I was going to title this post, ‘A farmer and two horses walk into a McDonald’s’. But that was a little too far out. (Even if it was plum homage to the old-joke opening!) What happened was, a farmer drove up to a McD’s in his horse-drawn buggy – and was banned!
What happened?
Allen Hatch, 53, said he hitched up his buggy horses, Coal and Onyx, to his vintage buckboard for a some exercise, and to do a little shopping. Then they drove into Powell, Wyoming, as usual.
‘No better way to go get horse feed than take them to get it themselves,’ Hatch told the Cowboy State Daily.
The stop for lunch was a ‘spur of the moment’ decision, Hatch said. He thought nothing of steering his team into the McDrive-thru.
Mixed reactions
“There were several different reactions,” he recalls. “The young lady at the first window was very excited to see horses in the drive thru. The young lady that was handing me my food at the second window thought it was great.”
But the manager said it was a stark contravention of the McRules.
“There’s a company policy precluding having livestock in the drive through for purposes of liability,” Hatch says. “The one thing that she [was very] clear about is what happens if they, ‘shit in my drive through, and there’s no one to clean it up.’”
Bottom line?
Hatch received his meal before he got his lecture. So he basically got off scot-free. This time. But he’s definitely banned from that McLocation if he ever shows up with Coal and Onyx again.
Not just horsing around
Hatch explains, Coal and Onyx aren’t just pets, or what rich folks call a ‘fancy’. They’re being tuned to the language teamsters in and around Powell use with their horses. Then, they’ll graduate to ‘ment-oring’ younger horses in the fine art of teamwork in harness.
My take
When not working in the fields, or training other horses, Hatch says he’ll be asking Coal and Onyx to pull passenger wagons for ‘trail rides’. The trip into town was all part of his plan to get them used to motor vehicles, crowds, and the busier, noisier town environment.
As for McDonald’s… “After that experience, I won’t be blessing them with my presence again,” Hatch confirms.
~ Maggie J.