Hola, Sneakers! Welcome to the 511th episode of the podcast that won’t stop, can’t stop!
This week: crowning glory; weak teeth; sticks and bones; soothing grind; boring grind; burning eyeballs; Porsche payments; cheques and balances; animal voodoo; sports of kings; flying horses; battle cats; rhetorical question; horse mysteries; wrong turn; theme cake; specialized dishes; dislocated food; sad dad; sibling harmony; family museum; moving back; basic chef; sidewalk dentistry; RIP Norm MacDonald; locker room humour; plain speaking; too much religion; wringing humour out of face cancer; sharing weakness; awkward hugs; obligatory kisses; unpredicable Ed; designed for menial tasks; you might be a jedi; it’s a Covid-y world; body books; jelly jam; keep on tractorin’; eating a meal song; and, finally, the 444!
Question of the Week: Have you ever owned a horse? Or – let’s make this less niche – have you ever had the pleasure – or displeasure – of riding a horse?
Sub-question of the Week: Who is your favourite female action star?
Thanks for listening.
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HAVE I EVER OWNED A HORSE?!?!? Well, I’m glad you asked. Get comfie there for a few hours and let me tell you all about them!!
Currently I own two: Harris (a bay, 14 hh at year old Connemara) and Archie (a chestnut, 16.1 hh 7 year old thoroughbred).
The first pony I owned was a pinto Welsh cross named Diamond whom we thought was a bit of a brat but looking back, I recognize now that he put up with a lot from us; after that I had my wonderful Misty, a grey Welsh/Arab mare. When I was 12 my parents bought me a three year old off track thoroughbred mare (what were they thinking?!?) called Jenny. After that I owned a successive of off the track thoroughbred geldings: Buddy, BJ, Baker, Scampi, and one Appendix mare, Phoenix. When the girls were little we also bought them a pony called Rocky (whom Mary always called Wotty). There were a few others I owned for short times that people gave me (Ginger, Ashley, Nordic) that I passed on to others.
For female action star I liked Linda Hamilton in Terminator II or Carrie-Ann Moss in The Matrix.
And I forgot to add that I have had the pleasure to ride many, many horses – probably thousands. There have been a few that were displeasures to ride, but only three that I would call real and consistent displeasures; all were horses people had sent to me for training. The first one bucked me off three weeks in a row, getting progressively worse each time – the last time, I was determined to hang on, and I stayed on for the full length of the ring while he bucked and twisted and corkscrewed and bronced beneath me, until eventually I gave up and let go, not a second too soon as in his next step he threw himself against the fence and I would have been crushed. The other one was just an extremely spooky, reactive, inconsistent horse that eventually reared up and hopped like a kangaroo, and I came off the back, landed flat on my back but somehow managed to break my collarbone. The third was a pony who had been feral and then the original trainer had been too hard on her – she took exception to something I did and flipped herself over backwards onto me, fortunately only landing on my femur, not my pelvis or thorax. I didn’t break anything but it damaged the muscle in the front of my thigh, which resulted in a loss of muscle/a big dent in my leg, and me limping for about six months.
Resigned to being called the Great Gazoo of Sneaky Dragon. I deserve it.
I’ve only ridden horses a few times…enough to know that galloping is fun and trotting can be painful, even if you’ve read about how to “post” in the Nancy Drew mystery, The Ringmaster’s Secret. My most memorable trail ride was in Hawaii. We followed a scenic path across the ranch then took a trail down to a beach. We rode over sand as the waves crashed and the winds whipped around us. It was so romantic…for all the honeymoon couples I was riding with. The wrangler commandeered the couples’ cameras and took photos of them kissing on horseback. I was the only one in the group without a partner because my boyfriend told me he didn’t like riding because he fell off a horse once. Not that I was bitter at the time. Nope, I saved that for a couple of years later when he told me he’d run into a friend while he was in Alberta and went with her and her other friend on a horseback ride through the Badlands. People: don’t do something with someone else that you told your partner you didn’t want to do with them. Or if you do, keep it to yourself!
