It Seemed Like A Good Contest

Hey yall! I went shopping for you (well, one of you) today!

I'm not sure if the AERC National Convention is always in Reno or if it's just been in Reno twice in a row now. Either way, this is my second spring in Reno and my second AERC convention. I went last year and had an interesting time - it was three days before I went to Vegas and took the bar exam (recap: I failed, wahoo well shit.) and I didn't hardly know anybody and I hadn't ever done an AERC ride. I definitely felt like I was sneaking around somewhere I didn't quite belong.

This year, I knew a few more people, met more people at the convention (hello Gaited Endurance Riders yahoo group), had a successful if short LD season, and had much more fun. I bought a bunch of raffle tickets, after I made G promise that if I won an entry to a ride I could go. Ok, I only entered West division raffles, but still - maybe I'll win an entry to something.

And I have purchased a cool thing just to give away on my blog, because 600 posts with no giveaways is shameful. I wanted to get something endurance-related, but also something that any horse person could use. I think I found it!


This is Steph Teeter's training journal. She does really cute MS Paint type cartoons on endurance.net (which she also co-owns). It's a little Arab-centric, but I'm sure us non Arab people can overlook that. It's set up like a blank calendar. There's monthly and weekly calendar pages:


And generic "remember to do stuff" and "stuff I did" pages.


It's really cute, and really useful. I kinda wish I'd bought a second one for me. But I have this blog! But it's not like my tags are very useful, even to me... I may be talking myself in to going back tomorrow for a second one.

Anyway, here's the rules of the contest, shamelessly stolen from Mel.

On March 19, Dixie and I will (god willing and the creek don't rise) complete our first 50 at Rides of March. The person who comes closest to guessing my ride time, without going over, wins the awesome little training journal. Official ride time includes the holds. Our ride time will probably be influenced by the weather, so the contest doesn't close til midnight Friday, March 18. I guess I mean midnight PST, but if one of the Alaskans forgets to enter til midnight her time, that's fine too :)

If we pull, I'll use The RNG to determine the winner. If you don't get me your shipping address in like a week or something I'll go to the next best time / next random number. I swear I will mail the journal out within a couple days of getting your snail-mail address. (Since I said it on the internet I can't flake out and forget to go to the post office.)

edited to add: Please feel free to change your vote at the last minute based on our crazy Nevada weather! If I go the RNG route it'll be one entry per person so I don't care how many times you vote, the last vote is what counts. :)