Heidi the hinny

Some day I have to learn to post photos in an entry. Unfortunately, today is not that day.

Last week I did a story about a hinny. Hinnies are the opposite of mules; they are the offspring of a female donkey and a male horse. There's only a 20% chance of conception occurring when a female donkey and a male horse breed. (The more common pairing is known as a mule which is a male donkey and female horse)

Hinnies have more horse-like faces. This one had a more horse like gait and was fairly skittish. In all cases but one, hinnies were sterile like mules.

Female hinnies are also more rare than male hinnies.
All of this means Heidi the hinny is a bit of a wonder

They seriously posed like that for the shot. I don't know how they could have been any cuter.

(This breeding happened because Mabel, a 10-year-old donkey was in a pen with a miniature horse stud. The family that owned her had had her for 5 years, and she had never bred during this time. So they were surprised when she got pregnant. I'm not sure how the miniature horse managed to knock Mabel up. He must have been hung like a horse)

There are some things you just don't forget...

I did a story about a dance group today and was watching the practice, and taking photos. The teacher started giving critiques to the girls, "More energy. Smile! Point those toes."

I explained to the teacher that I danced for 16 years, and that I was having a hard time not critiquing as well.

I started yelling some of the classic comments to make the teachers and parents laugh. "Your arms are not noodles. Smile! Make it look fun! Make me excited"

The girls were dancing to Footloose. This made me feel ancient because I did dance routines to the "Footloose" soundtrack when it first came out, when I was eight years old.

It's reassuring to know that I could make a good dance teacher, if all my other careers fail. I might not be able to teach the girls to dance, but I can sure shout out the directions