I've just received the new issue of _This Old House_ magazine (March/April 
97).  At first I thought I had gotten two horse magazines, _Practical 
Horseman_ and some new Western riding magazine I had never seen before, but 
it turned out to be Norm and Steve from TOH playing cowboy.  ;-)  The new 
house project is in Tucson, so if you want to see lots of pretty desert 
pictures, check it out.
But anyhow, about these horses.  If I describe the picture, can somebody 
explain to me what I am looking at?
Steve's horse has what looks to be a Western-style bridle.  It has a colored 
browband and no noseband and a bit with two really long pieces sticking out 
on the sides (yeah, I should know what they are called but it's late and I 
can't remember).  Underneath the bridle is a thing which looks like a halter, 
made of red webbing.  And his horse has a white rope or heavy cord around his 
neck.  There's a knot at the juncture of neck/chest and a loose piece which 
is attached to a swivel-clip which is attached to the halter, if that's what 
it is.
Norm's horse has the same kind of thing, only fancier.  His bridle is the 
kind which has little loops that go around the ears but no other visible 
means of support.  The bit has doohickeys on the side which only come out 
below the bit and are sort of S-shaped.  The heavy cord around the horse's 
neck is turquoise, and so is the halter-looking thing on the horse's head, 
but instead of webbing, the part around the head is made of a finer 
multicolored cord (turquoise and some other color).  The part which goes 
around the back of the horse's head, and the part which goes over the horse's 
nose, are both doubled cord, and the other visible parts are single cord.  
The only other time I've seen anything like this is in the movie _Sense and 
Sensibility_.  If you look at Emma Thompson's screenplay/diary book, there's 
a color plate of Colonel Brandon (played by Alan Rickman) and his magnificent 
black horse.  The horse is wearing one of these loops around his neck; there 
is one piece going up which seems to be connected to the bridle somehow, but 
I can't quite see how. And there's another loose end coming down from the 
bridle which is probably being held by a wrangler out of the frame.  (It's a 
great picture; the horse has turned his head and pricked up his ears and 
posed very prettily for the camera -- there aren't many actors in the world 
who can draw attention away from Alan Rickman, the world's greatest ham, but 
this horse has done it.)  
Oh, and funny thing, Erin McChesney's horse Cougar's Fete, the 1996 winners 
of the Tevis Cup, are featured on the cover of the new (March 97) issue of 
PRACTICAL HORSEMAN), and Cougar's Fete is wearing the same sort of 
arrangement there, too.  
So my question is, what's all this extra stuff for?  Is it common to put 
bridles on over the tops of halters?  What's the thingamajig around the 
horse's neck called, and what's it for?  Is it supposed to discourage your 
horse from stopping to graze on the trail?  And those long bars on the bit on 
Steve's horse, are they called 'shanks' or is my mind completely gone?  ;-)
Oh, and in case anybody is curious, both Steve and Norm's horses are reddish 
colored (Steve's is like a dark cherry wood and Norm's is more rust-colored 
-- what color do you call this if you don't say chestnut?) and Norm's has a 
white blaze and a white blanket on his rump with red spots here and there.  
Steve's horse has just a smidgen of a white star on his forehead.  I can't 
tell you exactly how the legs are marked because aside from the interference 
from the mailing label and cover graphics, both horses are standing in a nice 
dense patch of what looks to be prickly-pear cactus.  But Steve's horse has 
solid-color legs and Norm's seems to have some kind of socks or stockings.  
Norm's horse has a very alert expression and is clearly giving the cameraman 
the Eye, as in "what's this damn fool going to do next", which is what I 
would do to a maniac who posed me in a cactus patch.  Yeow!  
Anyway, I doubt the cover pic will be up on the Web, but if you want to look, 
try www.pathfinder.com/TOH/ or maybe there's a link off the main PBS web page 
at www.pbs.org.
Thanks for any info.
--- QM v1.31 
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