What's weird about that?

Well, the Zebras came to officials' attention after one, named Barcode (love it), was found wandering the halls of a campus building at Emory University as part of a year-end prank. The subsequent investigation revealed that the owners had let their permit for Barcode lapse and never applied for a permit for his striped pal, Jazz.

The take-home message here?

1- If you're going to have a Zebra, get a permit and keep it current.

2- If you lend your Zebra to someone, make sure you know what they're planning to do with it.

A donkey owner in North Hampton, N.H., became concerned earlier this month when he noticed his donkey was gaining weight. Suspecting a nighttime intruder was overfeeding the portly beast, he did the logical thing: he called the cops.

According to the story on seacostonline.com, the donkey owner inquired about posting 'no trespassing' signs and potentially prosecuting the intruder. He also floated the ideas of installing a security camera, and possibly spending the night in the barn to catch the intruder in the act (how fat IS this donkey?).

According to the report, the officer said he "could not tell him what to do, but getting himself involved was not the best option."

However, violence was avoided: the caller instead sprinkled flour and cayenne pepper near the grain barrel in hopes of finding some tracks. He succeeded. As noted in the police report: "It was determined from the tracks, that the offender is a large raccoon."

We've all done it: on the way home from the barn or a show, we pop into the grocery or a gas station.

But a London-area equestrian was recently asked to leave a grocery because, as the security guard put it, she was, "smelling too much."

According to the report on dailymail.co.uk, rider Krys Gunton stopped at the shop, still in jodphurs and boots, after finishing a ride on her boarded horse. She says she had a bit of dried mud on her boots, but no "muck" (love the Brits)--just "eau de horse."

I was thinking about this story last night as I went on my own post-barn errand, in my case, to rent a movie. Sitting in the parking lot, I decided to untuck my jeans from my mid-calf barn boots to camouflage them a bit. I also opted--despite the cold--to leave my beloved barn coat in the truck. You see, this coat is not a "light duty" barn coat. It's a relic of my college equestrian team days and has years of riding, stall cleaning, wheelbarrow dumping, and hay tossing, as well as layers of horse slobber and dog hair ... anyway, you get the picture. While I do wash it annually (a must before it's stored in a shared closet!), it absolutely seeps the dreaded "eau de horse" from every stitch. Simply put, it's not fit for polite company.

So I shivered my way into the movie store, made my selection quickly before my boots had a chance to get up to room temperature, and headed for the door. At the checkout, the clerk made a remark about the weather, which I replied to with an offhand remark about being glad to be done with barn chores. He froze (as I think "oh no! I'm smelling too much!"), looked up, and started telling me about he and his wife's horses, asked where I board, remarked on the price of hay, and generally seemed thrilled to have a little horsey moment in the middle of his shift.

Guess I could have worn the coat!

Any similar stories out there? How horse-friendly is your area?

Finally, am I the only one to misread this headline?

If your reaction was "poor pony!" then no, I'm not.

For the record, Mount Pony is a theatre.