Farm Animal Friday #5

Donkeys.  Naughty little donkeys, at that.

That's Harry on the left, and Donkey on the right.

I have a lot of donkey stories.  Like the time Harry met Sally (no, really - he jumped into the neighbor's pasture and terrorized their donkey, who is named Sally).  Or the time Donkey pierced his own nose.  Or the time I was five months pregnant and took Donkey to a show.

But I'll save those for another day.  For now...enjoy the donkey noses!

Farm Animal Friday #3

Did you read about the time I showed the donkeys in a donkey show?

Well, here is one of those two donkeys.  This is Roxy.  I miss this dear face (she's alive and very well, in case you're wondering).

Hee-haw, and Happy Friday.

The Donkey Show, Part 2

Did you read The Donkey Show, Part 1?  If not, I'll save you the trouble with this quick synopsis:

I had a few half-wild miniature donkeys sitting around and thought it would be fun to take them to a donkey show at the State Fair of Texas, thinking that because I had experience showing horses, donkeys would be a piece of cake (Do you know donkeys? Do you know horses?  Or, do you just realize how ridiculous that sounds?  Go ahead...laugh!).

And that brings us to Show Day.

Charles and I arrived at the showgrounds nice and early.  I had a lot of work to do to get these guys ready for their big debut.

I would be showing the donkeys in several classes - I'll break it down here so it hopefully makes sense.

Roxy and Donkey would each be shown in a "halter" class - this is a competition judged on manners and conformation, in which the donkeys compete against similar donkeys (for example, Roxy was a baby and would be competing in the Yearling class, against other donkeys who were all roughly a year-old, and Donkey was a "jack," meaning he had not been castrated, so he would be competing in a class against other jacks).

After the halter classes, they would be shown in performance classes.  A performance class requires some sort of skill and the donkey is judged against other donkeys on their ability to perform said skill with precision and obedience.  Some classes include riding, pulling a cart, log-pulling, or in our case, obstacles. Because the donkeys were too small to ride, the class was called Trail in Hand - meaning I would theoretically lead them through a course of obstacles they might encounter in a "trail"-like environment (crossing a bridge, walking over poles, etc.).

I took both donkeys out of their stalls and groomed them (pretty easy when they are 34" tall and have no hair, even if they were not as cooperative as I would have liked).  And then, I polished their hooves.

Hoof polish is like nail polish.  Only, it dries in a matter of seconds and doesn't come off.  Ever.  It's made to stay on the hooves of a very large animal that drags those very polished hooves through sand, and it does its job well.  I'm guessing it's made from some Super Chemical that is outlawed for human use, because I could only wish my nail polish had this staying power.

Whether or not hoof polish is used depends on the type of show you are attending, and in the case of the donkeys, hoof polish was a must!

This particular type of hoof polish is applied with a spongy brush.  You simply dip it in the polish, run the brush around the top of the donkey's hoof, and watch as it spreads down over the hoof, drying almost immediately.  This should have been the easiest part of the day.  But instead, it ended up sending me into a tizzy.

It turned out Donkey was ticklish.  And every time that little brush would even lightly glance against the long hairs right above his hoof (which I clearly neglected to see when I was clipping him...), he would stomp his foot.

The first time he did this, he bumped the brush and black polish splattered onto my hand and all over the concrete floor of the barn aisle (which was marked with rings of black paint from all the hooves that had been painted before us on the same surface).  So, I got smart and told Charles to pick up a hoof and hold it while I polished the other three, knowing that he couldn't stomp his feet if one was already off the ground, right?

Right!  He couldn't stomp his feet!  But he COULD REAR.  And rear he did, straight up into the sky, hitting the brush and splattering polish ALL OVER HIS WHITE BELLY, my shirt, and knocking the bottle over onto the ground.

I said a bad word.  I picked up the now mostly-empty bottle and said another bad word.  Donkey eyeballed me out of the corner of his eye.  He now realized the polish smelled funny and was 100% sure he was not going to participate in this ridiculousness from this point forward.  And he had black paint all over his belly.

The plan changed.  Before I could finish painting his feet (and oh, yes, I would be painting those feet!), I first had to remove the paint from his stomach.

