Or call it equestrians. We've all had those conversations with fellow equestrians where we admit we have a certain level of craziness. If you ask my non-horsey significant other he will tell you all about how nutty us horse people are.
Sometimes though I take my level of horse craziness to a new level. Like the the couple of times where I have owned 5 horses all at once. Or buying a horse without telling my husband and trying to hide said horse from him until I could come up with a plan to break the news (found out grey horses are hard to hide at night). Or driving several hours away to buy a mini horse from a breeder because....well I just wanted one...and I wanted it to have papers...in case I wanted to break into mini horse showing and...stuff. Or waking up in the middle of the night because an unexpected storm rolled in and bringing all the horse in. Or spending hours and hours of my day taking care of all of these equines.
Occasionally I do question my own level of horse craziness/obsession. Let's take last night. It rained all day which in FL means 6+ inches of rain all at once and thus creating small ponds all over the place. I hated the thought of keeping the horses in all night (rain had stopped) so after the National Championship game I went out to the barn and turned everyone out. At midnight. Then cleaned stalls so they would be fresh when they came inside in the morning. And replenished hay. And water. At one point I thought I thought I saw our bedroom light on and thought for sure husband will surely conclude I have lost my mind this time (whew false alarm). Then of course I got up at 5:30 am the next morning to bring horses in and go to work (completely exhausted).
So what sort of crazy things have you done for your horses? Out with it, I can't be the only person who does horse crazy things!
That's quite the commitment! I worry about my horse like crazy, but I don't think I've done anything truly crazy for him. At least not that I think is crazy :)
ReplyDeleteTo see their excitement that they get to be turned out versus staying inside until the next evening makes it worth it :)
DeleteI 100% agree that horse people are all a little bit nuts, it just depends on exactly how nuts we all are! I've never done anything "crazy" but last night sounds like you being a very considerate and responsible owner :)
ReplyDeleteI try to be :)
DeleteHorse people have our own special brand of crazy.
ReplyDeleteFrom November 1st to the end of April the horses on my yard are supposed to be in 24/7. However I have been super lucky and found a plot of land i can lease & turned it into a turnout for the girls. I go almost every lunch break to turn them out and then go back in the evening to refill haynets, top up water and bring them in to hopefully ride before repeating the whole thing again the next day...for 6 months i eat lunch at my desk and go for a whirlwind power walk & bus journeys to turn the little darlings out...my special brand of horse crazy & I wouldn't trade it for anything as i get such peace of mind knowing they can move and aren't locked indoors & can have fresh air and frolicking to their hearts content ♡
Yes!! Happy horses makes my heart happy!
DeletePreach!
DeleteThe craziest thing I did happened last year during that crazy cold and snow we got in early January. The power went out at around 1 in the morning. My husband was out of town that night for work. I use those big heated buckets that sit on the ground was worried about them breaking from the frozen water. Then they'd be useless once the power came back on. So I hauled some buckets out the barn at 1am, dumped the heated bucket water into 5 gallon buckets, hauled those up to the house so they didn't freeze. We didn't have running water in the barn last year. I did leave some in a small bucket for the animals, but knew that was going to freeze shortly anyways.
ReplyDeleteI guess that's more to save money and future effort than for the horses themselves.
Oh, and the power came back on shortly after I finished. I think I waited until morning to bring the water back down to the barn.