alobear | Lost In Austen and Forward Seat

When people first mentioned Lost In Austen to me a few weeks ago, I thought it sounded awful and wasn't planning on watching it at all. However, later reviews sounded more promising, so we got hold of a copy and watched the whole thing in one go last night. It did indeed get off to a slightly rocky start, but I'm glad I gave it the benefit of the doubt, as it was largely hilarious and extremely well done, with just the right amount of humour and some really interesting portrayals of these familiar characters (I particularly liked Wickham). Drawing a veil over one specific moment (anyone who has made the mistake of mentioning Colin Firth and Mr Darcy in the same breath in my presence will know why, at one point, I recoiled from the TV with my hands over my face, screaming, "My eyes! My eyes!"), I really enjoyed this series.

Back to riding this morning after two weeks off, and Kerry really made us work hard. We spent most of the lesson in forward seat, working on our balance, posture and lower leg strength in both trot and canter. I had Joe, which made certain aspects of the task much easier (ie he stayed quite happily in trot regardless of what I was doing), although he did keep veering off the track in rather an annoying manner, and halt transitions proved impossible because he just simply wouldn't stop. I had to wimp out of the forward seat a lot because it really made my ankle hurt, but it's shown me I need to keep on with my strengthening exercises in the gym, and it definitely gave me a workout.