Of course, it had already dried.  And no amount of water/brushing/soap/scraping would remove even a smidge of this dastardly polish.

So, to the tack store (a place that sells horse equipment) we went.  Because I happen to know that hoof polish remover exists.

But you know what?  They didn't have any.  And the clock was ticking.  It was getting closer and closer to showtime, and all those thoughts I'd had about just having fun were nowhere to be found.  I wanted my donkey to look good, dammit.

And this, my friends, is where Charles shines.  When I am a panicky mess, he is a rock,  He told me to get myself ready and that he would fix this problem, and off he went.  Where to, I have no idea.  But I trusted him, and quickly changed into clean clothes and braided my own mane and found my hat.

I should tell you now how someone is supposed to dress for a donkey show.

The proper attire includes western pants (plain old denim need not apply!), a nice shirt, a sports coat, boots and a hat.  The look is polished, simple, and professional.

It does not include jeans and a hokey button-up western shirt...which is exactly what I had worn.  I knew the required attire, but if you hadn't noticed, I left my "A" game at home.  I wasn't sure if I would continue showing donkeys or not, and the show had been expensive enough as it was...so I made the decision to save some money and just wear what I already had with the exception of a few things I needed to purchase.  This was all fine and dandy, except I stood out like a sore thumb (as if I needed anything else to make us stand out at this point).

So there I was, wearing boots a half-size too large because they were the only ones I was able to find in my price range and a hat that didn't quite fit right because I couldn't justify the expense of a nice hat, holding a donkey who was wearing a cheap halter I'd bought off of eBay with a bunch of holes punched in it to make it fit and who had one painted hoof and a belly covered in black paint, waiting for Charles to magically save the day.

And like a beacon of light at the end of a dark tunnel, Charles appeared...armed with a can of...WD-40?

Apparently he had asked everyone who would listen how to remove hoof polish and finally...FINALLY...someone had an answer.  Just put a little WD-40 on a rag, apply to the offending polish, and VOILA...polish is removed.  Just.  Like.  That.

A few minutes of spot-cleaning and sneaky polish application later (maybe with a little help from a couple of capable bystanders), Donkey had sparkling black hooves and not even a hint of polish elsewhere.

He was ready.  I was ready.  To the warm-up area, we went.

Now, this is where things go from not-very-good to much, much worse.

Donkey rebelled.

He didn't want to go to the show anymore.  He started rearing.  Balking.  Striking out at me with his little front hooves.  Rearing and striking at the same time, even.  He quit, and we hadn't even started yet!

All of the other donkeys waited patiently, swishing their little tails in annoyance while their well-dressed handlers deftly maneuvered them out of our way as Donkey unleashed his fury.  Some of the donkeys gave him the stink eye (who did he think he was, anyway) and others ignored him completely.  The handlers, owners and spectators all watched quietly and many made sympathetic faces when I told them - between rears - that it was his first show.

And then it was our time to enter the arena.

There were seventeen people there to cheer us on.  SEVENTEEN.  For some perspective, there were probably about twenty people in the entire audience, and this included the seventeen from our Pep Squad.

And these seventeen spectators we brought?  They.  Were.  Loud.

As the other donkeys filed into the arena, my cheering section was already cheering for me - and we were still in the warm-up area, because Donkey didn't *want* to enter the show arena.  He reared, he backed up, he nearly ripped the lead rope from my hands...and then he burst forward, dragging me into the arena, much to the delight of the roaring crowd.

And so it went for the next ten minutes or so.  The other handlers put their donkeys through their paces.  I was lucky to have Donkey stand in one spot.  I believe the saying "full of piss and vinegar" would accurately describe Donkey's demeanor at that time.

It was no surprise when they called out the results, from last to first, and we were the first ones called.  Despite our last place finish, we still got a ribbon (this is the benefit to only having three other donkeys in the class!), and this brought great satisfaction to my cheering section, which was having great fun at my expense and growing rowdier by the second (and the louder they got, the less cooperative donkey became).

Two things about this picture.  First, do you see the judge standing there watching us?  She's dressed the way I was *supposed* to be dressed.  Secondly, do you see how donkeys feet are all splayed out?  Yeah, they weren't supposed to be like that.  But they do look shiny and black, don't they?

