Little John

I found out today that Moss's posh name is Little John.

I've spent the day with Lou, starting off with an hour or so at a nearby horse show. Lou and Moss jumped in two classes, but he knocked fences down in both unfortunately. He was the biggest horse competing, being a large hunter compared to the more dainty, svelt show jumpers. He brings fences down with his back legs and Lou jokes it's because he's so long that by the time his back end arrives at the fence, he's forgotten what he was doing and lets his hooves drop! But he's such a sweetie, so we don't care.

By the way, he did clear this fence, despite looking as though he's ploughing through it!

Back to the farm for a sandwich and then whilst Lou and James were having a meeting, I went out into the garden with Jack ( the dog ) and Mr B ( the cat ). Somehow, I ended up gardening!

Next thing I knew it was time to milk, and as James wanted to go fertilizing the pastures, I helped Lou. It wasn't a bad session, but it did seem to go on for ages as the cows were particularly keen to pee and poo in the parlour! Lou had a lucky escape - I looked across to talk to her and saw a cow directly above her lift her tail ... " Moooove!! "

After milking we made toad-in-the-hole then went for a ride, leaving instructions with James and his mate Pete about when to take it out ( ie before they went to the pub! ).

Had a bit of a scare with Winnie as we were about to go out for a hack. She was a bit grumpy because Moss had been out with us and was giving Lou a hard time, when suddenly she fell to the floor. I think she'd become so het up she'd slipped, then scared herself. Lou got her up but she was behaving so perculiarly that she kept the stable door closed and I stood outside with Moss so she could see him. She had another little freak out and went down again. She just sat there, not knowing what to do. She eventually got up with encouragement from us and I said maybe we should just untack them and let them out into the field, but Lou wanted to try getting her out to settle her. It was raining steadily by now, but we mounted and set off through the woods.

By the time we got back an hour or so later all seemed to be well and Winnie had composed herself.

We ate, joined the menfolk at the pub for a shandy and I left for home about 10pm. Sav had been out on the razzle with the blokes from work on a leaving do for someone. He arrived at the train station an hour after I got home so I went to pick him up - we had to drive with the windows down as, in his own words , he'd " drunk too much and didn't feel well "! Luckily he doesn't throw up, and is now fast asleep in the spare room as his breathe would give me a hang over!!

Forgive the lack of commenting. I will try to catch up over the weekend.