My favourite female action stars are Sigourney Weaver in the Alien movies and Charlize Theron whenever she’s kicking butts. I also admire Michelle Yeoh and Ming-Na Wen who are still doing action scenes at their age…which is also my age. Even if they have doubles for the more athletic moves, they still have the skill and energy to sell their part of the fight choreography through multiple takes.
My dad wasn’t much of a hugger either. If Dave wants to attempt to hug his dad, I’d suggest starting with a brief pat on the shoulder and if that goes well, next time try a thump on the back, then progress to a side-hug before moving on to a frontal-contact hug.
Horse Mysteries = Shergar Holmes
Hi Ian and David,
I’ve never owned a horse and have only ridden one a couple of times. I suspect that this is because our neighbours had a horse paddock behind our backyard when I was growing up and my parents warned my brothers and I that we should NEVER EVER EVER WALK NEAR THEM BECAUSE THEY MIGHT REAR UP AND KICK YOU! AND A KICK FROM A HORSE COULD BE FATAL! SO. DON’T. GO. NEAR. THEM. OR. ELSE!
So even though there were at least three or four beautiful horses on the other side of our back fence, we regarded them as potential child assassins waiting to strike.
Some alternate title ideas for your HORSE MYSTERIES podcast:
Hoof done it?
The Neigh of the dead
A neigh at the races
The Remains of the Neigh.
The Neigh After Tomorrow
A Hard Neigh’s Night
And the top female action star has to be Helen Mirren in RED.
Never have I ever owned anything with four legs weighing over 75 lbs., so that rules out horses by a long shot…and you’d think I lived in Texas or something. I did go horseback riding once and surprisingly it wasn’t in Texas, it was back home in Chicago! My Aunt had the brilliant idea for my cousins and I to go horseback riding one Summer, so we went to some farm and learned how to get the horses ready, brush them, put on the blanket and the saddle, etc. Then the wrangler said to my two cousins, “You two take Daisy and Buttercup here.” Awww, what cute cliché names for these sweet horses. He then looked at me and said, “You can take ‘ol Diablo there, he hasn’t been out in awhile.” or something like that. This horse continued to run under low branches and trees in an effort to knock me off his back and would stop suddenly and go the other way. I knew right then and there I wasn’t made for horse riding. I had no business being on the back of a beast that vastly outweighed me with a mind of it’s own, even though that accurately defined my dating situation in college…but that’s a different story.
If I ever find myself on horseback again, I only hope it’s as a human martyr. I’d accept being the first man killed in the Great Equestrian Uprising by the one horse who has had enough of humans, deciding to stand upright on his own two legs, screaming, “NOOOOOOOOO!” And maybe like the Planet of the Apes, this horse would be known as Caesar, the first horse of many to rebel against his oppressors.
On a kinder note, my best friend of 41 years has a son with severe autism and horseback riding is the one activity he thoroughly enjoys participating in. When he’s on his horse, it has a calming effect over his mind, body and spirit. In fact they just went early this morning as cooler temperatures have made it bearable for a long ride on his favorite horse.
I can remember being completely awestruck with Linda Hamilton pumping that shotgun with one hand in “Terminator 2″ and her transformation into a complete psychotic badass from the first film. Hamilton stood out onscreen with very little competition outside of Sigourney Weaver at the time. More recently, I felt the same watching Sofia Boutella, all 5’5” of her as she gracefully used her prosthetic legs in “Kingsmen” to cut others to shreds. I almost didn’t recognize her in “Star Trek Beyond” made up as Jaylah, one of the more interesting characters new to the franchise. Boutella brought some great energy to that film fighting alongside Kirk and “Montgomery Scotty.”
David, I too had a dentist that didn’t feel the need to have fancy equipment or a busy staff. He was the husband to a co-worker of mine while I was at Dr Pepper. Sadly, it didn’t last long since he decided to trade in his practice and become a free service to those less fortunate with low income. I thought it was a noble cause and he was a very good dentist, so I was happy to know he went where he was needed.
