Eight Belles Down (sad)

[astanley]

Cinghiale? It's wild boar, yes? How'd you have it prepared?

A myriad of ways. Let's see, in my last trip...

Cacciatore, which is nothing like what you get stateside (it's a hunters stew)
Prosciutto
Salame
Al Ragu
Carpaccio with truffles
Roasted and stuffed with chestnuts, rosemary, lemon, and mushrooms

If someone asked me what I wanted my last meal to be, it would be a 4 course cinghiale (I always spell it wrong) meal, finished off with fior di latte gelato and a nice arugula and fennel salad. Add in a few bottles of Barolo, and one or two Rhones, and kick back on the porch with a glass of Bourbon... mmmmm.

Cheers,

-Andrew

 

[jason]

I bought my Mom an "old nag" a few years ago that would probably have ended up this way.. she is just the sweetest, calmest horse. And not even that old - the owner couldn't afford her anymore and was going to just dump her. Wrong wrong wrong.

See, This is what I don't understand. While I agree with you that every person should have a certain amount of responsibility when choosing pets, why is it just wrong when it's horses? It happens to dogs and cats and chickens and hogs and parrots and the list goes on. If he was going to sell it for further use, then maybe he was doing the right thing. I know you don't understand why they can't just be put out to pasture, but one thing we know in Nebraska. Pasture is an expensive commodity! Why waste good pasture land on a horse when they could be using it to raise calves and put food on their family table? In a few more years that horse is still going to die and it will have just stood there for years in the blazing hot summers and the freezing cold winters and it won't have done anybody any good. Maybe it could be used to feed a starving human in Africa. They sit and starve while we just let possible food roam around in our fertile fields.

I'm sure your horse is very sweet, but I'm also sure there are thousands of very sweet chickens that will be served at a KFC this afternoon.

 

[ScottM]

I'm also sure there are thousands of very sweet chickens that will be served at a KFC this afternoon.

And when coated in BBQ sauce not only sweet but tangy

 

[woodstock]

See, This is what I don't understand. While I agree with you that every person should have a certain amount of responsibility when choosing pets, why is it just wrong when it's horses? It happens to dogs and cats and chickens and hogs and parrots and the list goes on. If he was going to sell it for further use, then maybe he was doing the right thing. I know you don't understand why they can't just be put out to pasture, but one thing we know in Nebraska. Pasture is an expensive commodity! Why waste good pasture land on a horse when they could be using it to raise calves and put food on their family table? In a few more years that horse is still going to die and it will have just stood there for years in the blazing hot summers and the freezing cold winters and it won't have done anybody any good. Maybe it could be used to feed a starving human in Africa. They sit and starve while we just let possible food roam around in our fertile fields.

I'm sure your horse is very sweet, but I'm also sure there are thousands of very sweet chickens that will be served at a KFC this afternoon.

I don't believe I used the word "just" in any of my posts - where did you get that impression? The horse wasn't actually that terribly old, maybe mid-teens. The owner was just tired of paying through the nose for a horse and wanted to dump her. Don't get me started on people who just dump pets by the side of the road, or put them to sleep because they are inconvenient.


edit: "just" referring to "only wrong when"... of course. not in other contexts.

 

[jason]

I don't believe I used the word "just" in any of my posts - where did you get that impression? The horse wasn't actually that terribly old, maybe mid-teens. The owner was just tired of paying through the nose for a horse and wanted to dump her. Don't get me started on people who just dump pets by the side of the road, or put them to sleep because they are inconvenient.

Fair enough.

 

[astanley]

It amazes me what people will do. I've been looking around for a horse to lease up here in Columbus, and I see a large number of ads for 20+ year old horses for free or very cheap, or people trying to lease out their 20+ skinny horse. Most say that they have had the horse for the past 10 or 15 years, and the pictures show them being very thin. It's sad.

and not just horses. I volunteer at a humane society here. They get 10,000+ cats per year. 85% of them are euthanized. That's a lot of cats! Less dogs, at about 3,000 per year admitted.

People have screwed up attitudes about animals in general. I personally it has to do with our distance from the food chain; if more people had exposure to farming and animal life in general we'd see some changes (I think). The animal owner has a responsibility to his or her animals; whether that animal is raised for food, husbandry, show or companionship. People will complain bitterly about Eight Bells, but go to Mickey D's and have a super-feedlot burger without a care in the world.

They used to protest the small slaughterhouse in my town growing up; the served a 5 town area and were pretty low volume and served a small network of butchers and grocers. They protested so hard that it shut down; now the animals had to be trucked 75+ miles to a feedlot/slaughter operation. The farms closed and we got more developments, and (without knowing it), those people degraded the quality of the meat we ate, the lives of the animals raised for food, and the overall environment of our fair little town.

In that same vein, in the Bar Harbor area, they have had a terrible problem with feral cats. Why? Because vacationing summer families will purchase a kitten, let their kids play with it for the summer, and then let it go when they prepare to move back home. Our eldest cat, Penny, is the product of such an environment -- she was the first post-summer litter from a cat released by a family in the Northeast Harbor area. It is so incredibly sad that people will treat any animal in any inhumane way.

Just my $0.02.

Cheers,

-Andrew