Running on all cylinders

Jazz is perfectly sound and we had a short but stonking hack in a very cold wind. We met an oil delivery lorry on the way home and he was going to go past it like a good boy but the driver tried to wind down his window to tell me what a nice horse he was! At that point he spun on a sixpence and showed himself as the dork he really is :-) He went past easily enough though, and I was pleased with that because I think it's probably only the second lorry he's ever met out on a hack.

When he came in last night his pulse was up a bit and I thought I would find him with a fat leg this morning, but no. I checked his foot after he had scrubbed it clean on the road and there are several holes in the side of his foot,and a definite inch long split in the white line close by. I am squirting hydrogen peroxide into it all twice a day, and hopefully he is now cured.

Zippy is quiet and tired. How much of that to put down to the flu jab I don't know, because he is also off his food. He ate some, but not all, of last night's tea and today's breakfast. He's happy though, you can tell. Jazz, on the other hand, has been jealous - Mr Green Eyes.

I know that there are people who think that we attribute too much emotion to horses, but how else would you interpret this morning's behaviour? He loves having his ears pulled. I went to do it this morning and he shook his head and said "get off, don't want you". Later I took him out for a ride, and when we got back he was, as usual, angling his head so that I would pull one of his ears. I honestly reckon that the jealous little toad had been upset about me taking Zippy instead of him yesterday, don't you?

C