People who have known me a long fucking time did not give it a second thought when they heard I had been a time or two to the racetrack. It is widely known I crave the widest breadth of experience possible. Those same people also know me to be a dragonfly. Once I have landed some place I do not stay long. Not even to fuck. Wish I could fly around fucking like a dragonflies do.
Anybody I know who observes, "Fuck do you ever spend a lot of time at the track," gets the same sort of response from me about the excitement of the sport, the intellectual challenge of picking winners, the titties on the beer girls. None of which is lies and none of which is exactly truth either.
I go to the track as much as I do for one reason only: to help pay for the all the beer I drink and all the wine Sonja drinks. It is expensive as all motherfuck to drink in the criminally over-taxed jurisdiction my province is. Our income taxes are sky high and our user-pay taxes are even higher and the two of us use a lot of fucking booze.
So it was off to the track again this weekend. Not just the home track either. We went to one of the few remaining tracks in the interior of the province that will never stop believing, no matter the contradictory evidence, its NHL hockey team will one day win a Stanley Cup. They really ought to change the name of my province from British Columbia to Fuckheads Areusbia. We went to Kin Park, nearly 250 miles from home.
Sonja did not want to go that far. "Are you fucking crazy?" about summed up her opinion of the idea when I first presented it to her. I had to add a little sweetener to the deal.
"We could stop at a winery on the way there."
She thought it over about as long as a politician thinks it over before he spends all your money on something you do not fucking need and will not fucking use. Ever.
We were going to Vernon.
Had to get up early. Sonja does not like that that much. Not really a morning person. Like travelling with a constipated grizzly bear with one leg entering a bull edger until we got to the winery whereupon she turned into Tinkerbell, sparkling wand and all.
We have been to wineries before. Banned from a few of them. Motherfuckers have no sense of humour. Take their medals and shit real serious. The best thing is for me stay outside in the car drinking beer, leaving it briefly only when I have to sneak into the vines to water my horse. Sonja sweet talks the wine ladies, drinks everything they put in front of her and leaves with a case of whatever tickled her fancy - invariably the most expensive wine they have available.
This time it was a merlot.
"I bet it won a gold medal from some French motherfucker who thought it tasted just like pussy."
It had.
Sonja put eleven in the trunk. One joined us up front.
Sonja's tasting notes? "This shit is fucking great!"
Pretty soon we were at the racetrack. First thing I noticed was the colour and texture of the racing surface. Damn near black and sure to provide the horses competing surer footing than what I am used to seeing at Sunflower.
It was going to be a while before the races, just five of them due to the steadily decreasing number of horses available to run for the interior's small purses, so we sat down and had a few in the beer garden. Five bucks. A dollar more than the beer at Sunflower. Must be a government motherfucker in charge of Kin Park's beer garden.
We were getting to feeling good by the time first post was getting near so we walked over to the paddock. Kassie Guglielmino, injured just two weeks ago (I hear she broke her nose) at Sunflower was standing in the shade of a big willow. Her horse in the first, same one that fell in Kassie's second official ride, had scratched. Turned out the horse was not as tough as its rider.
Once the horses had been saddled up and were being led onto the track to be paraded before the good people of Vernon I led Sonja to a good spot on the rail before I circled back to speak with Kassie. Got her to sign my programme; told her how brave she was to be back riding just two weeks after her fall at Sunflower; told her how much I liked and was made to feel at home on my previous visits to her home town. Polite as fuck I was. Reckon her family has more guns at hand than the entire Canadian army. She was real nice in return. Going to be a great jockey. It is bred in her bones.
I hoped Kassie would get her first win Sunday but she did not. Placed a couple times and gained herself some more valuable experience. Stayed on top of all her horses.
Picked three winners. None of them favourites. Picked them using figures and my years of experience watching races in the fucking bushes. I would like to thank the people of Vernon for sharing their money with me.
See you at the home track soon, motherfuckers.
No comments:
Post a Comment