Artist's Rendering

Here is an artist's rendering of our new horse, Maggie. I pointed to my beloved Bob that he probably never expected to have even one horse in his life time, and here he is, onto a second horse! And for someone who never thought to have dogs, Bob is well onto what? his fourth dog. (That doesn't count Archie who was my dog in college and beyond and accompanied us to Bridgewater. He died there, after a year at age 16 or 17!)
So Bob is becoming quite the animal expert; next thing, he'll be begging us to get a cat. Or chickens. Or that alpaca...
So until that vet check on the 12th of December, I'm happy with Maggie. I am trusting the vet does not turn up any really awful unanticipated surprises. I was told she was around 15, but I suspect she's a but older, which is okay. I did some research on the web and here's an interesting fact about determining a horse's age by their teeth. Of course, I've always heard that was a semi-reliable way to tell but I thought there was a bit of voodoo or something involved, in which horse whisperers and other sages were able to read teeth like tea leaves. But there is actually a formation called Galvyne's Groove that helps to give a somewhat accurate read. (Boy I love the Internet!) This groove appears on the side of a horse's teeth at about age ten. By 15, the groove is half way down the tooth. At about age 20, the groove is all the way down. After 20, the top line of the tooth is clear and the groove is only present in the lower half of the tooth. In very advanced old age, the groove disappears entirely. Now you can impress all your friend's with a morsel of horse knowledge. So I'm guess-timating that Maggie is about 17 or 18 by the length of her Galvyne's Groove. (She wasn't super cooperative about my looking in her mouth but I managed!)
Maggie is great fun to ride but she isn't the easiest horse to catch! She's smart and on to my tricks. If I get the saddle and bridle out, she walks very purposefully away, down into the field and will allow you to approach- but not too close. She has this figured out. So I tried a bucket (empty) a carrot extended. Boy did she stretch and reach for that carrot, but I couldn't get the lead rope over her neck. Finally, I pretended to lose interest and I got the wheelbarrow and started cleaning up the field. The she got all nosy; she never suspected that I had the halter in the wheelbarrow! And she's fine about tacking up after you get her, and even seems to enjoy the ride. I'm certain we'll come to an understanding.