I’ve only ever heard the first version but last night I was reading a book by an English author in which the second version was used.
Which of the two is more familiar to you? Or are there even more alternatives?
Neither. I’ve always heard “…the horse has run free”.
I’ve only heard “shutting the barn door after the horse has gotten out”…
That is what I use except it is “after the horses have gotten out.”
It’s shutting the barn door after the cow’s already been stolen.
Or so I’ve always heard it. So I guess I go with # 2.
…the horse is gone. So, no intentionality implied in either direction.
A closed stable door wouldn’t keep out a horse thief. Around here, it’s “Closing the barn door after the horse is gone.”
Fixing the barn door after the cow came back.
I dunno. That is the way it was always presented to me.
Locking the barn after the horse has been stolen.
Or maybe it was like rain… on your wedding day…
Just reading the thread title, I thought “…the horse has bolted.”
The stolen horse bolted the barn door after the cows came home.
Yep, this one.
It’s “after the milk has been spilled”
Oh, all right, the only one I am familiar with is “after the horse has bolted”.h
Yup, that’s the only one I’m familiar with too.
Ditto.
Same here. I’ve heard no other version.
Thanks for everyone’s responses. There are obviously more variations of this phrase than I first thought.
After the <insert livestock> is out.
Though I suppose we could now add “after the horse has made sweet love to the dolphin”.
That’s bizarre. I’m almost fifty, have not lived in a cave (In fact, I’ve lived in three very distinct geographic regions in the US <NJ, Los Angeles, and Atlanta> and Halifax, Nova Scotia), and yet I’ve *never * heard *any * variation but “locking the barn door after the horse has been stolen.” Maybe I was just so used to hearing that version that my mind overrode what I was actually hearing.