One time I rode a horse. It was kind of fun, but also kind of bumpy. To amuse myself, I sang the theme to Mr. Ed, which the instructor didn't think was funny and come to think of it the horse I was riding didn't seem to much care for either. They probably heard it before. The instructor said the horse liked me. I couldn't tell by the way it kept rubbing its face on my shoulder like it was trying to knock me down.

 

The horse's name was Thunder. Or something like that. Something with a "U" sound. Maybe it was Bunny. I'm not real sure. But since I'm a guy I will choose to remember the horse as Thunder.

 

Horses are kind of a girly thing anyway. It doesn't matter how many cowboy movies you watch or how rugged the Marlboro man image is in your head: A horse is still a bumpy ride, and men still have testicles.

 

(Most men do, I mean. The ones that don't have them live in urban areas where there are no horses. They stay up all night and have names like Dominick).

 

But anyway....

 

My one hore-riding experience was ok, but no big deal. I sure wouldn't make a movie out of it. People do make movies about horses, though. They're all about nobility and sacrifice, with horses named Spirit or Cloud Dancing, and Indians and Nature and a single small child learning a lesson about what it means to be free.

 

Monkeys never get movies like that. Monkeys only get comedy movies. And not just comedies, but wacky hijinks about a group of kids who have to hide a monkey from a bunch of businessmen in tuxedoes during a formal gathering.

 

Cows never get movies like that. That totally isn't fair, either. Cows are just as important as horses. Even more, now, since the internal combustion engine has kind of made the horse obsolete, and cows will never be obsolete. We're always going to need milk, and beef, and leather. Except once I was watching Regis Lee and Kelly Ripa and they had Alicia Silverstone on there and she was telling how she didn't eat meat or dairy products anymore which if it ever caught on would almost make cows obsolete, except for Hindus and bikers. I think you would call Alicia Silverstone a vegan because she doesn't eat meat or dairy. Except that when I hear the word vegan I think about an old comic book I used to read called Omega Men which was set in the solar system around the star Vega. I know that Alicia Silverstone isn't an Omega Man because she's not made of rock and can't shoot fire from her hands. But anyway. I was talking about cow movies. Of which there are, like, none.

 

Cows do so much for us, and it totally sucks that there are no movies called Clarabell: Spirit of Freedom or My Friend Rosebud.

 

I would say that they're treated like dogs, except that that wouldn't be fair to the dogs. It wouldn't be accurate, either, because there are tons of movies about dogs. Old Yeller and Lassie and even Benji, who was one of those little yip-yipping breeds called a Kickmee. Dog movies can be funny or dramatic or whatever, but that's because dogs can be all of those things, big or small, nice or mean, whatever.

 

The thing that really kills me though is the pig movies like Babe and Charlotte's Web. It's ok to even make a movie about a pig, but not a cow.

 

This is cowism.

 

I think it all comes back to the fact that there are no wild cows. I mean, horses can be free and noble and dogs can be wild and whatever, but cows just kind of stand there.

 

And so, back on the sub ject....

 

My one single horse-riding experience was unremarkable and based on that I have a hard time understanding the enthusiasm that some folks have for it. Maybe I missed something, but they're dirty and outdoorsy and smelly and they're a lot of work to keep up with, so I totally don't understand the attraction that they hold for 12-year-old girls. It's like if you had a list of things that little girls like:

 

 

 

 

 

Ash

 

Those are good examples, Ashley. But both of those movies came out long after I posted this entry, and I am thinking that the people who make movies actually read my site and got the idea from me.