So as you can imagine, I didn't have much hope for Roxy's halter class.  Especially because it was the most competitive class of the day, with sixteen donkeys entered!  The *only* thing we had going for us was that because it was full of young donkeys, the judge was lenient towards their juvenile behavior.  It was easy enough to pretend that Roxy was well-trained and just acting like a baby rather than just being wild.

But still...as I dragged Roxy into the arena (she didn't seem interested in participating, either), I was kind of ready for the day to be over, already.

We went through the paces as well as we could.  There was some rearing, some bucking, some balking.  The usual young donkey fare.  There were a lot of donkeys and many misbehaved, and it took a long time to get through the class.  Roxy and I were both over it.

It seemed like this class would never end.  The judge walked up and down the rows of donkeys, stopping here and there to inspect one more closely.  She stared at Roxy for what seemed like an extraordinarily long time, and I thought to myself it was a kind gesture (judges will often know their top horses/donkeys from the moment they walk into the arena, and if you are being inspected closely, it likely means you are being considered for a prize).  I was pretty sure she felt sorry for us and wanted to make me think she liked us, but I could see what we were up against!  Fancy, well-bred donkeys who arrived in expensive trailers and had several generations of winning show donkeys in their bloodlines.  I was under no false impression that we were going to be competitive.

When the judge handed the final results to the announcer I stood up and breathed a sigh of relief.  My knees hurt from all the squatting, and I was starting to get sweaty as the day warmed up.

After some discussion between the announcer and the judge, the results were read.

"In sixth place," he announced, to an arena of complete silence (every one of my cheering squad was on the edge of their seats!), "is Short n' Sweet Roxy!"

O-M-G.  I looked up in shock.  It was...us!

The crowd WENT WILD.  They were screaming, stomping their feet, whistling...in general spooking every single donkey within hearing distance.  Even the other competitors were cheering (it was pretty obvious it was our first show, and everyone was very supportive), as their own donkeys danced around their legs in response to the sudden outburst from the audience.

I gave Roxy a tug and headed towards the exit, the other competitors congratulating me as we walked out, a giant smile pasted on my face.

In fact, it was so loud that I could barely hear the announcer trying to gain control of the crowd and be heard above the melee.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"  he was saying.  The crowd hushed.

"Sixth place actually goes to Little Donk, owned by..." but I didn't hear the rest.  I only heard enough to understand that we hadn't received sixth place after all.

The announcer had made a mistake.

There was a collective groan throughout the warm-up arena, the bleachers and the show arena as everyone realized what had happened.

Embarrassed, the announcer apologized again as we re-entered the arena, red-faced me dragging one reluctant little donkey as I looked at the cheering squad and shrugged.

We had barely returned to our place when the announced said, "FIFTH place goes to Short n' Sweet Roxy!" and if I thought it had been loud the first time, I was in for a surprise because they were even louder the second go-round...they brought the house down.

We walked out of the arena with our heads high to what pretty much equaled a standing ovation.

Roxy's owners were excited, her breeders were excited, our Pep Squad was excited, the casual observers who had witnessed my embarrassment were excited, and maybe most of all - I was excited.

Fifth place out of sixteen was not a bad showing at all, especially considering our company, my half-ass (hehe!) preparation, and the drama leading up to the Big Win.  It was a good day for Donkey Showing.

I'll be honest, it could only go downhill from there.  And downhill it went, fast.

We had two more events, remember?  Performance classes, that required actual...performance...from these disagreeable little donkeys.

Well, we never actually got a chance to perform.

Both donkeys were disqualified before even getting over the first obstacle.  Donkey refused to even enter the arena, letting me know loud and clear that his days as a show donkey were over.  Roxy entered the arena (high off her win, maybe?) and promptly planted her little hooves in one spot and refused to move forward.  At all.

But I was okay with that.  The little fifth place ribbon we had won earlier more than made up for the failures of the day.

And this was the show that kept on giving.

Several weeks later, after the excitement had worn off and I had decided to shelve donkey showing indefinitely, I received something in the mail from the State Fair of Texas.

