Will our horse make the 12-year-old vet faint?

‘The vet’s here and he’s 12,’ I called over the farmyard gate where the builder boyfriend was waiting with the injured cob.

I don’t think the lad heard me as he got out of his car. I hope the Irish ones don’t faint, I thought, because we had a nice gory cut for him.

The best you can hope for with horses is that your six-monthly freak injury is a near disaster.

So when the smaller of the two black and white cobs reared up into a tin roof it was cause for celebration that he nearly had his eye out.

You’ve only got two options with horses. Either they nearly bugger themselves up or they bugger themselves up. There is no magic third option where they don’t do anything to themselves as a sort of thank you for forcing you into hard labour and eating your money – ‘You’ve gone through €2,000 worth since you got here,’ the hay runner said to us as he unloaded another ten giant bales.