This is Toby (his racing name is Rizzmo) enjoying his preliminary training in a riding arena on March 13.
See below for video clips of him and Audi's World, as well as a brief update.
Two More Video Clips From My Launch of 'Love and Death':
Gold
This (very) short story was written during a ten-minute on-the-spot writing challenge during an Uxbridge Writers' Circle meeting.
There was a prompt: a fist-sized, gold-coloured lump.
The wind is so strong I can barely walk to the shed to unearth my spade. I'm hoping it's not frozen to the ground, like it was last April - I had to fetch a kettle of boiling water to swirl around the metal blade and kick it a few times to set it free. No, I'm lucky this year. I must have remembered, when the snow was flying, to put it on a piece of plywood. I make my way to the garden bed, which surrounds the house, with the intent of clearing the packed sodden leaves which fell last autumn. I plan to clear them away from the neatly trimmed edges and to free the bulbs of their deadening canopy - to allow them to sprout. And I have some new bulbs to plant at the corner of the bed.
It takes only two plunges of my spade into the defrosting ground for me to unearth something shiny. The gleaming sun reveals a fist-sized lump of something gold in colour. I have no idea what it is.
My neighbour is a geologist, so he comes to mind as someone who might be able to identify it. I hand it to him as he stands on his doorstep shivering, his reading glasses falling down his nose. His eyes widen and he appears to be fascinated by this unexpected bounty from the earth.
"I'll get back to you, Sid. I'm busy at the moment, but I'll analyze it and let you know."
Epilogue: Of course, this is the last I saw of him and my mystery lump, so I have to assume I parted with a fortune in gold.
Vicky Earle Copyright 2025
Video Clips of Racehorses in Training
Martin and I visited the riding arena where Toby (Rizzmo) and Audi (Audi's World) are 'warming up' in preparation for their move to Woodbine Racetrack planned for March 23.
Toby is the younger one, being (officially) two years old. (All thoroughbred racehorses have the official birthday of January 1). And, of course, he didn't race last year. He will require a lot of training to get to the races this season. Young horses should not be rushed. They need to be ready both mentally and physically to compete on the racetrack.
They need some good luck too! We hope for no illness and while the trainers do their utmost to protect their horses from injury sometimes it happens - a stumble could damage a ligament, for example.
Audi is three. And we hoped he would race last year, but he wasn't ready. He's telling the rider now though, that he needs to get to the racetrack- he's ready to get down to serious work!
I hope you enjoyed these video clips!
Thank you for reading this post, and please share!
PS I'm on page 71 of the first rough draft of book 7 in my Meg Sheppard Mystery Series so I hope you've read the first 6!!
Vicky
Beautiful horses!
I’m off to get my spade to dig for treasure!