Well, what a few days it’s been! I have been baked alive, rained on, blown sideways and had an altercation with a bunch of fast-moving flying lawnmowers trailing white, red and blue smoke, but I have also met literally hundreds of people, been stroked so much that I think I’ve actually lost facial hair and been photographed more than Kim Kardashian.
It was very much a tale of two very different days — well, in weather terms anyway. Wednesday dawned bright and sunny. I’d been left in the night before with strict instructions to levitate all night so thus not getting my glowing white feathers (thanks to Aunty Em’s fearsome scrubbing skills) mucky and so I was awoken by mum and Aunty Em arriving to get me ready.
My exec transport arrived and suitably booted I loaded like the total pro I am and we were off. By the time we arrived at the showground and sneaked in our special entrance (I am a star after all and don’t go in with the normal people), the heat was rising rapidly with the sun already high in the sky.
Because mum, Aunty Em and the Bransby crew are totally understanding of my status (and quite frankly who the talent of the relationship is) I had been provided a gazebo for shade in my pen while Aunty Em and mother were left to cook outside like a pair of slow roasting chickens. The fact that the pair of them looked like part-baked lobsters by the end of the day is probably testament to how hot it was.
So I settled in for a long day (10 hours people — I deserve a sainthood) of cuddling, posing, allowing large groups of school children to crawl all over me, meeting existing fans and making new ones and generally hobnobbing with everyone be that school kids, mayors, Hovites, news crews and VIPs.
Mum and Aunty Em slow roasted while I got a sponge bath every 30-40 minutes and enjoyed my gazebo (although to my utter horror people did seem to think I was sweating more than a fat dude at a cake convention — it was WATER people).
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Mum was interviewed by various radio shows, which let’s face it, is more her forte than mine — she has a face for radio whereas I’m destined for TV and film. Whereas I got filmed by the Lincolnite and another crew who mum didn’t manage to get the names of. A copy of the Lincolnite video can be seen below and mum is hoping to upload all the radio sound files to my Facebook page — just so that it looks like she actually did some work for the two days she was there.
Who's been getting into the show spirit?See more highlights from day one of the Lincolnshire Show here – http://thelincolnite.co.uk/?p=198979Posted by The Lincolnite on Wednesday, June 21, 2017
By the end of the first day we’d made some serious money for the charity, made a lot of people’s days (if not lives) and mother had developed a red nose so bright that there was concern that aircraft may divert from other airports thinking her face was a landing light.
I shall save the Thursday details for another day — suffice to say it involved more cuddles, mother with borderline sunstroke, a run in with the Red Arrows and an offer of rehoming…
Until next week.
Laters,
Hovis
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Hovis shared his weekly diary each Friday on the Horse & Hound website between 2008 and February 2025. Initially located on the popular H&H forum, he moved to the main website in February 2013. He published nine books, each to raise funds for his local equine welfare charity Bransby Horses. You can read all his diary entries below. H&H also published a final tribute to our much-loved equine contributor.
