George Washingtron and my Uncle Will

I read that some artists considered George Washington hard to do a pleasant likeness of him on canvas. He was uptight when posing, that was the main problem. One artist, Gilbert Stuart, noticed when a horse walked by the window or when the subject of horses came up he relaxed. So the Stuart got George to ramble about horses and the portrait was great. Which reminds me of my great uncle. I, inro genealogy, went to see the brother of my grandmother, who was about 93 at the time. I brough a tape recorder. Most of his answers about his family were just “yeah”, “Yes” or “I don’t remember”. Somehow his mule came up in the conversation and he could say enough about her. He talked of he mule’s eccentric habits, when and what she like to eat on breaks and so on. After he sold most of his land and there was no use for his mule anymore, he sold it to another farmer in the area. After that he visited mule from time to time with a snack of its favorites. I wonder if the farmer that owned it then got jealous?