Woke up to discover that Larry had moved our horses out of the large paddock into a much smaller one, but I assumed that the horses had had much of their breakfast before they were moved, I just tossed a moderate amount of hay into the new paddock. I hadn't taken off their halters when they were in the big paddock because it was so big and I didn't want to have any trouble catching them later, and should have taken them off after they were moved, but didn't take the time because we were anxious to get our play day started, and because Larry had assured me all his paddocks were "horse proof". Considering this was one of the most expensive stables we've been in yet, I certainly expected that. That said, we drove downtown, parked the van and started walking down the Riverwalk. It started out very cloudy, but gradually became sunny throughout the day, with very nice temperatures. We finally settled on a late lunch at Landry's, which served us fabulous broiled seafood platters which we thoroughly enjoyed at a table right on the Riverwalk. Afterward, we walked over to the Alamo and toured around for a while. Once again, we were disappointed, because earlier memories of our last visit were that it was less commercial and more like the original layout. I just don't understand why "preservationist" want to dress it up these landmarks like an overly landscaped amusement park rather than actually preserve it in it's original form as much as possible, which is what I always thought they were supposed to do. Anyway, we were walking around, waiting for dusk so that we could see the Christmas lights (our primary purpose for the day), but at about 5:00 we got a call from Larry, who told us that Hubby's mare had had an accident, and that she had a cut on her face that might require stitches. We were mortified. The one day we had counted on to spend the day enjoying ourselves knowing our horses were safe and then this happened. We cut our day short, went back to the ranch to see how bad it was. Turned out it was about 1 ½ inches long an deep enough to hang open, though most of the bleeding seemed to have stoppe. The cut was so close to her left eye it was a miracle she wasn't blinded. We got out our super-duper antiobotic spray we had bought a few months back, as well as some wound ointment, and after cleaning it out, I put a couple of long butterfly "stitches" with medical tape across the cut to hold it together. We finished by putting her fly mask back on to keep her from rubbing it all off. She seemed grateful for the attention, and held still for the whole operation. Apparently, she was trying to reach under the gate for some grass (I guess they didn't have as much for breakfast as I thought), and got her halter caught on some wire at the bottom, then lifted her head up in such a panic she pulled the gate completely off its' hinges. It's a miracle she didn't get hurt worse. What she did end up getting should heal in a few days, and hopfully, if the tape holds, she won't have much of a scar. Needless to say I was rather unkind to Larry, who I felt should have discussed his plans to move the horses before doing so, and for telling me everything was safe, though I suppose if I had taken the time to remove their halters it could have been avoided as well. Enough said, it was an unhappy end to an otherwise pleasant day. Of course, we took off the horses halters for the night, though left on Clio's fly mask to protect her cut. Looking forward to leaving in the morning.
