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I found this bit of humor on the internet and had to print it out
for my husband (the same man who say's nothing when he trips over the
steaming buckets of bran mash sitting in the middle of the kitchen to get
to his cold sandwich for supper... or gets up at 4:30 to hitch a trailer to
a truck on a show day... or has mastered the art of taking 36 photographs
of (1) 5 minute training level test...
- JB
Reply to: Randall William Holt
HORSE COMMITTEE OF RESENTFUL ACCESSORY PERSONS
4 Oct 1995 11:12:07 -0700
University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Newsgroups:
rec.equestrian
Reply to newsgroup(s)
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* HORSE Committee of Resentful Accessory Persons *
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Does your wife spend an inordinate amount of time with a large
dumb smelly creature other than yourself?
Does she spend more money on her horse each month than you spend
on your house payment?
Do you wind up getting the kids from school and cooking dinner
while your significant other is hanging out in a barn on the other
side of town?
Could you put a kid through college on what goes through the horse
each year?
Is your spouse non-available on weekends because of three day
non-events that you wouldn't attend on a bet even if you weren't
allergic to horse dander?
Is your social, family, and financial life confounded by a
spouse's equine fixation?
If this sounds like you, it is time for you to join the new
spousal support group for families of the equine afflicted.
Join the Horse Committee of Resentful Accesory Persons (HORSE CRAP).
We have absolutely no answers to any of the above cited problems
or any of the other miseries suffered by families of the equine afflicted.
But we sure as hell can swap stories and lend a virtual shoulder to cry
on. You are not alone. You are only in a hopeless situation. Horses are
like cancer. They just last longer. Send E-mail to the HORSE CRAP hotline
and share the misery.
TO JOIN THE HORSECRAP HOTLINE email an introduction to:
tomnagel@freenet.columbus.oh.us
or
rholt@hsc.usc.edu
Here are some introductory responses from new members:
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HORSECRAP NEW MEMBER - TOM N.
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CONFRONTING EQUIHOLISM--A FAILED ATTEMPT
Hi, guys. My name is Tom. My wife has been an
equiholic for about 10 years.
This is a story about trying (and failing) to confront
my wife's equiholism. It all happened about two years ago.
You see, the expense and inconvenience to myself and the
kids was bad enough. And her second hospitalization for
broken bones was worse. But what finally made me snap was
the horse stuff in the washer and dryer.
Both myself and the younger son are highly allergic to
horse hair and horse dander. We can't even go into a horse
barn without having our lungs shut down, and when we ride in
the wife's car we both itch and wheeze. Both Andrew and I
use inhalers and stuff to deal with the allergies, and I
finally got outraged at having horse blankets and wraps go
through the same washer and dryer as our clothes.
Talking about it didn't help. "The washer and dryer
clean themselves out" she'd say. "That's what the lint trap
and rinse cycle are for."
"If I rinse out the dog's dish, do you want to eat your
dinner out of it?" I'd reply.
"That's different."
And so on.
The universe does have a way of evening things out.
Although Andrew and I are allergic to horses and pollen and
mold and who knows what else, neither one of us seem
sensitive to poison ivy. So I hatched a plot.
I got a nice little bonsai dish, and some potting soil
and gravel, and potted up a nice little specimen of poison
ivy. I placed it on the window sill in the kitchen, and
began to train it into the classic "cascade" bonsai shape.
"That's poison ivy!" the wife yelled.
"You're right," I said.
"I'm allergic to that stuff," she yelled.
"Don't worry. I'm not," I replied.
"Get it out of here!" she commanded.
"But I like it; I'm doing a bonsai with it," I
explained.
"I want it out of here," she insisted.
"Take it out yourself then," I suggested.
"I'm allergic to that stuff--I can't touch it." She is
getting really upset now.
"Why in the world would you want to bring something like
that into the house?" she demanded.
"Well, its a lot like you running your horse blankets
and wraps and other horse stuff through the washer and dryer"
I explained.
And then came the clincher.
"THAT'S DIFFERENT!"
Shortly thereafter the poison ivy bonsai wound up on the
window sill at work in my office. It turns out that poison
ivy makes a pretty good bonsai, adapting well to being
potted, and exhibiting really nice fall color. However, you
do wind up having to trim off a lot of adventitious roots.
