I Think This Horse Wants Me Dead.

"I like beer and I like cheese. I like the smell of a westerly breeze.
But what I like more than all of these is to be on horseback."
- Mike Oldfield, "On Horseback"

What do you get a lady for your 3 year anniversary? Is it diamonds? Fine china? Tickets to go see her favorite musical? If you're a chump, maybe. A real man sets his lady atop a stallion and rides her off into the sunset with a six-shooter in one hand and his genitalia in the other. I'm talking a galloping ride of epic proportions through terrain so breathtakingly beautiful and transcendent that it would make God himself smack his forehead and say "I'd love to meet the guy who made that!" Or, if you're a real man on a budget, you take your girlfriend to ride some pretty tame/smelly horses underneath the HOLLYWOOD sign at a place called Sunset Ranch. But, hey, that scenery was pretty nice to look at.

Meet Sawyer. That's him, right there. He's got a great sense of humor.


Look at me when I'm mocking you dammit!

This one time, about halfway through the ride--while straddling the edge of a cliff that would have surely killed a lesser man had he fallen off it--Sawyer thought it would be a hoot if he bucked me around like I was a piece of unpopped corn and he was a microwave with a vendetta to settle. Ha! Like Jim Carrey, this horse. Oh! And then there was the time where he considered it a real riot to turn around and bite the face off the horse behind him. Of course, the other horse didn't find it quite so hilarious, but me and Sawyer had a good laugh over it. Then I think I passed out for a few minutes due to terror. But when I woke up, I could see for miles and miles...



The mountains were breathtaking. And so was the sight of the city from a far distance. It really makes you feel so small and unimportant.


That ass makes a guy feel pretty small, too.
(Sidenote: that ass belongs to a horse named Tiny. Nice!)

Lest you think we were in any real peril on those bucking broncos, we were wearing adequate protection as provided by Sunset Ranch. Because when you fall 10+ stories onto a bunch of jagged, unforgiving rocks, this is what's going to save you.



And if I might add, I felt the helmets gave us a Rain Man-esque element of style that was really lacking in our ensembles. Two points for headgear!

But really, the experience was all-around enjoyable. We saw a piece of L.A. that we never knew existed while making our spirits high and our butt cheeks numb. We battled ferocious, hairy beasts and lived to tell the tale. And we capped the night off with a romantic dinner, dressed in our finest attire and only smelling slightly of horse remnants. (And fear. It took me a while to calm down from my near-death experience.) Good times.

Now, the true question is: what do you get a lady for your fourth year together? Pearls? Perfume? A trip to a Mexican apple orchard? Only time will tell...


This Entry In Song:
Modest Mouse - "Gravity Rides Everything"
Rufus Wainwright - "King of the Road"

Be Back Soon,
Shaky Jake