It was a check. For $10.  Which, for the record, is about $390 less than we spent on attending the show, but that's beside the point.

It remains the one and only time I have ever won actual money from a horse (donkey) show.

That check has yet to be cashed.  In fact, Charles recently looked up my name at a website for unclaimed money and found that I had $10 from the State Fair of Texas waiting for me.  Maybe one of these days I'll cash in - but for now, that unclaimed money serves as a reminder of the time I decided to enter a donkey show with two nearly-wild miniature donkeys.  And that, my friends, is priceless.

The Donkey Show, Part I

You know that awful "icebreaker" they make you do at work events - the one where they go around the room and everyone has to share something interesting about themselves?  It's been awhile since I've worked, but I hated that.  I really, really hated that.

But it didn't matter that I hated it, because everyone had to participate.  What mattered was, did I have an interesting fact to share?  Because everyone else had something fascinating to say ("My parents are from Germany!"  "I drive a 15-year old car!" "I have a dog named Darth!").  And when they rolled around to me, every head turned my way and I could feel every pair of eyes boring into my soul.  And I delivered.

"My name is Carrie, and I won money in a donkey show with my show donkeys."

BOOM.  Just like that, I was officially the *most* interesting person in the room.

Most people laughed.  They assumed I was kidding.  I was business casual in a north Dallas country club at an insurance professional's continuing education event.  I was not a donkey-showing country girl in shit-kickers.

And that, I suppose, summed me up at that time in my life.  I was all of those things.  Insurance professional by day, donkey showman by weekend.

It should be no surprise that I showed donkeys to those who know me best...they are, after all, the ones who grew up with me in 4H and FFA...yet, everyone thought it was funny that I was showing donkeys.  Me too, even.  The thing about donkeys is, they require a sense of humor.  And right now, I am tapping into that sense of humor of mine to bring this story to light so one day my kids will know about the time Mama took her country donkeys to the city for the Big Donkey Show.

It started innocently enough.  My husband's aunt gave us a miniature donkey, aptly named Donkey.

Donkey and Goat-Goat, shortly after arriving at our place (the Saga of Goat-Goat is a tale that also needs to be told...).

Shortly after, my husband's uncle decided he wanted to get a couple of these little critters for himself and we found ourselves boarding two additional donkeys, Roxy and Bella (this is when we lived in the country, in case you were wondering how they fit into our current suburban lifestyle).

So there we were, with three miniature donkeys.  And somehow or other, I discovered that the State Fair of Texas was hosting a Donkey Show!  It didn't take long for me to decide that a donkey show with a couple of mostly untrained donkeys was a great idea!

Now, I should say here that I know a thing or two about showing animals.  I have been showing horses since I was a wee lass, and I know what it's all about.  And donkeys have four legs and tails, so surely a donkey show couldn't be *that* different from a horse show, right?

Ha!  Hahahahahahahahahaha!

The first thing I did, after signing up, was attempt to train the donkeys.  Because mine were far from "trained."  Oh yes, they were tame, and friendly, and all up in your business 100% of the time, but they weren't really trained.  They were little, and like little dogs, I just kind of let them do their own thing, and if we really needed some proper behavior out of them (for example, when the vet came), they were small enough that we could just muscle them around (not that it was easy, or pretty...but certainly easier than actually training them proved to be).

Training went...okay.  They would usually walk properly once haltered, and occasionally put their feet where they were supposed to (like the dogs you see in dog shows, they are supposed to stand a particular way while they are being shown so the judge can inspect their conformation).  Sometimes they would walk over the obstacles I set out, even.  And by the Grace of God and All That is Holy, I managed to body clip them both on my own (that means, shave off their fuzzy coats) and trim their manes based on some pictures I had googled of show donkeys (I knew they were supposed to look a certain way, I just didn't know how to get them that way, ok?).

In case you were wondering how hairy donkeys are, here is Roxy a few months before the show (and, obviously, pre-shaving - you can see the shaved version below).

And before we knew it, it was time to go to the show.

Weather in Texas is persnickety.  The show was in early October, but it was cold, cold, cold that day, and the donkeys were bundled up in their jammies (remember, they had no hair because I shaved it all off) and and off we went!

