Apart from relying on the sometimes slightly irked comments of friends and family to identify symptoms, there are several easy ways to recognise the onset of horse mania- but be warned, it tends to be an incurable disease!
Fashion Boots and Shoes go on the Wrong Feet
Zips belong on the OUTSIDE of legs to avoid chafing your horse’s sides, any fool knows that. If you’ve ever spent an afternoon in a high-street shoe store trying to put the left boot on the right foot and vice versa, you’ve probably spent far too much time in half chaps!
You Ask Your Family and Your Pets to Hurry up or Move Over by ‘Clicking’ at Them
If someone’s in your way or dragging his feet, you deploy the standard vocal cue, the clicking of the tongue. It works brilliantly at the stables, so why not at home!
You Pat Inanimate Objects
Whether it’s your bike, your car or the PC, if any machinery in your life has performed well, you have been known to deliver an affectionate pat to show your appreciation. Hopefully, not when there were witnesses.
Hay and Straw are an Integral Part of Your Interior Decor
You have become a magnet for stable debris. Somehow, even if you pop to the yard with the intention of staying clean, it gravitates towards you. And even after an hour of diligent hoovering or sweeping, one stubborn strand will still be floating obstinately about the living room.
Your Pockets Always Contain Mints
When the cry is goes out; ‘Anyone got a mint?’ the office horse-person is the one individual guaranteed to provide her colleagues with oral refreshment on demand. Unfortunately horse hair and wood shavings are a standard accompaniment.
Horses in Fields are a Guaranteed Distraction
The horse-obsessive has a head on ball bearings when he or she is passing a stable yard, a horse-graced field or a group out riding. You can have five of your own eating their heads off at home, but other people’s horses remain an irresistible fascination. Blinkers may need to be employed when the horse person is actually driving a vehicle.
No-one and Nothing Limps Anymore- it’s Lame
The kids, the husband, the family dog... anything not bearing weight evenly on all available legs is lame. Your finely honed eyed will detect the slightest favouring of a limb, and it will be all you can do not to rush out for medical advice or try and wrap the appendage and its partner leg in stable bandages. You have been known to get carried away and prescribe box rest and no riding.
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