January and February in Arizona means citrus season.  Including oranges, like these delicious blood oranges from my backyard tree:

You just gotta get over the name and the ruby-red color inside that gives them their name.

 But that wasn’t the kind of orange I wanted to talk about today.

This one is:

Yes, my Renegade is sitting on my guitar case. Blending two facets of my life.

Also known as “Hunter Orange”, “Safety Orange”, and “Blaze Orange” in various applications, I’m specifically talking about Renegade’s signature color: Sport Orange.

It’s distinctive.  It’s hard to miss.  On the rare occasion the boot might come off, it’s easy to spot.  It actually looks good on most color of horses.

(History Lesson: Ironically, I have only ever run with orange Renegades once…Mimi’s very first pair, a set of Beamer’s old boots, I co-opted as an experiment right before a ride to “see if they’d work.”  25 miles later, I decided she needed her own set of shiny boots.  Quite a few pairs, and five years later, they’re still working.  But because Mimi’s registered name is Skip Me Gold, I usually ran her in Yellow Gold boots.  That may have to change…I’m getting pretty attached to these orange ones.)

But in the last couple of weeks, I’ve taken to subconsciously surrounding myself with the color orange.

It’s in a couple of travel mugs:

White one is actually plastic.  Bought with ridecamp and horse trailer-living survival in mind.  The other one is just pretty.

This was actually purchased a couple of years ago.

And of course, I’m proudly wearing my colors:

Jacket won at the McDowell Ride raffle in November. A sign of things to come? (Not pictured: the several Renegade t-shirts I possess.)

And then I got really excited when I found these boots from Ariat:

The same boots I already own and adore as fabulous barn work boots, but mine don’t have orange on them.  Is it wrong for me to wish for my current boots to quickly wear out so I can get these?  (Good luck on that…Ariat boots wear like iron.  These are 5+ years old, and my Terrains are 7+.)

And then they have these:

More appropriate for when I’m not hanging out in the barnyard.  My own signature red cowboy boots may have some competition.

(Note: Not a spokesperson for Ariat.  Just been wearing their boots for the past 16 years.)

And then there’s this shirt:

I actually got this shirt about ten years ago (and worn it maybe half a dozen times since?) on a whim at my very last show.  Wearing Western shirts (as opposed to the jackets and/or vests/slinkies that made up the Western Pleasure/Equitation outfits) for reining classes was very popular at the time.  Not that it helped me do better or worse in the classes, but I felt more important.  Or something.  I justified it on the basis that: I was competing in something like 5 or 6 Reining and Western Riding classes, and more importantly, I liked the colors.  (If the detail isn’t showing up very well, it’s orange, black, white, and lime green plaid.)

I kept the shirt as a fond memory of that last show, and have since discovered it’s lightweight enough to make a good overshirt for riding.  As if my wild tights weren’t enough, right?

My next task is to get a pair of wild orange tights.  I’ve already found a few fabrics online…

(Oh, yeah, forgot one of the more obvious…the blog color scheme. :))