract comes up at the end of the month ( which is Thursday, by this point ) and I don't yet have anything else lined up. This means that my poor abandoned mare will get some work to do while I sort something else out. Hopefully another contract will be forthcoming reasonably soon because if I don't find anything in November, the market tends to go dead in December as everyone in HR goes skiing and then with the spin up time after Christmas it would probably be February before anything much turns up, unless I want to go to London, and nobody wants to go to London. I do have a mobile phone project I've been working on for a while, so I guess if I'm not in a full time job I can concentrate on that in between horses and maybe get enough done to get it out in some app stores and make a few quid. It would be nice to be running my own stuff, but at the same time I prefer not to put too long of a break between contracts and my bank manager likes me not to as well.
Iris has been somewhat underworked lately, between recording and the growing dark of an English autumn, but I am planning to combine intensive teaching with one of my students with working Iris by driving her over to my student's yard ( which has a really nice arena, unlike our own muddy swamp ) and teaching from horseback. We tested travelling there and back today as it was sunny but too blustery for riding out with Iris as she is at the moment and although she was very sweaty after the journey, the wind gave her a chance to dry off and she offered some really nice work. This horse is so amazing - she just gives and keeps on giving. I feel so much responsibility to be as generous in my training and care of her as she is in her work with me.
Iris anxious upon arriving at the yard.
Doing a little groundwork in blustery wind, the air fluttering with falling leaves.
Backlit and autumnal.
herecirm is a heck of a pictureographer.Not our finest trot, but the picture conveys a hint of our briskness.
Weathered and windblown.
Also a couple of pictures from yesterday, when we went out for a walk at Waggoners Wells, a local nature reserve consisting of a series of man-made lakes among beechwoods which is the ideal place for autumn colours:
Oops! Someone didn't switch off Ben's pretension filter quick enough.
Trying to capture leaves floating downstream makes for intriguing abstract patterns.
This one is about the dwindling of the sun, almost certainly.
Also I read The Book Of The New Sun recently and if you haven't read it you could probably put it on the "to read" list. It is unlike most of the books.
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no subject
Date: 27 Oct 2013 22:33 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Oct 2013 23:12 (UTC)Job hunting comes with the territory when one is contracting, but the freedom of being able to chop and change is a clear benefit, so I still prefer it over working full time as yet. The pay tends to be a little warmer too, which helps persuade one.
no subject
Date: 28 Oct 2013 16:26 (UTC)Good luck with the job hunting.
no subject
Date: 28 Oct 2013 22:01 (UTC)I have no idea where job hunting will take me, but until it has taken me nowhere for a while I shan't worry too much. The nightmare scenario is that I have to work in London for a while...
no subject
Date: 30 Oct 2013 19:25 (UTC)Looking for a job is tough. I am out of work since March and it doesn't get easier the more time passes. The market is just too lean...
Iris is gorgeous! The Lusitano in her definitely shows. I'm a little curious - judging by saddle and bridle, you work with her Western style. How did that come to be? I've never seen a baroque horse being worked Western style before. Has she been broken in that way or did someone (you?) teach her later?
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Date: 30 Oct 2013 22:20 (UTC)There aren't many people in this country who are into riding western and a lot of the ones who are aren't into the same type of riding that I do ( which is probably best known by association with people like Ray Hunt and Buck Brannaman ) which is all about feel and timing and helping the horse to feel confident and relaxed in their work. Because I did my core learning on western horses I'm happiest in a western saddle, but I will have to get a set of regular tack if we're going to be doing dressage, which I think we will. I think all riding is the same really, but I want to be riding my horse's mind when I can, so I ride on a fairly loose rein mostly. I think until she came to stay with us at the start of the summer she had always been ridden very conventionally.
I am lucky in that I have a very marketable set of skills combined with enough experience that I can generally pick up work reasonably easily. The worst case is that I have to either undersell myself or commute to London. If it came to choosing between those I would be quite challenged...