Mountain horses

It's Friday! 

We have a family movie night on Fridays.

I made popcorn.  After all these years we finally bought pop corn kernels!  After few attempts that resulted both in burned pop corn and raw kernels in the same pot (how is that even possible) I mastered the skill of just enough oil and kernels in a pot with a lid.  Result: fluffy, soft pop corn! 

(Now I know the difference between fluffy soft pop corn and not so fluffy, rock hard look alike.) 

Movie of the night: Princess Bride

I have actually seen Princess Bride 14 years ago in January.  I was visiting my then boy friend (now my husband) and we watched it at a sea side cottage with friends.  I fell asleep in the middle of it and so clearly was not so impressed with it.  I think it was hard for me to understand the English?  

After putting two Princess Buttercups and one handsome Westley to bed (young Mr. Eppu Westley went to bed earlier), I have been playing around with my photos from the mountains.  

So last time I left you with me changing my camera lens and approaching the two, three, four, five horses and seeing three more disappearing behind the hill.  

I knew the horses had heard me.  My snow pants were making funny swishing noise, camera lens cover was clanking against the camera body and I must have been panting like a race dog, half with excitement and half with being out of breath.  

Well, ok, maybe 75% of being out of breath?  

The wind was blowing toward me though, and for a moment distant memories of Tarzan and other educational books and wind direction and preying etc. were flashing through my mind.  They cannot smell me...so I won't scare them away.   

But clearly the horses could see me.  I mean, you could see a mouse a mile away in this snow.  

And I saw them looking at me.  

I just didn't want to scare them away.  Not now.  Not this close.  Careful, careful. 

So I enjoyed the moment, moving slowly and snapping pictures.  

There were 5 horses on one hill and ten more in the valley.  15 horses running free?  

But I guess it is really really hard to keep 15 horses fed through the winter.  Yeah, let them run in the mountains and find food.  They will come back. 

I don't know how long I was standing there and enjoying these beautiful creatures.

At the end I was hoping they would run a bit, you know, for great photos.  But no. 

Eventually the background noise of screaming children sledding down the hill faded away and I guessed they were getting into the cars.  

One more picture!  

I heard the car honking for me.

I was going to call and say I was coming, but there was no cell phone reception.  

So I put the camera away and started to run towards the road.  It was fun after I told myself to ignore the chances of stepping into a hole and twisting my ankle.  

After sliding down a very steep hill on my *tail, to the great amusement of my family that was watching me from the car, I was down on the muddy road wiggling between the hills.  

In the perfect world the horses would have come galloping on the mud road to say goodbye to me, but I guess they were busy keeping themselves alive.  

I wonder if their teeth get cold at meal times in the winter?