You laughed at my service Donkey...

[drcorey]

McDonalds, not technically poison, of course it's not technically food either.

yeah, think Supersize me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1Lkyb6SU5U

[hobie16]

Which half?


hehehehehehe

Hey!!!

[GRUMPY PIRATE]

Hey!!!

hehehehe

Sorry, just like tom cruise in Top Gun:

"I saw that shot, and took it!"

RUM?

[Whazzup]

I used to belong to the Escambia County Sheriff's Posse and we rode in all the local parades. My mare usually did quite well with all the noise and crowds, but one thing she didn't like was Santa Claus on the float during the Christmas parade. They always put the horse groups at the rear of the parade (gee, I wonder why) and just in front of us was Santa Claus on a huge float with loud sirens. Santa and his elves would throw candy out to the parade goers and occasionally a piece of thrown candy would go astray and hit one of the horses. No wonder they didn't enjoy doing parades.
In fact, if I went out to catch my horse in the pasture while wearing my posse uniform, she'd run the other way! I had to wear regular barn clothes to catch her, then run in and change into my uniform.

[mechurchlady]

Hee hee hee...that might be Churchy's proof. Maybe she knows something we don't...after all, Imagineering isn't all that far away from DLR...all those horses are perfectly behaved Audioanimatronics!

(But wait...didn't the robots turn on the humans in Westworld? I don't think I'm going to be riding the Main Street trolley anymore.)

I was in the rental ECV and pulled up to the CMs and the belgian as asked it the Disney horses were skittish. He was kind of perplexed then I explained how I said that the DLR horse are not skittish and that someone said they were. The CMs confirmed that the working horses are not skittish. That horse though would not stop staring at me and it was because of the ice cream I just had. Big beautify belgian. Maybe some people can lob ice cream at the horses to make them skittish.

CM or Syndrome whom do you believe?

[turkeyham]

I have seen the horses freak out around the balloon vendors. The Mylar and glass house balloons causes the horses to run off into the area where the balloons are. Now the vendors are to be in an area where they can not make contact with the horses. :)

[ktulu]

CM or Syndrome whom do you believe?

I have seen the horses freak out around the balloon vendors. The Mylar and glass house balloons causes the horses to run off into the area where the balloons are. Now the vendors are to be in an area where they can not make contact with the horses. :)

Hmmm, I'll go with Syndrome. It is an animal, you will never fully take the instinct out of them.

[techie-13]

I agree with Syndrome. All animals can be scared of something that they might normally not have a problem with. My in-laws have a farm with a few horses in Missouri and my brother-in-law makes and shoots fireworks at the farm. On one of our visits back there, he and his friends were working on the design of some salutes (similar to a large launched m80) for a upcoming fireworks convention. I was standing with his wife watching her mare. Everytime the guys launched a shell, Giz would twitch at the sound of the launch and then ignore the actual bang of the shell. My sister-in-law commented that after a while at the farm, the horses were basically bomb-proof to loud noises.
Then they sent up the shell they were going to show at the convention. This was an 8" salute that had the timing messed with. The purpose was to spook the other pyros at the event by having the shell go up and instead of bursting at apogee like normal, it would come back down a little and then go bang. Well, it went up, Giz twitched like normal but because the timing was not what she knew, when the shell went bang, that horse SPOOKED! She jumped backwards, her front legs were straight out in front of her and I could really see the whites of her eyes. Then she took off racing around for a bit until she satisfied herself that everything was still where it should be. After a while, she would come to me and my sister-in-law but when the guys showed up, she avoided them. Ever see a horse give someone a dirty look? I have!

[dazyhill]

Funny how horses minds work,they never seem to forget something that spooked them.
When I was at Cal Poly Pomona, I took some equitation (horseback riding) classes as electives. I rode one Arabian mare that was very mellow,but seemed to spook at one corner of the riding arena. Across from that corner there was a round pen that was used mostly to train the younger horses. My mare spooked at the sound of the pen's gate latch opening. She wouldn't go far -she would just jump sideways. It didn't bother me except for the times the head trainer shook the latch just to see how a green rider would react.Not cool!
Another time,at the same place, another Arabian mare I was riding spooked at something that was outside the arena. She bolted and a few scary seconds later,I got her under control. I tried cantering her again and again she spooked at the same spot she did earlier! There was nothing there but try telling her that! This time I wasn't as lucky. When she bolted I lost my balance and fell to the ground. My right foot was still caught in the stirrup and a I was dragged a few feet until I finally was able free my foot. I had a helmet on,so I was saved from getting seriously hurt. I ended up with a small bump on head, a good sized bruise on my arm, and lots of sand/dirt in every part of my body.
The next class I got on her again and had no problems with her after that. I however, am still nervous about cantering. This was a few years ago and I haven't ridden since those classes,but only because I don't live in area where there are a lot of horses. :(
Horses can be trained not to react but you can't train for everything!

[Whazzup]

Funny how horses minds work,they never seem to forget something that spooked them. Horses can be trained not to react but you can't train for everything!

Exactly! Plus they will see things differently out of each eye, since they are set on either side of their head. In other words, they might get used to an open umbrella on their right side, but coming back the other direction, with the umbrella on their left side, they are probably going to react as if it's something new they've never seen before. Silly horse brains.