Monday, January 12, 2009

Cure for Cabin Fever

My human friend has been exhibiting some strange behavior this winter. She says it's cabin fever. I can see what she means about that. We don't get outside very often. Even though playing in the snow is fun, the driveway is very icy, and getting to where we can play can be very treacherous. She says that to keep us busy, we are going to explore some higher education.
She already taught me to bow. That was pretty easy. She was able to explain that to me pretty easily. Now I like to show that off for visitors to the barn. She didn't seem to know where to go from there though. She has spent a couple of days pushing and prodding me and testing my reactions to things, but I have no idea where this is going.
The other day she was letting me play with her glove. I like to bite the glove. I do that on my own anyway. Then she dropped it on the ground. That was a curious thing to do. I went over and sniffed it to see what was wrong with it so it had to be thrown away. I couldn't see anything the matter with it, but she thanked me for checking it out and gave me a cookie. A little later on, she dropped it again. I reached down and touched it to point that out, and she gave me another cookie. Well that made sense. If she dropped it, and I went over and touched it so she knew where it went, I got a reward.
Today though, she seemed to not to care that she had dropped it. When I showed it to her, she patted me but no cookie. Well, that wasn't right! I wanted my cookie! I begged and begged for it, but she was really stubborn. She picked the glove back up and dropped it a few more times, but I still hadn't gotten my cookie. I tried to get it for myself, but she boxed my nose and told me "No". I was getting pretty frustrated, and apparently she was getting pretty bored too, because she just stood there and ignored me for the longest time. Finally I gave up and decided to entertain myself. I went over to investigate the glove. I had no idea what's wrong with it. I tasted it to make sure it was still the same glove. Well, when I did that, she told me what a good boy I was and gave me a cookie.
Oh good, we're back to cookie dispensing. But no. She is being really stingy with the cookies today. She boxed my nose. I tried to bow just in case that would loosen her up, but it didn't. So, I went back to the glove again because it was more interesting. I picked it up to play with it. That made her so happy she made a big fuss and gave me another cookie. OH ~ I get it! She wants me to chew on the glove. Well, I can do that. From then on I was very alert to when the glove was dropped, and I got a whole batch of cookies. I even threw the glove around for effect. Of course, I have to drop the glove in order to get back to her pocket for the cookie. That doesn't seem to please her very much, but surely she can understand that I'm in a big hurry to get my cookie.
People can have the oddest ideas, but as long as there is a reward involved, I'm willing to go along with it. In fact, I really like trying to figure stuff out. I study my people very carefully because if you don't you could definetly miss a cookie opportunity.

1 comment:

Leah said...

LOL! I love it! It's like that comment that was made over on Trot- something like "I'm afraid my horse will whip out all his tricks at once like my dog does when he gets excited." haha Grey- I'm glad you're a smart horse and you catch on so quickly! Just imagine all the cookie opportunities you'd have searching for things Mom lost in the pasture! ;)