'It's a funny old game'

The pre-dawn malaise and pouring rain evaporate as Tessa Waugh relishes a morning's autumn hunting - even when her pony gets a bit frisky and things don't go entirely to plan

- Tessa Waugh

HOW are you getting on? Horse fit and ready? Loving the first few mornings? Autumn is a heady time of year for hunting people, full of promise and expectation, but we have been slightly short of sunshine and rainbows around here recently.

Jess, who has helped us with the horses for the last year or so, has just announced that she is off to live in New Zealand with her boyfriend James. They are going at the end of the month. My horse, Jim, is lame again, cut himself in the field with perfect timing just before we started. I am hoping that it's the cut, not the tendon that he injured earlier this year, which is causing the problem.