Glossing over

I've started and restarted this blog over and over and I can't seem to get it right. Something in my head is telling me that I just have to write this blog and then I can move on to the unimportant stuff I usually post about. I'm tempted not to do it at all. Of course, I know that if I choose to do that, I won't come back for a good long while. I'm sure of it. Soooo...as this is such a nice little steam-letter-outer, I just have to get through this blasted post.

Why is it so hard, you ask? Because it is. So there. Life goes on and we just have to get through it - that's what family and friends are for!

Yay! I did it! That was all. I know it's vague, but didn't you read the title of the post? Sheesh. Some people.

...

I started playing the video game "Red Dead Redemption," which I got for my birthday from Ryan. It is WAAAYYY much better than "Grand Theft Auto IV!" I LOVE IT!!! In the game, you play as John Marston, an ex-outlaw whose goal is to get back to his wife and kid. Dueling, retrieving bounties (dead or alive, of course), shooting coyotes (which I now pronounce 'ky-ohts' in my Old West enthusiasm) and all manner of interesting creatures, including a jackalope (which I have already bagged, by the way). Woo!

So far, I think my favorite thing is still riding the horse. I just enjoy it. He's so neat. He snorts and whinnies and shies and doesn't poop. That's a dream horse right there. On another note, my character currently has a beautiful golden palomino stallion named Santo Domingo.

John Marston on a Kentucky Saddler, which is Santo Domingo's breed.
Courtesy of the Red Dead Wiki

I told Ryan that I named mine and he immediately started looking in the menus to find out how to name your horse. I laughed and explained that there's no naming your horse in-game, but that I did it just because. I asked if he wanted me to supply a name for his horse and he said he'd name it himself; he called it Brownie, which suited it as it was a bay horse. I say 'was' because Brownie wandered onto the train tracks and got hit by a steam engine.

You see, Ryan had dismounted to be less of an easy target for a group of outlaws he'd been tasked with killing. When you dismount out on the plains with no hitching post around, your horse just decides to go wandering and that's just what Brownie did. When Ryan finished killing the bandits and lassoed the gang leader, who had a hefty bounty on his head, he realized his horse was gone.

Ryan: "Where is it?"
Me: "It exploded."
Ryan: "What?!"
Me: *sad face* Brownie got hit by a train.
Ryan: "What? When?"
Me: "When you were shooting those guys. I saw it. He exploded like a balloon filled with red mist. It was sad."
Ryan: "Huh." *he whistles and a pretty chestnut horse shows up*
Me: "Ooh. What are you going to name him?"
Ryan: "Dunno. Reddie?"
Me: "Nice. Noooo...really think about it. Get to know him for a bit and THEN name him!"
Ryan: *laughs a little* "Ok."

To my amusement, he listened to me and after a round of hunting out on the plains, he noticed that this new horse stuck a lot closer to him when he wasn't on it than Brownie ever did. In fact, the horse followed him around "like a dog," he said. "I'm gonna call this one Doggy," he told me with a smile. AWWWWWWWW! He humors me and gets a kick out of it to boot. I think he still has Doggy the horse, too.

As for me, Santo Domingo is still my mount of choice, ESPECIALLY since he's one of the top 3 types of horse in-game. Also, I'll get a trophy if I can keep the same mount for 20 story missions without hitching a new one to the post in front of my house. I didn't think that was hard until last night. I go out to pick some flowers for an old guy and first, I fall off a cliff while saving a man from mountain lions. I was on Santo Domingo at the time and, though I survived the fall, Santo did not. I was devastated and re-loaded my game. This time, I traipsed around to near the same area (where those blasted flowers grow) and a mountain lion came out of nowhere, killed my horse and then killed me. So...after 30 minutes or so of playing, mountain lions put me right back to where I was twice. No sirree. I'll get it right tonight...stupid mountain lions. I'll wear all your mangy pelts AND keep my pretty Santo Domingo! Hah! Take that, you overgrown house cats!

...man, I love this game!