Frequent Flyer ... Horse Construction

While I was writing Frequent Flyer, I decided that I again had to write about what I knew. I'm certainly no expert on horses (that's my wife and daughter) and I have lots to learn, but I know what I see anyway... I think ... if that makes any sense.  So when I created "Flyer", the title character, he had the traits, demeanor and history of 6 horses.

Flyer has the color, mammoth size and funny playfulness of Monty our bread eating Hanoverian from Germany. I can't see over his back when I stand next to him.  I'm 6'2"... or I was before I starting shrinking... I'm probably closer to 4'9" now.



He has Bobbie's lips, as nimble as fingers, the ability to pull a cart like Bobbie and the condition in which we first saw him.  When we first met Bobbie, he looked like a giant ball of burdock.  I honestly wasn't sure what my wife saw in him, he was covered in burdocks and dust.  He oddly has the cleanest most organized stall in the barn now.


He has the unique facial markings of Evelyn ... that almost look like the swords you see in old pirate movies.   She's a beauty and don't you dare tell her otherwise.



For the most part, he has the relatively calm demeanor of Shane and Zeus (Couldn't find a photo of Zeus who passed away on Thanksgiving morning a couple of years ago).  Neither horse would spook during a fireworks show, at a shooting range, during a thunder storm... yup ... atom bomb proof.

And, Flyer was a former race horse like Dion.  Dion is 23 ish now (my wife will correct me if I'm wrong) and he still thinks he could beat Seabiscutt with 1 leg tied behind his back, on a full stomach.  Given Seabiscutt's current condition ... I think it's a safe bet.

I picked the best qualities from each horse to construct Flyer.  Flyer's bad qualities...those all came from me!

TGIS ... Thank God It's Snowing

It's Friday, but one can forget the, oh, so mundane "TGIF" salutation on this glorious Friday.  For today in Central New York, it's all about its long forgotten cousin "TGIS"... Thank God Its Snowing!  Oh, and it has been so so long. 

Syracuse usually secures between 100 to 200 inches of snow a year. We pride ourselves on so little, but Syracuse Basketball and 20 feet of snow will make our chests swell with honor.

Yet, this year has been different.  No, not different in the way of Lady Gaga or the duck billed platypus.  We've had no snow to speak of this winter.  In mid January of 2012 and up until today (Friday the 13th), this winter has only blessed us with a mere pittance of a wimpy dusting of snow ... for the whole winter.  Now if it seems to you that I'm one of those odd frozen ducks who loves the white frozen happiness that falls so gently from the heavens... I'm sure it was a lucky guess.

Yes, Al Gore's Global Warming has reared it's ugly head in Central New York.  The shame of it all.  We water skied the week before Halloween.  We jogged in early December in tee shirts and shorts.  The horses have been caked in mud from what seemed like the never ending Spring. This has been the first green Christmas since Nixon was not a crook.
But today, Friday the 13th, behold the eternal beauty of snow.  We've had close to a foot of the hardened H2O today and more to come tomorrow, the 14th.   Yes, we're talking the proverbial "Winter Wonder Land" and "The Luster of mid-day of objects below"

We can make snow angels, snow men, snow caves, snow balls and snow forts like we were once again 10 years old with our frosted wool mittens barely able to bend in the subzero arctic cold. 

We can trudge to the mail box watching our foot prints form deep craters in the alien like land ... and then carefully trace our own foot steps back as if to hide from the hounds sniffing the scent of our trail.

We can feel the cold pinching our rosy cheeks like an over affectionate grandma on holiday schnapps binge.

The horses can dance, play and roll in the snow and survive perfectly cleansed, except for the odd little icicles that dangle from their whiskers.

Yes, I love the snow.  Yes, I'm a little different.  No, not like Lady Gaga.