Some more highlights from my visit with the draft horse folks, who had many tales to tell, some on each other.
Doc McGinnis regaled us with the story of a trip to the Smithsonian Folk Life Festival, when New Hampshire was featured on the mall. They brought horses (hosses) with them and showed off their skills. One of the crew served as emcee, explaining the action. He liked to talk and kept up a steady stream even if only one person was sitting on the bleachers. Doc recalled the emcee wore shorts (shots) which revealed his pasty New Hampshire legs – Doc said those legs looked just like “two peeled cucumbers,” ain’t that a picture?
Doc also remembered being called to a certain farm to tend to a sick cow (he’s a veterinarian), noticing young Bruce and his brother out in the field with a hoss hitched to a stone boat. They were studying something that Bruce held in his hand. (Bruce in attendance at the meeting, now a grown man, nodded agreement.) Doc said when he got up close he saw that Bruce had an unopened bottle of beer. “Oh,” young Bruce said, “Doc, we were saving it for you.”
Finally, a true story. Seems Bruce drove his vehicle off the side of the road and got it good and stuck in the mud. He asked at a nearby farm house, did the farmer have a tractor to snag him out? “No,” the farmer said, “but I got a mule.”
“No mule can pull that car out of there,” Bruce said. “It’s hung up bad.”
Nevertheless, the farmer hitched the mule to the bumper, and yelled, “Go Daisy. Go Bub. Go Chester.” Sure enough, the mule dragged the car clear.
Bruce was impressed. “But why,” he asked, “did you yell out three names?”
“She’s blind,” the farmer said. “That way, she thought she had help.”
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