Hovis’ Friday diary: ‘Is it too much to ask?’
Mary King riding Hovis at Belton Horse Trials.
(Image credit: Karen Thompson)
Dear diary,
So much for spring finding some balls and you know, springing. After a few days of glorious naked romping we have spent much of this week getting absolutely soaked. If more rain had run down my nose, Niagara Falls would have been suing me for copyright infringement. As it is, I’m pretty sure some of the local mice turned up thinking I was a water park; very wet and not very wild…
Is it too much to ask for some actual consistency? I mean, I know Mother Nature is a woman and thus, I would have more success asking a snake to grow boobies than her actually be anything like reasonable, but heh, a boy can try, right?
At the time of penning this missive, we are still all in our winter fields, because every time we get to the cusp of moving to the very green and nice looking summer fields, the aforementioned mercurial one unleashes some fresh wet hell and the decision is reversed for fear of trashing the summer fields in the tsunami. At this rate we will still be in our winter fields in July, which then means looking forward to a winter of three blades of grass a day because frankly, my field is so bad I think it’s going to need a lot more than a “rest”. More like rehab and a lot of therapy…
Talking of people who can actually ride, I note once again (and frankly this is getting boring in its regularity) that my name is a glaring omission from the summer party lists again? I mean the stressage one is no loss in my view – I have the moves but frankly I only like pulling them freestyle and usually upon seeing a tractor – but the showjumping and eventing ones just once again show the alarming levels of featherism rife in elite sport. If I was a puny, spindly-legged thoroughbred with my kind of skillz, I’d have a queue longer than that for the ladies’ toilets at a Taylor Quick concert. But because I am manly, and muscled and feathery, instead I am treated with the sort of distain usually reserved for finding a bug in one’s Pimm’s (unless you’re mother and she just views it as protein…).
Now, I have to say I am in a mixed mind, because I understand said party is in France and we all know what they eat in France. With my manly buttocks and beefy thighs, I fear that it would be like a well fattened seal prancing about in front of a hungry whale and I’m not sure how good they are as a nation at resisting temptation. I suppose I could round up some snails in advance and throw them behind me like edible flack as I hurtle around the cross-country course?
Anyways, I will stand by the phone, look at my summer fields and practice parleying le Francy.
Laters,
Hovis
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