In the 80’s there was a local dentist in Mesquite named Dr. Nelson. Everyone knew him because he was a hot air balloon enthusiast with a balloon shaped like the Cheshire Cat. Dr. Nelson was also very close friends with Jerry Hall who was married to Mick Jagger at the time, both Nelson and Hall were graduates of my high school, North Mesquite. When The Rolling Stones came to Dallas for the Steel Wheels tour, Dr. Nelson was a guest of Jerry Hall which meant he got invited to the party afterwards. I asked him what the Stones were really like offstage, so he told me as he cleaned my teeth. Jagger, he said was all business and very formal, he also owned some land in Texas which he talked about. Ron Wood was the life of the party, Dr. Nelson confessed he really couldn’t understand a word he was saying but he was fun. The late Charlie Watts was present at the party for about 15 minutes then disappeared to go find a Jazz club in Dallas and maybe sit in to play drums. “What about Keith Richards?” I asked, being the most interesting member by far, “Well, Keith just kind of sits in one spot and does his own thing, we really don’t bother him or his people.” Sounded accurate as I wondered what “his own thing” was. He then finished by telling me he replaced an emerald Jagger had mounted in his tooth with a diamond, it seems people were constantly telling him he had food in his teeth, so he had the emerald replaced by Dr. Nelson. Sadly Dr. Nelson didn’t live much longer and passed from cancer in the mid 90’s, he’s still remembered by many members of the Mesquite community to this day.
I’ve never owned a horse, but my husband owned a couple of Tennessee Walking Horses (long before he met me). He said he bred one with a jack for what he called a Tennessee Walking Mule. He said it had had a “real nice gait.” Like David, he also use to be a ferrier– mainly so that he could not have to pay someone to shoe his own horses. He still does some blacksmithing here and there. I have ridden a horse (once), as well as an elephant and a camel.
My favorite female action star isn’t from a movie, but rather a television show: Diana Rigg as Emma Peel on the Avengers. If you are looking for a movie where a girl goes around killing people and not feeling bad about it, I recommend American Psycho 2. It is a dark comedy starring Mila Kunas and William Shatner. Mila is a criminology student who won’t let anyone stand in her way of going to study at Quantico.
We’ve all heard about the #FreeBritney movement, but did you know there is a new #SaveMichaelNesmith campaign that started a few weeks ago. Apparently there is a group of fans that believe Mike is the victim of elder abuse. If you search “Save Michael Nesmith” in YouTube, it’ll pull up the video “What Ever Happened to Michael Nesmith from the Monkees.” I’m not entirely convinced by the “evidence” presented in the video.
Dave, I have been thinking of foods that you might want be on the lookout for when you visit the South. I hope Ed will add to the list, too.
Breakfast: chocolate gravy with buttermilk biscuits; country ham with red eye gravy, scrambled eggs, and buttermilk biscuits; buttermilk biscuits with milk gravy or sausage gravy; scrambled eggs with squirrel gravy and fried taters… basically buttermilk biscuits ought to be their own major food group…
Lunch/Supper: fried catfish; fried chicken livers; chicken-fried deer steak; chicken and cornbread dressing; squirrel and dumplings; a plate of pinto beans with fried taters, cornbread, sliced tomatoes and cucumbers, and a side of chow-chow; salmon patties (which aren’t really Southern, but most people here think they are).
Sides: grits, fried okra, fried squash, turnip or mustard greens with hot sauce, blackeyed peas with hog jowl, poke salad
Desserts/Snacks: chess pie, Sun-Drop cake, Goo-Goo clusters, boiled peanuts, RC Cola and a Moon Pie, pork rinds, oh my gosh, Dave has to try dumping some salted peanuts into a glass bottle of Coca-Cola, and despite what my resident Yankee friend says, banana pudding needs to be on this list–baked in the oven with a real meringue, not that nasty instant pudding with whipped cream.
Blueberry preserves are nice, but seedless blackberry preserves are better. Have a great week, everyone!
I’ve already written my fill, maybe I’ll recommend some Chicago food next time, I think Crystal has the South covered.
More horse podcast titles:
Long FaceTime
Mane Street
The rein event
There’s no jumping like showjumping
The Princess Bridle
Horsepower Rangers
Okay, I’ll bow to public pressure and change the name of the podcast to the perfect name for a horse-related true crime show:
Mare of Easttown.
Late entry: The Rockford Fillies?
Genius.
Genius.