Fall UnEase

    I don't know what is going on with everyone getting sick around here.  First AA, that big Thoroughbred mare that used to live in Boston had a belly ache and she was lying down and pawing until the lady gave her some medicine and then she felt better.  Then my Mom Tudi started lying down and was sad.  So the lady called some guy who stuck a needle in her neck and then she felt better.  And then yesterday, the black Tux, who lives with us, got sick and he didn't want to move.  He would just stand there.  He is quiet and sensitive and doesn't say much and the (other) bossy ponies didn't even know he was sick at first.  They would tell him to get out of their way and when he didn't, they would bite him. So the lady made him go into the White Hill with her and she washed off his feet and then another lady came when it was dark and she stuck a bunch of needles in his neck.  So I think he is feeling better now.  He is getting a lot of hay to eat in there and he doesn't even have to eat it through these nets in boxes.  
   But the lady said she is getting fed up with all these sick and dead and suicidal and stupid animals.  She has to keep dumping out Fusion and Artie's water trough because mice jump in there that can't swim. And then there was the raccoon.  He had decorated his fur with burdocks, so I guess he wanted to show it off.  He walked right up in the middle of the day and sat by the barn door watching the lady while she was making loud bang noises with a long brown stick.  You know, the barn is full of those noisy little brown birds, and sometimes after she pointed the stick at the birds, one would fall down. So she saw the raccoon sitting there watching her and she said "Shoo!"  I don't know why she thought saying "Shoo" would make the raccoon run away if the loud bang noises didn't.  Wow, if that was me, I would have run off when I heard the first bang, but not that raccoon. He just strolled over closer to the lady and sat down.  So then the lady went in the place where she keeps medicines and some carrots and brown and black leather things and when she came back out, she pointed the stick at the raccoon and it went bang again.  Then the raccoon fell over dead.   I think the lady felt bad for the raccoon, what with it being all friendly and everything, but she said that wild things are supposed to act like wild things, like the deer that run off and wave their tails at her when she gets close to them.  And she didn't think those dogs that live in the other barn with her would want to be friends with the raccoon.
   So I hope no one else is acting weird or sick around here.  It is getting chilly and we are all wearing warm fuzzy coats and are pretty chubby, so I guess we are ready for when that white cold stuff falls out of the sky.  But I would rather have nice grass!      

For kicks

    Today was wonderful!  The boxes that the lady brought to our field with the big orange machine were sitting there this morning and here came that lady with hay in the back of the little green truck and she put it right inside the boxes.  We all shoved each other out of the way and tried to pull the hay out through those nasty nets, but now there are so many boxes that everyone can eat hay at the same time so even when we are jostling and switching around we can still be eating.  Even Haylie and little Krissy can eat from some of the boxes.  Then the sun was out and warm, so most of us laid down and the lady came out and handed out carrots.  It was so nice with our bellies full and lying in the sun that we didn't even get up.  We made that lady reach down and give us the carrots. She took Harley and Krissy and Tux over to the White Hill and they got to eat carrots there and then they even went down to the barn where they got their forelocks combed.  The rest of us didn't even care because it was so nice out there by the boxes.
     Then the lady took some carrots out to the young horses and ponies that live with that cranky Red mare.  She took the little bay horse, Mat, with the white feet in front and combed him and put brown stuff on him and squirted stuff in his mouth.  Then she started to make his feet pretty.  Actually, his feet looked fine to me, so I don't know why she wanted to mess with them.  He didn't want her to mess with them either and he told her so a couple of times.  Sometimes that lady just doesn't listen to reason.  So she went to pick up his foot and Wham!  -- she was flying back into the wall.  Her dark shade things that she wears in front of her eyes went into the dirt and she had mud all down the side of her face and there was even red stuff under her mouth. She got up and looked pretty surprised.  I don't usually notice things like this, but I think her teeth were shorter.   So then she picked up his feet again anyway, but she only trimmed a little bit off the one that kicked her in the face.  And she didn't trim anything off the other ones. She just put him back in the pasture and went into her barn where she lives.  Then we didn't see her for a while, but when she came back, she didn't have dirt on her face any more and parts of it were really pink and shiny.  We didn't get any more carrots, so we are hopeful there will be more tomorrow.        

innocent ponies

Ha! Ha!  We are all such clever ponies!  Some tree branches fell on our fence tape and it was flat.  We could walk right over it.   We went into a wonderful grassy field and ran all around.  Then we went up a big hill and at the top the ground was black and hard and there were barns with windows that had people inside them.  So we ran back down the hill. You know that man with the nice grass in his yard?  He came to the lady's house and he told her that we ran up the hill and back down.  He said that some people called his house because they thought we belonged to him.  Ha!  If that man belonged to us we would be eating his nice grass! So the lady and the man came back to look at us, but we all acted like we hadn't been anywhere.  We just stood there in a bunch in our pasture and hoped the lady didn't notice that the fence tape was flat.  But she walked back there and put it back up.  Then that smart man asked which one I was?  He said he recognized me and said that I will have something exciting to write in my blog today!     

