Second time in quite a short while that I'm in tune with DougR. Dangerous territory.

The guest who mentioned the Blencathra/Saddleback hunt was spot on. This is far removed from the toff-led image usually projected, and if there were an acceptable face of fox-hunting, this would be it. But I don't think there is, as I have just made plain in my longest-ever Mudcat post. (Takes for ever to load if you haven't got broadband, but worth teh wait of course....)

What kind of idiot Laura is I can't imagine. Prefers drag hunting to foxhunting but now finds herself compelled to go foxhunting before it is illegal, even though she is not yet up to it, and even though the ban will no doubt result in more drag meets (by which time she might also be more competent on a horse). Won't go deerhunting because of a Disney cartoon character, but couldn't care less whether foxes are hunted to the death or not, even though she finds foxes (the real things, this time) cute and cuddly (which they're not). Maybe when she grows up, she'll come back to this nonsense and try to make sense of it. But with any luck she'll get to do that foxhunt for which she isn't ready but has to do in protest; hit a ditch while gaily yelling Tally-ho, and break her neck. I just wouldn't want the horse to get hurt.