PUBLISHED!

From the Horse's Mouth...

If only horses could talk.  I'm sure they'd make a lot more sense than some of their human counterparts.  Not that it normally matters to me.  Here is Majesty saying, "How'd you like my new Christmas headcollar?"  See, without even speaking, I know what he's saying...  He lets you know what he's thinking in his own little way.  Like the time Tom told me, "he's telling you 'enough already'" when he (Majesty, not Tom) tried to take a chunk out of me as I struggled to clean his dandruffy mane for far too long.  Thinking about it, Tom does the same too if I'm preening for too long...  And the time that he jumped in the air and spun around a few times when he heard a firecracker; that was him saying "I'm scared, someone's trying to shoot me..." Thankfully Tom was riding him at the time.  And today, he seemed depressed.  The first time I have encountered my horse in a miserable, unhappy, head hung low kind of mood.  It all became clear after a short time riding; he was a little lame on one leg and lugging around my post-Christmas weight was obviously making it worse.  So, we set off back to the stables for a 'shot of bute' to relieve the pain and, I kid you not, a 20-minute heat lamp treatment, administered by moi, on his rump.  He was very patient throughout the process, looking back a few times to see what was going on, but for the most part standing patiently while I heated him up - and hung onto my aching arm.  In an effort to humanize the process, I even tried a little 'deep tissue massage' to help the healing along.  Majesty can now look forward to a couple of days of rest, perhaps some time in the paddock (unless like last time, he jumps out of his into someone else's and proceeds to start a fight....) and be fit and well for a Sunday morning ride.  Let's hope when he sees us his 'horsey voice' is the usual - welcoming and friendly - and not screaming "bugger off to the gym, lard asses, I need to rest up my leg!"

If Music Be the Food of Love...

... I'm full!  There's nothing like a holiday or celebration of some kind to bring out two things in India - a never ending supply of very unsafe fireworks and loud tasteless music.  Of course, New Year's Eve was no exception.  It started (quite late) at 4pm at our apartment; a loud unrecognizable noise which remotely sounded like 24 monkeys playing kazoo's, and one of them on drums.  By 5pm we had progressed onto 'real' music including a rousing disco version of Wham's Last Christmas.  What makes it worse is that we are surrounded by apartment buildings that form a very inconvenient echo chamber meaning that the booming bass booms even more.  Thank god we were going out for dinner to escape the infernal racket!!!  But at our New Year's dinner we didn't escape it either.  After expecting quite violinists in the corner, come 11pm the thumping DJ started playing a mix of bad 80's disco (I kid you not when I say the last record of the year was D I S C O by Ottawa as I recall...) and Bangra Bollywood Beats.  And not content with pouring our free flowing fizz all night, come midnight, the over eager staff decided to drench us with it too, much to the chagrin of Tom, who protested loudly as the bubbles missed his new Christmas tie by inches!  Anyway, back to the music.  It started again today, New Year's Day.  At 8am.  Fabulous.  Happy New Year and here's to a noisy 2008.