Saturday, January 14, 2006

"Horse Apples"

Early on in our country adventure, we visited a stable. I noticed the dogs ravenously gobbling up something on the ground. "What are they eating?" I asked in full city-slicker innocence. "Oh, dogs love horse apples," chuckled the stable owner.

"Hunh, horse apples," I thought. "Must be some kind of weird plant they only grow in stables."

Well, I was sort of right, because I later learned that horse apples is a nice way of saying horse poop. For someone with LVT (Low Vomit Threshold) that was not a good thing to see.

And dogs don't just eat it, they chug it like they're bellying up to the finest caviar bar on the East Coast. I wonder if they have little doggie tasting parties, as if they were going on a tour of wineries. "Oh Radar, you simply must try this excellent Milagro scat, it's simply unbelievable. Just the faintest hint of rye grass with slightly oaky overtones. Divine!"

I looked at our dog food bill the other day and couldn't believe it. We buy this ultra-pure human-grade dry food for them, but I honestly think they'd be happier if we just scooped up horse apples and shoveled it in all day.

City Slicker Lesson of the Day: If you go out for a nice country drive some day and your host offers you "horse apple pie" -- say NO!

1 comment:

Denise said...

This reminds me a story from my Exxon days back in the 1970s. One of our young engineers was going to Denver for a conference. Some of the technicians told him when he got there, the best thing on the menu when you're in Colorado are Rocky Mountain Oysters. He was really excited -- this is a Cajun who loves food. When he came back, they asked if he'd ordered them, and he said he had and, cher, they were great eatin'. Then the guys burst into laughter and told him what they were. Good times... good times.