Fall fashion

My new do

burdocks

weeds w/burrs

So Fall is here which means that the opportunities abound for those of us fashion conscious gals to accessorize.  Of course, I am already glamorous in my luxurious shiny new coat with its intricate shading of red, gray and black.  But even I like to make a little extra effort as the pastures offer up a chance to try new forelock styles.  Some of the ponies go in for the whole mane effect and others even decorate their tails, but I personally find that less is more in that department.  So I am currently flaunting a fairly discreet if intricate forelock roll.   How do I do it, you ask?  Well, you need the right sort of ornamental plants in your pasture, for starters.  Everyone knows the classic pony adornment is the burdock.  These are robust plants and grow to large sizes, so they can be used by horses as well as ponies. As you can see in the pic, they are currently in perfect condition to be introduced into the forelock and can then be shaped and molded as the pony desires.  Burdocks have the additional bonus of coming apart as they age, so they are perfect for those who prefer a more extreme style, like the unicorn look that Krissy was sporting this morning.   A more recent arrival on the decorative scene is this weird weed that usually grows by the streams.  It has a hard burr that really sticks to your forelock and it doesn't come out easily, so it is excellent for the long term.  This weed can get pretty tall, but it tends to stoop down low as it grows, so you mostly have to walk along the stream to get it.  I was thinking the lady didn't like these weeds too much, because she whacked them down in my dad Bob's pasture (he had REALLY fancied up his mane and tail with them!)  but then today, she came down to our stream and cut them all down and carried them away back up to the barn.  So she must want them all for herself.  And she combed out everyone's forelock and tail except I wouldn't let her do mine.  I prefer to be the fashion plate of the farm! 

fall days

    The days are perfect!  We had been eating nice grass by our pond and after we ate that all up, now we are back in the other field.  There is only a little bit of grass out here so we have to look for it really hard and we almost get dirt in our teeth trying to bite it off.  But it's not like we have a whole lot of other stuff to do every day.  Now we are getting luxurious fur coats and all of us pony mares are glamorously Rubenesque.  There are hardly any bugs.  It is grand.
    The lady came down to our field with the big noisy orange machine and looked at a gate into my dad Bob's pasture that is right next to our field.  She never uses that gate, but I guess she wanted to do something different with the big orange machine. But there was a great big gray nest with a hole in the bottom of it hanging on the fence right next to the gate.  So the lady got one of those red metal can things and a long shiny stick and in the morning, she squirted white stuff on the nest and then she poked it with the stick.  All us ponies went over to watch.  We thought those skinny yellow bugs would come out of it.  But nothing happened. So the lady knocked it down and still nothing happened.  There was only one bug inside and it was big and black.  So that ended up being pretty boring.
   So then she came down to see us and she had carrots and was trying to give us the carrots but my brother Harley kept butting his nose in and biting us.  He wanted all the carrots for himself.  So the lady sat on his back and he didn't have a halter on his head or anything. The lady would say "Wo" and Harley would stop and then he'd get a carrot.  So then my little sister Elf came over to see if she could get a carrot. Harley is not big on sharing so he took off after Elf to try to bite her.  You should have seen that lady's face!  Wahoo! Harley did not stop when she said "Wo."  So she jumped off and told Harley he was naughty and he didn't get any more carrots. Harley was sad and he followed her all the way over to the fence.  So then none of us got any more carrots.  I think that Harley ruined it for everyone.           

