Doggies and horsies and sunshine oh my!
Dec. 13th, 2009 08:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stephbgHusband occasionally gets Ideas. "We shall go to the beach on Sunday, at dawn!" he said a few days ago.
We didn't manage dawn by a long shot--mainly because we neglected to check when dawn was--but arbitrarily picked 6:30AM as a time to get up. I think this was at about 1:30AM. We were sober, but not quite ourselves. On the bright side, I'm now a lot clearer on the history of the Protestant movement*. Yes, we were sober.
We arrived at the dog beach at about 7:00AM, and it was well and truly occupied. We settled in the shade of the dunes to watch dozens of extremely happy doggies rush out onto the beach like bullets from a gun. There was the usual assortment of tiny, medium and big doggies, but I'd have to say the population was skewed towards medium. There was one HUGE great dane. Maybe the tiny doggies were still having their lattes.
Husband went for a dip while I held the keys. I hadn't come prepared to swim, but it was a beautifully calm day and I might have been persuaded. The air temperature had galloped ahead of the water temperature though, and when Husband eventually made the plunge in up to the neck he said a word that I was sure I lip read correctly, but which he later denied. It wasn't "Wow it's cold" that's for sure.
From his vantage point he'd seen that there were actually horses on the horse beach, so we decamped north. There are almost never horses on the horse beach at the times I usually walk there (trust me; I'd have mentioned it), but clearly early on a hot Sunday is the time to go.
At first it was just the expected battery farm racehorses being walked in the water by the ubiquitous teenaged girlslaves strappers. But over time an amazing variety of horses came to the beach:
* A heavy horse of the clydesdale/shire persuasion did not want to get his huge feathered feet wet, despite the urgings of the girl with him. More than once she attempted to lead him by tug-o'-war which was a strength match she was never going to win. Hello, physics. She produced a carrot and waved it enticingly(?) in front of the horse's face. Where do I start with this? Firstly, it's a horse, not a cat: grass doesn't wiggle enticingly. Secondly, take a moment to look at the horse's eyes, and consider their role as prey on the open plains: right in front of their face is not a good place to show them something of interest.
* At the other end of the spectrum were two miniature ponies, who were without doubt smaller than the great dane I'd seen earlier. You could feel the collective aaaawwww as they were led on to the beach, despite the slightly less romantic cry of "Don't step on my bloody foot!" from one of their handlers. They (the ponies) were very playful and seemed to love the water.
* A beautiful skewbald part arab (maybe welsh pony x) was the target of unwanted attention from some illegally unleashed dogs. They nipped at her heels and the pony would have been quite justified in kicking, but she didn't. Hew owner looked like she wanted to bite the dog owners. I'd have helped.
* A golden palomino strode onto the beach like the sun itself. Wow. Quarterhorseish, but not enough quarters to be a full quarter. Maybe a half quarter, or a quarter quarter. He went into the water without fuss, but at knee deep he decided to paw at the water with some enthusiasm.
I let them have their space and didn't approach the owners with requests to say hello to their charges, but next time I should just go up and ask. They can only say no. OK, they can very very rudely say no (boy can they rudely say no), but I'm starved for horse contact (the sculpting both helps and makes the cravings for the real thing worse) and might score a win. If the horse is willing :-)
(*) He couldn't sleep so we wikipedia'd the development of Catholic offshoots. As you do.
We didn't manage dawn by a long shot--mainly because we neglected to check when dawn was--but arbitrarily picked 6:30AM as a time to get up. I think this was at about 1:30AM. We were sober, but not quite ourselves. On the bright side, I'm now a lot clearer on the history of the Protestant movement*. Yes, we were sober.
We arrived at the dog beach at about 7:00AM, and it was well and truly occupied. We settled in the shade of the dunes to watch dozens of extremely happy doggies rush out onto the beach like bullets from a gun. There was the usual assortment of tiny, medium and big doggies, but I'd have to say the population was skewed towards medium. There was one HUGE great dane. Maybe the tiny doggies were still having their lattes.
Husband went for a dip while I held the keys. I hadn't come prepared to swim, but it was a beautifully calm day and I might have been persuaded. The air temperature had galloped ahead of the water temperature though, and when Husband eventually made the plunge in up to the neck he said a word that I was sure I lip read correctly, but which he later denied. It wasn't "Wow it's cold" that's for sure.
From his vantage point he'd seen that there were actually horses on the horse beach, so we decamped north. There are almost never horses on the horse beach at the times I usually walk there (trust me; I'd have mentioned it), but clearly early on a hot Sunday is the time to go.
At first it was just the expected battery farm racehorses being walked in the water by the ubiquitous teenaged girl
* A heavy horse of the clydesdale/shire persuasion did not want to get his huge feathered feet wet, despite the urgings of the girl with him. More than once she attempted to lead him by tug-o'-war which was a strength match she was never going to win. Hello, physics. She produced a carrot and waved it enticingly(?) in front of the horse's face. Where do I start with this? Firstly, it's a horse, not a cat: grass doesn't wiggle enticingly. Secondly, take a moment to look at the horse's eyes, and consider their role as prey on the open plains: right in front of their face is not a good place to show them something of interest.
* At the other end of the spectrum were two miniature ponies, who were without doubt smaller than the great dane I'd seen earlier. You could feel the collective aaaawwww as they were led on to the beach, despite the slightly less romantic cry of "Don't step on my bloody foot!" from one of their handlers. They (the ponies) were very playful and seemed to love the water.
* A beautiful skewbald part arab (maybe welsh pony x) was the target of unwanted attention from some illegally unleashed dogs. They nipped at her heels and the pony would have been quite justified in kicking, but she didn't. Hew owner looked like she wanted to bite the dog owners. I'd have helped.
* A golden palomino strode onto the beach like the sun itself. Wow. Quarterhorseish, but not enough quarters to be a full quarter. Maybe a half quarter, or a quarter quarter. He went into the water without fuss, but at knee deep he decided to paw at the water with some enthusiasm.
I let them have their space and didn't approach the owners with requests to say hello to their charges, but next time I should just go up and ask. They can only say no. OK, they can very very rudely say no (boy can they rudely say no), but I'm starved for horse contact (the sculpting both helps and makes the cravings for the real thing worse) and might score a win. If the horse is willing :-)
(*) He couldn't sleep so we wikipedia'd the development of Catholic offshoots. As you do.