This is Roxy, in the horse trailer, waiting to be unloaded for her big show debut.

Once the donkeys had been unloaded (I'd brought Roxy and Donkey, since Bella was pregnant and a little on the wild side, still), I walked around and learned my first lesson of donkey-showing.

I hadn't done a very good job trimming their manes.

Apparently there's a technique involved, one that surpasses holding a donkey's head still in one hand and manning scissors with the other.  I had kind of guessed that as I was manning said scissors, but at the time google proved to be useless when I typed in "trimming donkeys manes for a show," so I just did the best I could.

Well, the best I could do was not good enough!  These other donkeys looked sharp.  Their manes were little works of art.  Mine was too, but...not in the same way.  Mine was more...abstract.

So, I freaked out.  And promptly went looking for Roxy's breeders (who were also at the show and had promised to assist us in any way they could).  One thing about Donkey People - they are a really kindhearted and pleasant bunch, and like to help their own.  And before I knew it, I had learned the mane-trimming technique, borrowed a couple tools of the trade, and trimmed my donkeys' manes to near perfection.

Now, the donkeys were staying two nights at the Fair, and showing the second day, so I had some time to wander up and down the barn aisles and check out the competition.

And it was fierce.

Not only were most of these donkeys bred for the purpose of competition, but they were actually trained, too (imagine that!).  Typical donkeys are a dime of dozen (just check Craigslist), but show donkeys...not so much.  They are little, and cute, and expensive.  I had brought with me one free donkey that had spent most of his life living with a goat, and one donkey that had been purchased by my husband's uncle on the low end of the "show donkey spectrum."  We were outclassed, and I knew it (hey, I didn't win the FFA State Horse Judging Competition in 1996 for nothing!).

Not only were we outclassed, but we were also unprepared.  And not even dressed properly!

I was just there to have fun and gain some experience for myself and the donkeys...it didn't matter if we were the bottom of the barrel.  And even if my donkeys were "backyard" at best, especially when sized up against these other fancy, big-dollar show donkeys, this was going to be FUN.

And that is the attitude I had (along with our cheering section of a gazillion family members, extended family members, and their friends, too) going into Show Day.

To be continued...

Once Upon a Time (my pledge to start recording memories so I can prove to my kids that I was cool...or not)

Once upon a time...it was just me and Charles.  And Janga, Cricket, Dinah, Twinkie, Mo, Seamus, Norman, Donkey, Harry, Rocket and Lando.  Our fur children.  That's right...we had lots of four-legged fur kids.  Dogs, horses, cats and...donkeys.

And how I miss my donkeys.

The adventures we had when we first moved to Texas are something else.  In fact, people often tell me I needed to write a book about our experiences (I take this with a grain of salt since most of these people are relatives).  But it's true that we've had some amazing adventures (misadventures?).  And it's also true that we had a whole lotta animals (animals = all kinds of drama).

How many of you have had your poker guests have to leave because they were volunteer firefighters who received a call to impound a horse from a drunk guy riding down the road? How many of you have come home to a herd of buffalo in your front pasture?  How many of you have received an email saying you have unclaimed money from the State of Texas and it turned out to be LEGIT because you never cashed the check for $10 you won in a donkey show at the State Fair??  

These stories need to be told.  For my children and for every person even thinking about selling a little condo in Southern California and buying 15 acres of land in rural Texas on the same road as all of their husband's family (who's that dumb, right?!).  And also, for me - so I don't forget these things.  Already, the memory of pulling into my driveway after a long day at work (in Dallas, in an office) to find wild buffalo destroying my fences and terrorizing my horses as two strangers tried to load them into a trail is starting to fade.  

I DON'T WANT TO FORGET THAT KIND OF STUFF.  

So, the next time I'm waxing nostalgic over the "good" old days, I'm going to take it a step farther (further?) and actually record said memory in my blog so I can one day show my kids and say, "SEE???  This really happened to your good ol' Mom and Dad.  We were invaded by buffalos / won $10 in a donkey show / called 911 on three separate occasions because there were loose cows in the street at night and we almost hit them / etc."  

I know the image is blurry, but I'm totally not lying about the donkey show.  

Oh, yeah.  I got more where that came from.