Presto has been at Michelle’s for all of a week now, and I’m guessing that if you asked her she’d say it felt like a year. Perhaps I undersold his general level of day to day mayhem. Perhaps she’s just forgotten since we haven’t heard as much about it while he’s been at Megan’s. Or perhaps Michelle is just too nice and didn’t fully realize what she was signing up for when she offered to let him come stay at her place. Either way… she’s stuck with him now, no takesie-backsies. (just kidding. maybe. not really.)

When we left off with last week’s update he was in the pen next to the 2021 foals. They were obsessed with him, and he had already recruited their Chief Chaos Officer (Teddy) to his cause. It was very suspicious how Presto and Teddy would stand there in the corner just looking at each other, probably plotting all manner of terrible things. And then that next night Michelle came out to feed and found that SOMEONE – I’m not naming Teddy names or anything – had chewed a chunk out of Presto’s tail.

These LITTLE SHITS. I mean luckily it was off the top and I think we can just…. blend that for a while until it grows in, but seriously guys. WTF. Thank goodness Michelle noticed it before they ate the whole thing. But they did immediately lose neighbor privileges, and Presto got switched with Daisy. Now he’s got the end pen with Daisy as his only neighbor, and the babies are another pen away where they can no longer victimize his tail.

Naturally he wasn’t particularly pleased about having his minion army taken away, and did some really fancy arabian impressions while expressing his feelings. Michelle had to spent the rest of the evening dealing with THAT (her trying to make him walk places instead of trot is futile but cute… on the plus side he sure has looked awfully darn sound in all the videos). I’m pretty sure she’s rubbed like half a gallon of lavender oil on him by now in an attempt to just… take all the PRESTO down a notch. Good luck. You’d have to dip that dinosaur in a vat of it to root out all the chaos demons, I think.

And let’s face it, even when he’s chill (which he is most of the time, to his credit) he’s still a wrecking ball in horse form. Maybe I should have warned her that he’s a feed bucket/feed pan serial killer, but, uh… she knows now. He just simply cannot resist the excuse to paw at and put his feet in something that was clearly designed for just that purpose.

Every single place I’ve kept this horse we’ve gone through the gamut of how to feed him without him tossing it all over the place, tearing the feeder off the wall, or putting his feet in it. I’m not sure there’s a bucket/feeder/pan in existence that he hasn’t met by now. Usually things end up bolted to the wall, high enough to where he can’t put a foot in it and designed so that he can’t easily fling the food out. That’s just an accessory of Presto. So he started out at Michelle’s with a regular rubber feeder, which… LOL… and then Michelle went and dragged out her big guns: the red no-turn feeder.

It took him all of one day to master that one, but ya know… A for effort, Michelle? He finds the no-turn feeder to be a very delightful toy. Finally, someone gave him something FUN! He’s smart in all the worst ways but at least he’s never boring?

At this point I think I owe her a few bottles (or maybe just skip straight to a barrel) of Pinot Noir. And some chocolate. Maybe a fancy dinner. Definitely a value-size bottle of tums and some omeprazole, because he’s definitely giving her an ulcer. Welcome to the club, my ulcer is Presto-size and has been there for almost 5 years now.

One week down, Michelle, just… 2-3 more months to go. Hang in there…