A Horse is a Horse, of Course

We woke up Friday morning determined to make J-Ben and P!'s last day in town laid back and relaxing, since Saturday held a 15+ hour drive back to Texas. I took them to the best breakfast place in town, Snooze, which I have rhapsodized about before. They fell hard for it, just like I did. I never knew a breakfast diner could have so many beguiling ways.

Speaking of beguiling, look at how sweet they are. Awww.

I'm wishing Bobby was here to sit with me. Le sigh.

After breakfast we hit up Wild Boar, a local coffee shop in an old house, and then we dropped off P! at the apartment. He rarely drinks and the previous day's brewery tour plus night out had done him in a bit. A nap was in order. J-Ben had wanted to check out the Clydesdales at the Budweiser brewery, and since it was only about 20 minutes away we decided to head out and leave P! to nap in peace. We had no interest in a brewery tour, so we just walked in and asked if we could say hi to the horses. We were pointed to the "Clydesdale Hamlet" out back. They have a huge amount of pasture space to run around, but when we arrived they were being fed in the stable. Hence the following pictures where they look like they're in jail.

This is one of the few shots we got of them looking up. Mostly they had their faces buried in their feed bags, munching away. I clicked and whinnied at this guy until he glanced my way with a look of utter contempt. Sorry dude! I'm just a girl trying to get a picture.

Then he totally posed in a stereotypical "oh, look, I'm just being a gorgeous horse, nothing to see here folks, just casually scratching my leg". All of them really were truly beautiful, and HUGE. They all stand 18 hands high. If you don't know about horses, just trust me, 18 hands is a big horse. I kind of think they knew how awesome they were though, what with the whole ignoring us and acting put out when we took pictures thing.

The rest of the stable had a few memorabilia/museum type items. These are the carriages they pull- I don't think they were the original 1933 "we're debuting the Clydesdales to celebrate the end of Prohibition, whee!" carriages though.

This picture is blurry, but I included it just to emphasize how mammoth these animals are. The top is a Clydesdale shoe, the bottom is a regular old run of the mill horse's shoe.

Since we were there and since it was free, we checked out the hospitality room and J-Ben tried their Blueberry lager. I took advantage of their free Pepsi. I'm trying to be, as we say in our group, "all awkward dog" about the fact that I find myself, once again, in a bar or a brewery. This picture makes me laugh every time I see it, because I can hear my friend Kate saying "bunny, quit being all awkward dog!!" every time.

We headed home to a restored P!, and I got to work on dinner. Bobby came home and we shared our last meal before heading down to the hot tub. It's nice to relax and actually enjoy the heat because everything around you is literally freezing and covered in snow. The next morning J-Ben and P! left early for Texas. We were sad to see them go but we were *so* happy they came. Since we've moved up here 3 sets of couple friends have come to visit for a week each, and I'm always beyond thrilled to play host and soak up their company. I'm looking forward to lots more visits!