Is that a horse following me?

The minion of Mina and bestest mom ever of Celeste has this to report. I'm sure Mina and Celeste have their own commentary. But I have excluded it. Ha, opposable thumbs for the win!

-----

There is a time and place for everything and yesterday it was the time and the place for Celeste to meet horses for the first time. Mainly, it was the time and the place because, well, there were the horses and there was Celeste, sticking her nose through the fence to see the horses. Mina followed suit because Mina wanted to make sure Celeste knew that Mina knew whatever it was Celeste knew. That is how Mina rolls.

Of course, I must point out that Celeste did not actually go up to the fence because there were four large horse heads attached to four large horse bodies. She went over there because it smelled interesting. And when the horses snorted, her strange little ears perked up, she sniffed the air, and then BAM! realized there were four large horse heads attached to four large horse bodies three feet away.



After I took this picture, I told Celeste she was a ninny for being unafraid of horses but petrified a new dog might sniff her butt. She could not answer due to the fact she was sniffing noses with a horse and that was hard work, requiring the same amount of concentration one might give to, I don't know, understanding string theory.

Mina has met horses and cattle and goats and pigs and sheep - she feels they should be sniffed once and then ignored utterly and completely. So while Celeste acknowledged the horses desire for her NOT to be in the pasture with them, Mina thought they were all silly little equines. She walked behind their hooves, under them, in front of them, feigning utter disinterest in the presence of these 1,000 lb animals. I told the horses they were all very big and beautiful and please to not be minding the very small and demure pit bull lurking behind their left hooves. They were all very impressed with my speech, demanded more scratches and were considerate enough not to send Mina flying with those left hooves. I told Mina this was all a very bad idea, that she should perhaps choose another location to look adorable.

So she did. She wandered jauntily further afield. Truly, she jaunted. And if that is not an actual variation of jaunty, it should be added to the dictionary. One horse took it upon herself to act like she had in fact chased the mighty pit bull away and followed Mina at a measured, but leisurely stroll. The horse conveyed to me she was not strolling but was walking with purpose. I wasn't convinced. Neither was Mina who ignored the approaching mare in that special way she has.



No, I did not race across the field to save Mina. I feel a little bad about this but temper my feelings with the fact that my coworker did race across the field to, in his words, "defend Mina from that horse". That horse was easily distracted by butt scratches, which is how I often distract Mina and Celeste from doing inappropriate things like eating wood, grass, chasing squirrels (does not work), eating cats (also does not work), licking themselves, chewing on the table, chewing on what they thought was a toy but was actually my remote control, etc. ad naseum.

In any event, Mina and Celeste bonded with the horses. The horses bonded with me. I nearly bonded too much with a wooden post after one horse got angry over something and shoved the horse I was petting into me and thus into the wooden post. I shook my fist, which they ignored. I threatened them with my pit bull, who had by now returned to stand behind the left rear hoof of the horse who had me pinned to the post. And when this did not work, I scratched her butt. She had to lean a little to the right to appreciate the scratching, which gave me enough room to escape the wooden post.

And then Mina snorted and snorted and snorted and snorted. And I thought she was going to snort out her lung but realized she was trying to snort out a fox-tail. We abandoned the horses in favor of vets and ended our day with a $233 vet bill for the removal of a bloody, two-inch useless piece of grass.

And to answer the question, yes there is a horse following you. Scratch her butt and you will be okay. Watch out for wooden posts.