Anything...except for duct tape part 2

[Coujurs1@aol.com]

 Okay I forgot to mention meeting Dr. Andrew (Andrew Daglish) he is Sheikh 
Monsour bin Zayed Al Nahyan's vet.  Actually his card says H.H. The 
President's Stables, I assume (yes I know what happens when you assume) that 
is the President of UAE, Sheikh Monsour and Sheikh Tahnoun's father. All the 
vets are known as Dr. (insert first name), So Jim Baldwin is Dr. Jim etc.  
Dr. Andrew was the (is) nicest man you would ever want to meet.  Goat had him 
eating out of his hoof in no time.  Well, actually Andrew was bringing Goat 
carrots so I guess it was the other way around.  Goat is (as they say in the 
South) "eat up with Personality".  Plus is a major con artist.  I'm not sure 
the other horses in the barn got 1/4 the amount of carrots that Goat did, 
they should have watched and seen a master at work.  Andrew said one night he 
came to check on them, and was standing in the middle of the barn aisle, and 
hadn't given Goat any carrots, and Goat all but picked his pocket.  Guess I 
should have warned him about us playing hide the carrot.  (Don't go there!)
  I forgot the toys!  Sheikh Monsour had an indoor swimming pool that was oh, 
50 foot long.  He had three treadmills, not your ordinary run of the mill 
treadmill.  No, these were built into the floor of the building, so the horse 
didn't have to go up a ramp.  They had several speeds, would incline I have 
no idea how far, and if the special belt was on, would put a readout of the 
heartrate up on the display unit.  Also in this building, scales for the 
horses (Goat weighed around 1000 lbs <moo>), and a lab for running blood 
work. The lab must have been fairly new, as they had the owner's manual out.  
  Sheikh Tahnoun has two of the above treadmills, plus these way cool Aqua 
trainers.  These things have a treadmill in the bottom, and fill up to about 
chest high with water and have jets!  I WANT ONE, not for the horse!  He was 
getting his own lab set up.
  They both have warehouses full of goodies, cosaquin, elytes, saddles 
(mostly wintec's).  One worry we had going over was hay.  They had some of 
the best looking Orchard Grass, little bales that weighed a ton!  Plus great 
looking Alfalfa, both shipped from Washington State.
   My one suitcase that parted ways from me was still missing.  I kept 
getting messages saying it was here, or there (Nairobi), shame my suitcase 
was more places than I was.  Hadn't heard a thing from the tack trunks that 
were missing, until...
  I get a message saying that they found some luggage with my address I gave 
them, but not fitting the description, could I come to the airport and look 
at it.  Now this was Abu Dhabi, Duane and the horses flew into Sarga (sp?).  
So off to the airport Duane and I go.  They take me in this room and there is 
one of my tack trunks and Darolyn's!  No suitcase but the tack trunks.  They 
had no idea how they got there or so I could ascertain with the language 
barrier (southern English is hard to understand, So y'all don't know where 
this came from?)  They ask to look in the top one, mine, I start thinking 
what is in it?  Oh I hope there aren't elytes because we put them in baggies. 
 Sire taste them!  It's not cocaine!  But turns out that trunk was still 
missing, this had my saddle etc. in it.  I asked if they wanted Darolyn's 
open, I had no idea what was in it!  They said no, one was fine.  
  I finally found out what KLM (airline I flew) meant Keep Luggage Moving.  I 
went to the KLM office to raise a stink 4 days after arrival, they gave me 
400 dirahms for my trouble, to shop with, that's a little over $100.  I don't 
think that would have replaced too many items in it!  And asked me to fill 
out a form for a World wide search.  I asked why this wasn't already being 
done...On returning to the hotel a few hours later I tripped over my 
suitcase.  I had finally returned from it's world tour.  Luckily it had some 
Dramamine in it just in case all the landings were rough.
  Anyway, back to the ranch.  We rode the horses lightly Tuesday or 
Wednesday, this is before my suitcase was found so I rode barefoot so as not 
to mess up my only pair of shoes I had with me.  (No comments about 
southerners).  The grooms thought this was a hoot.  BTW, I had my helmet on 
<g>.  After riding Jubilee tied up, pretty bad, got real tight in the hind 
end.  And Goat got a little painful, acting a little colicky.  Dr. Andrew 
came over and treated them.  Goat was back to normal (as normal as he can be) 
in an hour or so.
