Melissa Kite Melissa Kite

Desperate horsewives

Melissa Kite's Real Life

issue 15 May 2010

One of the highlights of the horsey year for me and my equine girlfriends is our expedition to Windsor Great Park for the annual sponsored cross-country ride. And so with no sleep since the election I hauled myself bleary-eyed to the stable yard at 7 a.m. to start scrubbing grass stains. Why on earth did I buy a horse with white bits? I muttered, as I sloshed around Gracie’s back legs with a bucket of warm water frothing with Johnson’s baby shampoo.

No sooner had I settled into a satisfying rhythm of scrubbing and moaning than my peace was rudely disturbed.

‘Hello, smiler!’ said a fellow horse-owner, who seems to live for the joy she obtains from taunting me about lacking the requisite broad grin she thinks I ought to be displaying at all times. I really detest the practice of ordering people to smile. If someone genuinely wanted you to smile at seven in the morning, they would hand you a steaming mug of freshly ground coffee and a cheese toastie.

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