Sunday, March 04, 2007

Glorious mud

I don’t know why mud-coloured jodhpurs aren’t more popular. They would hide a multitude of sins. They wouldn’t show that the wearer had been crouching down while wearing muddy wellies, which then smeared mud onto the bottom and back of the thighs.

I was crouching down to battle with the mud welded on to my horse’s legs, so I could put her boots on. I might be better off following her example by wading barefoot through the oozing mass that is occupying the field gateway: then the mud wouldn’t seize my wellies and threaten to hang on until I lose my balance and fall over.

To be fair, it hasn’t been a bad winter; the ‘proper’ mud didn’t start until after Christmas, and there have been some stunning days. Take yesterday, for example, when the warmth promised spring and dropped hints about drying up the ground. I turned the moulting grey mare out for a few hours to have a roll without her rug. She came back looking like a piebald.

Yesterday was a false dawn, though. Today, the March winds have been blowing and the grey clouds have thrown down hard little rods of rain angled like clock hands at 20-to-the hour. The saturated earth lapped it up and became even muddier.


Horses suffer from mud fever. I have mud fatigue. I wonder if I can get a sick note for that?

5 comments:

Yorkshire Pudding said...

Hi there! Thanks for dropping by my blog. I've just been checking yours out. I like your style. I know what you mean about winter mud - the top end of our garden is currently like the Somme in 1916! "HELP! Me wellies are stuck in the mud and I'm sinking!"

Mutterings and Meanderings said...

Cheers Mr Pudding. Feel free to call again!

Eurodog said...

I know something about mud too. The dog club where I work as a dog trainer here in Brussels is in the forest and after it has rained, which it does frequently, we are knee deep in mud. We have wellies but the dogs find it less pleasing. Some will refuse to sit, some will walk as if walking on eggs, some will just stand there frozen to the ground wondering what to do next. Others don't care at all. As for the owners!!! Some don't come with adequate footwear, others worry about the state of their car or of their sofa when they get home, some answer for their dog saying things like: "he/she doesn't like the mud, he/she won't do that exercice because there is too much mud. Etc.." Since I have been working with dogs, I have learned a lot more about humans.
I know from your profile you like cats but please visit my newish blog:
http://eurodogtraining.blogspot.com

Arthur Clewley said...

crikey YP,what animals have you got in your garden? is it a horse or a herd of wintering serengeti wildebeast?

Mutterings and Meanderings said...

Eurodog, I shall pop along for a visit. My parents have two black labradors. I'd love a dog too, but I am out of the house all day, so it wouldn't be fair.