And you have to be very cautious about asking your secretary
to water your plants while you are on vacation.
It also turns out that the horse stuff is still going
through the washer and the dryer. Andrew and I are still on
Azmacort.
_________________
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Tom Nagel /O\ Columbus, OH
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HORSECRAP NEW MEMBER - MARK C.
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Greetings!
Since Tom requested an introduction from rholt, and I am just as
new to HorseCRAP, I decided to throw out a few lines about myself. My
name is Markus Clodius, I live in Coquitlam, B.C., and I am a grad
student in the biological sciences dept. of Simon Fraser University. My
SO has been an equiholic since well before I met her, but over the last
four years I have sort of gotten used to it. As I told Tom when I signed
on, for me the 'R' in HorseCRAP is more Resigned than Resentful. Still,
I'm happy to know that there are others on the margins of this
equi-insanity who find the whole business alternately amusing and irritating.
Sorry, Tom, I don't have any good horse disaster stories yet.
However, my lady-love intends to become a farrier (did I spell that
properly?) in a couple of years, so I will probably be collecting a few
before long. Just for the record, what defines a 'good' story?
Thus ends my beginning. If anyone has questions or comments,
R.S.V.P. You know where to find me.
Markus
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HORSECRAP NEW MEMBER - TOM S.
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> I'm happy to know that there are others on the margins of this
> equi-insanity who find the whole business alternately amusing and irritating.
Among the amusing aspects of equi-insanity is the proliferation of
pseudo-science sold to the addicts. Included in this catagory are:
a) horse psychics (no kidding ... my wife's friend uses one).
b) horse acupuncturists.
c) medical treatments, from magnetic blankets to basic snake oil
d) books expounding theories on how a horse's mind works (the best
metaphor that explains the behavior I've seen is a bee in a
mayonaisse jar).
e) training and cross training methods guaranteed to cost more with
out any associated guarantees of success.
f) the whole variety of cap-snafflers, turnip-twaddlers and bass-o-
matics sold in the average tack catalog.
How is it that engineers and scientists become involved with people
susceptible to this stuff?
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HORSECRAP NEW MEMBER - RANDY H.
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Hi there. Tap. Tap. Tap. Is this thing on? Can everybody hear me?
My name is Randy.
<<HI RANDY>>
This is my first time at this meeting.
I...I...I'm m-m-married to an equiholic.
There. I said it. Wow. That really feels good to get it out.
There's nothing I can do about it either. We've been to counseling, and she
says that she'll improve, but it never happens. And I find myself reacting
in the classical co-dependent fashion. I try to act like it's okay when she
comes home smelling of horse sweat. I clean up the horse magazines laying
all over the house. But she has a hiding place for Equus that I haven't
found yet, and sneaks them out when I'm not around. And I try to control
it, by setting up getaway weekends with another equiholic-co-dependent
couple where we can let them indulge in equi-talk in a controlled setting.
But I know it's just feeding the illness.
I can't tell you everything though, because, well, you see, my wife is also
a pusher to other equiholics.
<<AHH. OOHH.>>
Yes. It's true. Maybe you all can understand the shame. But it's eating me
up inside knowing that the one I love is also part of the insidious plot to hook
others on that terrible, addicting stuff. She actually sells other
equiholics those terrible, filthy things you see in those underground horse
magazines. When I catch her at it, she tells me that she doesn't really use
her own stuff, she just sells it, but I've seen her sneaking off to the barn
with brown paper bags, and I know. A husband just knows.
I guess the worst part is that we're still having, well, you know. Even
though I'm pretty sure that she is re-using dirty horse clothing. And I
think that she shares her horse with other users. She says she doesn't, but
I just don't know what to believe anymore. I know this is the nineties, and
you're not supposed to trust anyone, but I just keep on doing it anyway.
I don't know what to do anymore. I-I-I n-n-need help. Thank you. That's all.
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TO JOIN THE HORSECRAP HOTLINE email an introduction to:
tomnagel@freenet.columbus.oh.us
or
rholt@hsc.usc.edu
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--
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. Randall Holt, Ph.D. rholt@hsc.usc.edu .
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