Foalcuddles and teacup-chihuahuas

Oh my god, Becky. Look at her foal, it is SO big.

.....I like! BIG! FOALS AND I CANNOT LIE

I partook in warmth-share and foal-cuddles for a whopping 4 consecutive hours, which was magical like a unicorn's forest. He kept squishing his little nose against me and crumpling his whiskers till he sneezed. Or nuzzling his bony chin into my shoulder till I flinched, so he could punish me with an uppercut to the face. Or peeing lakes of urine that saturated the towels and dripped onto the sawdust. Or pawing the air in futility with his goat-hooves and pretending he could buck. He's a rascally spunkster, that 'un. With some delicious soft mane fuzz. All petting was performed using faces and arms of course, since latex gloves are required in the stall to minimize cross-contamination and disease.

At first, foaly and I cuddled in peace. The mare was drugged and sedated since her vag had just been flushed out to get rid of any placenta remnants -- apparently the placenta got stuck while the foal was birthed, and it finally dripped out yesterday. After our 3rd hour in the stall, she perked up a bit and slung me the type of attitude that only a hormonal, post-partum horse mom can sling, in the form of toe-stomps and aggravated nips, while we tried to get the foal to nurse-- unsuccessfully. She warmed up a smidge after I milked her (!), perhaps because she didn't have two bursting milk sacks slapping her in the gut. The milking process is an impeccable workout for the latissimus dorsi, but requires faultless aim if you don't want milk-drenched jeans.

Faultless aim is something I do not possess. Milk-drenched jeans are something I do.

The foal is a cutesome little tyke, especially when he tries to romp since his tendons are contracted, which means his toes are always pointed and he walks en pointe like tippy-toe ballerinas [advocates of feet-suicide]. He's in the neo-natal unit at the Virginia Tech Equine Medical Center, because he got stuck in his mom and had to be pulled out. So, he and Bella (his ma) are VERY lucky to be alive; stuck-foals usually die of oxygen deprivation and end up killing their mothers too. I hope the center chooses to pet-name him Rocket, since he enjoys launching himself off the mattress, only to land on the floor in a nonsensical heap of tangled limbs and startled whinnies.

I like itty fuzzy foals with velvet noses better than big ones, but this fella' was lanky and awkward and liked to gum my fingers. That's the kinda male I go for I guess. That is a lie.

The most titillating stallions are majestic, graceful and powerful, with sinewy muscles that ripple beneath their satin-silk coat. If I were a mare I would marry (be mounted by) an Arabian... (<3 ethnic studs). Arabians are so lovely, with their chiseled features, dished noses, expressive eyes, pinpricked ears, tapered nostrils, arched necks, delicate hooves. Aahh... horses. I love them like water. But my immune system apparently doesn't. My body marks equine particulate matter as a non-self pathogen and chucks out lymphocytes, antigens, and killer T cells to eliminate the immigrant substances that hopped the Joannean border. High speed chases ensue involving gunshots and immigrant abscondence into the dense overgrowth. Gunshots being a metaphor for sneezes, and dense overgrowth being a metaphor for... nosehairs? Blasted overactive immune system... I hope I got an A on my giant every-single-system in the body test today. Cause I sure as hell failed the math quiz... Yep