sunny day

Can you believe that horse Rita came along and hijacked MY blog?   I was pretty annoyed when I saw it.  If she had been  here, I would have jumped at her and tried to bite her like I did with Toby when he came barging in between me and the lady the other day and the lady almost fell down.  But you know, yesterday was a perfect day, hardly any bugs and the sun was warm and it was breezy and we got to go out in the nice grass by the pond and there was even extra grass where the lady moved the fence, so I got over it pretty fast.  You know, that Rita is the same color as my Mom.  And I was that color when I was little too. So MAYBE I will let her do that again some time.
   So, like I was saying, yesterday was super fun and all us ponies were standing around in the sun with our bellies full and here comes that lady with a halter.  Well, there was no way we were going to leave that nice grass forever, never, at all, ever.  So we turned around and pretended that lady was nowhere around.  We stuck our noses in the grass so she could see how starving and busy we were. I guess she could see how important it was for us to eat that grass, because she just walked up to one of the ponies and started one of the carrot-getting games.  It is a simple game once you figure it out.  The lady paws at her face and makes a funny noise with her mouth and kind of sticks her lips out.  "Kiss," she says.  At first, when she did that we thought she had flies on her face and was trying to get them off.  So we stayed back because we have enough of our own flies.  So then she would hold a carrot up by her face and do it some more. Once I saw that carrot, I figured she wanted me to have it and I stuck my nose up toward it and she made that other funny noise that means "carrot!" and then I got the carrot.  So it turns out that all you have to do is stick your nose against her face and you get a carrot.  The hard part is waiting.  You don't get a carrot if you just stick your nose in her face.  Some of the ponies haven't figured that out yet.  So anyway, as soon as we saw the carrot game was underway, we all wanted to get in on it. My brother Harley, of course, got right in the middle and then he followed the lady around and warned everyone else away.  So she put the halter on him and had him do some of the other carrot games.  He got a lot of carrots.
   It is nice by our pond because the stupid geese are not there.  A couple of days ago, right when the sun came up, there were lots of bangs in the field by where Rita lives and some geese fell out of the sky.  So maybe that is why the geese are gone.  That big yellow coyote has been hanging around here, but  I don't think he made the geese go away.  He tries to sneak up on the geese but they laugh at him and fly away.  I think the lady calls him Wily.                      

Robust Rita

So I am not Tinkerbelle.  All of us horses think that maybe Tink is a little biased and you are not getting enough of the right information about us.  So the other horses voted me to be the horse rep.  I am Rita.  We know we are in the minority here on the farm,  And we are not all dazzling different colors like those fancy ponies are, but someone ought to be extolling our virtues anyway.  Besides, everyone knows that the lady likes brown horses with black points and she isn't keen on white feet, so what would you expect most of us horses to look like?  So anyway,  I live in a big pasture with five other mares.  The lady calls us the "Bay Bunch."  There is a mare named A and her daughters Jewel and Alexis.  A actually has a long name that she used when she was at the racetrack.   But it is too long to use around the farm.  And there is a funny three year old named Fleur Scho.  Her Mom, Red, lives next door with a bunch of young ponies. Red used to be the boss of everyone, so Fleur thought she was quite the princess when she moved in here, but we taught her a thing or two.  And then there is my Mom, Mari.  Mari's full name is Mariposa because the lady thinks she looks like one of those Monarch butterflies.  (She used to go see lots of those butterflies when she lived in Mexico.)  Mari could have been a race horse too, like A, except that she doesn't have some kind of papers that horses need to do that.  Her dad won a fancy race a long time ago called the Kentucky Derby.   But she never met her dad and she doesn't have any racetrack stories.  My Dad. Lafleur, died last year.  He used to live next door where that Red mare lives with the ponies now.  My full name is La Florita, which means little flower.   I am very pretty and only a little bit bossy.  When I was just a year old, I saw that the one gate to our pasture was open a little bit, so I stuck my head in there to see if I could reach some of the grass on the other side. But it didn't open any further, so I tried to yank my head back out and the gate grabbed my head and held on to it.  AHHH!   I threw my head around and the latch pin from the gate went right into my head below my ear.  OWW!   When I got free, I had a hole about as big around as my eye and as deep as half my hoof  in my head.  Lots of the blood inside me ran out the hole and then I could hardly walk.  And then my face felt funny and didn't work right.  So then I got better and now I just have some white hairs where the hole was in my head, but my nose is crooked and half of my mouth is kind of floppy.  I think it is getting more like it used to be tho.  The lady tells me to eat grass for therapy, so I am good at that.  After my Dad died,  a lot of horses and ponies moved around to different pastures and me and A moved out back and lived with two ponies named Taca and Bob.  That Bob!  He is pushy and noisy and I just tried to ignore him when I got back there, but he kind of grows on you after a while.   So I decided he could be my boyfriend.   And then when the trees started to get leaves on them, me and A moved back up here with these mares again.  So I have only seen Bob in passing a few times since.  The lady says I look pregnant, but you know, we have a lot of green grass and so she says ALL of us mares look pregnant.  We are a robust bunch.