My wife and I recently went horsing around. And no, it didn’t involve traveling to Louisville for the Kentucky Derby. We are much too cheap to make a special trip like that.

Some years ago, when we were in Kentucky for business, my wife and I visited Churchill Downs. There weren’t any races that day, and the joint was as quiet as a Monday morning church. I walked into one of the high rollers’ suites just so that I could say that I did it. The view from up there wasn’t any better than what you see on TV.

Sportscasters have labeled the Kentucky Derby “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports.” They clearly haven’t heard about the highly competitive games of tic-tac-toe that my wife and I play on Saturday nights.

We have an old friend who went to the Kentucky Derby when he was young and dumb.

“I had the whole Derby experience,” he recalled. “That included enjoying way too many mint juleps and winding up face-down on the infield.”

My wife and I are too stingy to pony up (ha!) the money to attend the actual Kentucky Derby, so we’ll watch it on TV. My wife even purchased a large and floppy straw hat for the occasion, which she plans to decorate with artificial roses. Put a shot of bourbon in my hand and it’ll be just as if we’re at Churchill Downs.

We obtained our most recent horse fix by dropping in on the South Dakota Spring Arabian Horse Show, held at the W.H. Lyons Fairgrounds in Sioux Falls.

This was our first time at that show. It proved to be a highly educational experience.

I had presumed that Arabian horses came in just one flavor, namely, brownish. I was wrong. I learned that Arabians can also be black or gray. I saw an Arabian horse that sported a golden coat of hair with a snow-white mane and tail. I was astonished to see a gelding that was a hodgepodge of black and white. If I owned him, I’d name him Holstein.

My wife took a seat in the bleachers while I strolled off and wandered through the maze of backstage horse enclosures. I witnessed numerous examples of majestic beauty, obsessions with cleanliness, and fanatical attentiveness to hairdos. This applied to both the horses and their riders.

Some horses had tails that were long enough to construct an entire extra tail. The horses’ owners zealously combed and brushed their steed’s tails, making sure that no strand of hair was entangled with any other.

The young ladies who participated in the Country English Pleasure riding competitions were extremely attentive regarding their appearances. It must be a rule that the riders’ hair be formed into a perfectly spherical bun at the back of the head. Every young lady in the English Pleasure riding competition had clothing and makeup that could only be described as immaculate.

I stopped and chatted with Velora, an 11-year-old English Pleasure competitor. Velora’s mom and older sister were helping her get ready for her turn in the showring. I asked Velora how long she had been competing.

“This is my fifth year,” she replied, smiling broadly.

Whoa! You’ve been doing this since you were six?”

“Yep!” she replied, still smiling.

I asked Velora’s mom what competitive English Pleasure riding entailed.

“You have to work with your horse continually,” she replied with an air of mild exhaustion. “You have to board the horse, groom it, practice riding it, haul it around, hire a trainer. The training is as much for the rider as it is the horse.”

I bade them good luck and moseyed on. I soon happened upon a guy who was combing the luxurious tail of a bay Arabian gelding. There appeared to be approximately ten feet of tail.

I asked the guy, whose name was Randy, how he kept the hair so long, pointing out that you never see such tails on civilian horses.

“This horse is so pampered that he never has to swat flies,” Randy replied. “And we tie up his tail to keep him from stepping on it.”

For some reason, the word “Rapunzel” popped into my head.

I joined my wife in the bleachers, and we watched the riding competition. A PA voice would announce “trot” or “walk”, and the horses would immediately begin to trot or walk. There were no discernable signals between the riders and their mounts. They must communicate via Vulcan mind melds.

As if she were reading my mind, my wife suggested that it was time to go find something to eat.

“I’m hungry, so I won’t say neigh,” I said. “I canter wait!”

— Jerry’s book, “Dear County Agent Guy,” can be found at www.workman.com and in bookstores nationwide.