Behold How I Knew He'd Pick The Pale Horse

It's the Australia Day long weekend, so there's plenty to do out and about the countryside. Today we went nice and early to the 38th Fryerstown Antique Fair and rummaged around amongst goodies of both the genuinely collectible and the horrifically rubbishy sort, though, of course, one person's trash is...

Mostly at these affairs, it's just fun to wander around and look at all the lost stuff that used to have a place in other people's lives, stuff that used to belong somewhere before it was cast out into the cruel world to drift about for years in search of another safe haven. It's all a bit sad, really. One is practically assaulted by stories. And then there's the weird experience of suddenly coming across some overly cute nic-nac from your childhood but completely out of context on a stall table, and it's just a thing, not the amazing, almost living object you remember it being. Without the personal relationship, statues of donkeys pulling carts and dolls in glitzy dresses are just inanimate junk.

After that, we caught an afternoon session of Django Unchained. It's like watching Hamlet in that you know for sure there's going to be an awful bloodbath at the end. Anyway, enough has been written about this movie. The only new thing I can offer - and be warned this is a very mild and very silly spoiler - might not be a genuine observation at all, but the product of a horse-skewed mind desperately self-referencing. It comes from my being something of a palomino aficionado (just ask my sister). I notice all the horses in movies, but I especially sigh with joy when a particularly fine palomino trots across the screen.

 Anyway, after a certain scene put me firmly in a Blazing Saddles frame of mind, when we got to a later scene where there was a choice of horses for Django to take so he could ride back to reap his ultimate revenge, I anticipated for a good couple of minutes that he would take the palomino, because a golden horse is what Cleavon Little's sherriff very dapperly rides in Blazing Saddles. However, as said, this may be an entirely fanciful connection wrought by personal experiences in the palomino-obsessed hinterlands of my mind. But that wasn't my only reason for my betting on the palomino. Parallel processing an otherwise simple act, a pale horse, not a white horse, is also what Death, the Fourth Horseman of the Apocalypse rides. The fact that Django then rides the palomino without a bridle or saddle also has mythical resonance. Besides, any Western fan knows that the nameless stranger (again, Mr Death in disguise) usually rides into town on a pale horse. If he's called Bart or Bruce, he usually rides a dark horse. So lo, when Django did indeed take the palomino, I felt quite smug. Ah, the things that go through one's head at the movies.

And on that horsey note, I must go get some sleep soon. All the beautiful horse riding scenes in Django Unchained made me glad that I'm off on an all day ride tomorrow. Perhaps I'll even score my favourite pale horse for the morning ride. Crossing fingers.