Good News/Bad News

A non-exhaustive list in no particular order.

Established relationship with this horse.
 + We know each other well.  I figure the amount of trust and communication we've built up and all that practice at reading each other will be our biggest asset.
 - We can push each other's buttons like nobody's business...!

This horse, man.
 + Tucker has turned into a pretty nice trail horse, especially given how spooky he was starting out.  Seems to find the job interesting and enjoyable.  Has a special fondness for solving thick brush and tricky footing and for riding out in the dark (though that will only be an issue this season if we get ourselves hopelessly lost...), and a super work ethic.
 - The spook is still in there, albeit in much less dramatic form.  I actually prefer spooky horses (not the spook, but the overall temperament, yes), so that's basically fine.  But I'm not postive that he won't leave me for dead given sufficiently weird inspiration.  Also Tuck is not by default careful with his feet.  Tends to quickly smarten up given a question he finds worthy of respect, but sometimes it takes a stumble or three.

Soundness
 + Knocking on wood and crossing all fingers and toes, he has an exemplary record for holding up to work.  Good feet.  Good legs.  Has been lame for about three days in the whole time I've had him.  Easy to fit up.  Handy and catty and clever.  He takes pretty good care of himself.
 - Conformation could be better and he is a fifteen-year-old sport horse.  He's had some wear and tear, and a few issues at his current level of performance that will get a post of their own.  Nothing that strikes me as a clear no-go and they have all been manageable (and I have a crackpot theory about there maybe being some therapeutic value to this switch in focus), but I will need to keep an eye on 'em.

Schooling
 + As well as basic rideability, I am pleased to hear that all this time spent on dressage is apparently going to be an asset!  That's cool.
 - Rider can be a horrible nag.

Time
 + I am having a hard time believing what I hear/read about how little (it seems to me) conditioning is required to prepare a horse for distance riding, especially LD.  I mean, I believe it in that it's coming from people who know much more about this stuff than I do and I assume they are telling me the truth as they've experienced it!  But I think I will have to see it work before I can really buy in.  That said, a 4-5 day/week rotation of 2 trail-ride days, 1-2 dressage rides, and a jump school sounds like a dream schedule to me and will fit beautifully into the rest of my life -- especially now that I won't have a 150-mile round-trip to the barn!
 - All that time on my hands could make it easy/tempting to do too much, especially since my innate preference is to overprepare for everything.  I tend to overload my schedule and this is still a significant commitment.  Will need to watch myself.

Resources
 + I've run 6-8 events/season for the last several year along with at least weekly lessons, the odd clinic or dressage show/hunter pace, gear and maintenance, etc., etc., etc.  I am not saying it was smart of me to have done all that!  But this looks pretty affordable by comparison.  I own all the basic gear already, so I have the luxury of just getting started and then seeing what tweaks I want to make along the way.  I also have a larger-than-expected REI dividend this year!
 - Still an expensive pet and hobby.  Saving for truck and trailer will suck up any available pennies, and the lack thereof may in meantime restrict our options somewhat.  We'll see what Tucker's maintenance needs turn out to be for this workload.

Support
 + Have some great folks in my life who want me to be happy and achieve my goals, dreams, etc., no matter how silly and/or impractical.  Score!  Also lots of horsefolks who are great sounding boards and givers-of-advice and otherwise all kinds of helpful in all kinds of ways, including letting me scrape by all this time with no transportation of my own.  Lucky (and grateful) me!
 - Distance riding is uncharted territory for most (though not all) of them, too.

Control-freakiness and geekiness
 + I have this theory that the difference between eventers and dressage riders is that dressage riders want to control everything, whereas eventers want to know everything but then can work with it being whatever it is.  I feel like this ought to serve me well.  Also I am fascinated by the SCIENCE of sport and by detail work and am fully capable of submerging myself in learning and experimentation for as long as it takes (and then some).
 - I feel like this ought to serve me well, which may not be the same thing as it actually doing so!  The flip side of that ability to study is complete insane single-minded obsession, which definitely does not fall into the serve-me-well category.

Knowledge base
 + I have been doing this horse thing long enough to know a thing or two about how to manage my critter and myself, and/or where to find the answers I don't have as I need to find 'em.  I am pretty sure I will not kill us both.
 - But there are aspects of managing a horse's whole program in which I am somewhat out of practice.  I'll do a future post about some of what I'm pondering/investigating in service of that not-killing goal.

Outdoorsiness
 + I've done enough hiking and backpacking to feel comfortable in most normal approximations of wilderness, and to have a sense of what I know and what I don't.  Also to know that I enjoy it!
 - Terrible sense of direction.  Minimal experience in the woods with horses.  Certainly there are forest/parks/situations where I would be in well over my head (though I will be steering clear of those for now).

Fitness
 + Horse fitness I talked about a bit elsewhere.  I'm not too concerned about Tucker; unless we run into a soundness glitch I am confident he can handle at least the LDs, and we'll see from there.  I have been fit in the past, which is nice, and am probably slightly better than "normal" fit right now, and have a rough sketch of a plan to improve on that.
 - I am, uh, less fit than I would like at present time.  I can walk walk walk at a decent pace, ride for an hour or two with no undue consequences, and comfortably made most of the way up Mount Madison in recent memory.  (We got up above the treeline and then the group decided to head back down.)  On the other hand, when I've had occasion to run for more than a quarter-mile or so at a time, the results have been pitiful, and I would like to be fitter than I am.  I also have some history of heat intolerance, and have occasionally been reminded that having heat-related issues and managing them well is not the same thing as not having heat-related issues.

Hmm.

My likelihood of dying if/when temperatures rise into the three digits is not exactly where I wanted to leave this post...but I appear to have run out of bullet points!  So there you go: one scattershot and incomplete assessment of our current situation.  I've been pondering the soundness thing; I think I will tackle that question next.