  Ran down to the other quarantine barns (tents) and talked to Valerie 
Kanavy, she said Christie Janzen's horse had tied up, but she was doing 
better.  Val brought Jedi, Ohadi Las Tradd and Iris (whom she had just 
purchased off of Frank Farmer).  Everyone, except our happy little group, was 
down the hill close to the vet check area.  USA (other than us) and Canada 
(Christie) were together, and all were fenced off with chain link fence, 
separated by several feet then another chain link area with barn for another 
nation.  They all had assigned times to ride, and assigned areas.  I guess we 
had it a little better up on the hill, all we could ride was on Sheikh 
Monsour's track, but we could ride when we wanted.  And we weren't run off at 
lunch time. Could stay as long as we wanted.  
  Friday we all took off to the race track in Ghantoot.  Ran into Dr. Dwight 
(Hooten) and Matt Frazier!  We knew that Dwight was over there, but it seems 
that the Dubai Equine Hospital has externships for vet students.  They bring 
them over for a month, all expenses paid, and put them to work.  I hadn't 
seen Matt for years, and barely (okay didn't) recognized him.  I'm getting 
old, Matt was reminding me just how young he was the first time I met him, of 
course I was pretty young then too!  Matt said the hospital was doing 
treatment race day.
  Saturday, I went to the Abu Dhabi race course to take papers to register 
for the ride.  This is when I heard that Betty Baker might not be riding 
Corky whom she had sold to Sheikh Tahnoun.  And they were at this moment 
flying over to ride.  ARGH!  
  Sunday, Darolyn Butler and Mark Dial, and Betty and Steve Baker arrived in 
the middle of the night.  They looked pretty good for traveling half way 
around the world.  We went to a Gold Souk (shopping center) wow, is gold ever 
inexpensive there.  You also are required to barter.  Very hard for me, 
especially since I absolutely hate to shop.  
  Darolyn, Mark (Dial), Duane and I all head to Dubai to meet Dwight Hooten 
and Jim Baldwin.  They arrange a tour for us at the Dubai Equine Hospital, in 
a word WOW!  Surgery room, complete with viewing windows, TV's to see close 
up and phones with contact to the surgery team (why would you want someone 
watching to be able to interrupt, excuse me doc, can you move your arm, 
Mildred can't see!).  They took us around to the barns in town, and Jim took 
us out to Sheikh's Hamden and Mohammed's places.  Very functional facilities 
all. Interestingly, the "saddle room" had a large variety of saddles, not 
just Wintecs like Sheikh Tahnoun, also don't remember seeing the white spots 
that were so prominent on Tahnoun's horses.  Coincidence or special sauce?  
  Dwight told us that if Jim took us somewhere to eat, it would either be 
Fudruckers (gotta watch how you type that!) or Kenny Rogers Chicken, that is 
the only places Jim will eat, guess he wouldn't be interested in a lamb's 
tongue.  It was Kenny Rogers. 
  First before I forget, the title.  Yes I know it is weird, but the South 
was built (rebuilt)with Duct tape.  After Darolyn arrived and our tack trunk 
hadn't, we noticed we needed some duct tape.  None was to be found.  We asked 
everyone that wandered by, for some.  I even went to the construction site 
next door and asked, do you have any tape.  The gentleman looked at me very 
seriously and held up a finger and disappeared for 15 minutes and came back 
with a tape measure, I explained no duct tape, sticky see?  He didn't. Now 
they brought us, when requested, 10-15 heart monitors, HM belts, Cosaquin, 
adequan, Beet pulp, anything we asked for, they even built us a saddle rack 
the night before the race because we said we wanted one.  But a $2.00 roll of 
duct tape was not to be had.  I think I see a very lucrative side job.  
  Sometime in all this, we rode a camel!  Number 29, for some reason they 
don't name them, of course being from the South we did, Nellie.  Mark and 
Becky Elliot, Duane, Michelle and I were all victims.  No, Nellie was pretty 
good except for when Mark rode her, not his fault.  We weren't given "camel" 
lessons, just handed two reins and let go.  One was hooked to her nose, 
helpful hint to the future "camel jockeys" don't pull on the one in her nose! 
 They have long necks and will look you right in the face and express their 
displeasure!  We talked (bullied) Ashraf (the guy over the grooms) into 
getting on the camel.  He swells up (Southern term) and says "I'm a man!  I 
will ride it".  It gets up and dumps him on his er...manhood?
  Nina Gibson and Goat