{"piano":{"sandbox":"false","aid":"u28R38WdMo","rid":"R7EKS5F","offerId":"OF3HQTHR122A","offerTemplateId":"OTQ347EHGCHM"}}

Hovis’ Friday diary: ‘My field sounds like mother – prone to over exaggeration and a tad high-maintenance’


  • Dear diary,

    Thank you to all of you for your sympathy and good wishes upon seeing the damage that the cutesy carrot coloured carnivore had wreaked upon my mouth last week. It was fair to say I looked like I had attempted to play tonsil hockey with a shark and the thought of putting anything into my mouth was frankly horrible. To be clear, by that I mean things like bits and the like – food was something I managed to battle through, manfully, obviously. Let’s be honest peoples, I am skinny enough as it is due to the mothership’s perpetual fascination with diets – although sadly for both my back and her trouser seams, this seems to be mainly limited to other people’s…

    By the beginning of the week it was beginning to heal sufficiently for me to test the healing powers of salvia (other people’s) with Crazy Daisy, and unfortunately for me to be deemed fine to work. Luckily for me, I was also due some new shoes so I did spend a day waiting for Cool New Shoes Man and thus avoided any hare-brained schemes involving hacking in the hurricanes we have been subjected to this week. Wheelie bins are dangerous enough without them lungeing at you at high speed from behind hedges powered by storm Ninja-knickers, or whatever other stupidly named weather phenomena we are being subjected to this week…

    Cool New Shoes Man, as always, was thrilled to see me, and got all red and embarrassed when I leaned into him for a cuddle – the way he gets all flustered and breathes so heavily is endearing. I know that being so close to equine royalty is overwhelming, but I would have thought after 15+ years of shoeing me that he might have found a way to cope with it. I note he doesn’t get so red faced when he shoes Barbie Boy, but then again despite his attempts to usurp me, we all know who the true celebrity is around these parts and this, for me, provides evidence to prove it.

    He did comment to mother that I was in rude health, which I take to mean looking every inch the lady killer I am, but possibly in need of access to more grass. As I have apparently caused post traumatic stress to worms in my paddock by hooling around to the extent that the resulting earth shaking had seismologists convinced of the movement of the tectonic plates, I have been put into the all-weather turnout on a few occasions of late to give my field “chance to recover”. Frankly, my field sounds like mother – prone to over exaggeration and more than a tad high-maintenance…

    I am hopeful we may be moving to our summer fields shortly, which from what I can see, look like they have a lot of the green stuff in them. But knowing mother, I shall be limited to sniffing it for 15 minutes a day while wearing a grazing muzzle gaffer taped to my face. Why she can’t see that the same approach might help her, I know not – it would certainly cure the side effects of her see food diet. But then as I have always said, if she was subjected to the same standards that she subjects me to then she would have been euthanised years ago.

    Anyways, I am off to stare longingly into our summer fields, while praying for someone to ignore the current reprisal of winter weather and actually acknowledge that it’s time to move to them. I may even promise to keep the hooling down to a minimum.

    Laters,

    Hovis

    You might also be interested in:

    Horse & Hound magazine, out every Thursday, is packed with all the latest news and reports, as well as interviews, specials, nostalgia, vet and training advice. Find how you can enjoy the magazine delivered to your door every week, plus options to upgrade your subscription to access our online service that brings you breaking news and reports as well as other benefits. 

    Stay in touch with all the news in the run-up to and throughout major shows like London International and more with a Horse & Hound subscription. Subscribe today for all you need to know ahead of these major events, plus online reports on the action as it happens from our expert team of reporters and in-depth analysis in our special commemorative magazines. Have a subscription already? Set up your unlimited website access now

    You may like...