Things have a way of going wrong at the most inconvenient times. Today Selena had an appointment (made almost a week ago) to go in and get her shipping papers back. When she took them the first time it turned out the vets had put today’s date on them and the USDA won’t stamp them before the date. Therefore, she left them there and returned today to Gainesville to pick them up.
It couldn’t be that easy… First of all she left the farm without her wallet. Plenty of cash, but, of course, you cannot pay the USDA with cash. You have to have a card. So back to the farm, pick up wallet, set off again. Then when they gave her the papers they apologized because they had double stamped one of them (a no, no apparently). They advised Selena that she could take a risk at the border (no thank you) or take the stamped papers back to the vet for them to do some twiddly thing and then all would be right, so back to the vet she had to go. The vet is in Ocala, the USDA office is an hour away in Gainesville and the farm makes up the triangle, also an hour from USDA and half an hour from the vet. Sigh…..
This put the whole procedure of packing and leaving tomorrow in jeopardy. She is now leaving on the Wednesday morning around 3:00 a.m. in order to be at The Fork in time for the in-barns. It turns out most people are doing the same thing. It’s a huge and monumental task to arrange packing, baggage, shipping, papers, and everything else it takes to ship these horses. In addition they have extra supplements to protect them from the stress of the trip so they are all on Omega Alpha’s wonder product – RegenerEQ. It seems to keep tummies running smoothly no matter what, and everyone drinks and eats well when they are on it. With two of the six returning horses shipping with other people, the extra stress of unusual handlers and not their own rig, means that I will be concerned until everyone is there, unloaded safely and in a stall in North Carolina.
I keep thinking to myself, this time next week my two baby OTTBs will be home for me to cuddle and my beautiful boy, Solo and my bestest ride in the barn, Zephyr. I can’t wait to seem my boys, it’s been months.
With the temperatures here today I told her to stay where she is. Honestly nobody wants to come back to Ontario this week, stay where you are folks, it can only get better, can’t it?
