It has been another one of those weeks! There have been some ups and some downs. I’m not entirely sure if the ups have outweighed the downs yet, but I’m still mulling it over. On Monday he went off claiming that he was doing that work thing. I’ve been giving this a lot of careful consideration over the last few days. I’m not sure about that. I think he’s skiving off somewhere to get out of doing the things he is supposed to do. I mean, by not being at home he avoids coming out for walks with me and that means he avoids picking up my little presents – he’s had the same roll of poo bags on the go for quite a while now. I must concede that many of my presents of recent days haven’t really been very little and I’ve produced some two baggers with a pungency any dog would be proud of! I have noticed that whilst he does disappear off to ‘work’ quite a bit, the food and treats do keep coming too. I can’t imagine that he has anything to do with that but it is a bit of a coincidence! Anyway, whilst he’s been off doing whatever it is he has been doing, I have been spending some quality time with Daddy Richard. We’ve been out on some lovely walks without any of his moaning and groaning. It was on Monday that we bumped into Duke and his mum Fiona. Duke is lovely. He’s a spaniel (I think … I’m not an expert on doggie breeds because I am not all that well travelled) and Daddy Richard took his photograph so that I could share it. I’m afraid Daddy Richard isn’t very good with a camera so probably isn’t Duke’s best photo ever, but at least he was here to try! With him claiming to be working so much, I’m spending quite a bit of quality time with Daddy Richard but the downside is that sometimes he’s even worse than him at taking photos!
On Tuesday morning I got my morning walk with them both but I flamin’ knew he was up to something on Sunday and, sure enough, a new lead has arrived. It was very misty and quite cold on Tuesday morning too but it was the lead, the flamin’ lead that got me! It is called a ‘figure of eight’ lead and it is designed to stop me pulling. If I pull forwards it gently lowers my head which is, frankly, flamin’ annoying! I hate it! I absolutely hate it!!!! He says that they have no choice because me pulling is damaging the slipped disc in his neck that he claims I caused last year. I think he’s just trying to ruin my fun. I really don’t like it. I have tried pulling it off with my paw, I have tried dragging my nose along the ground, I have even tried rolling around to try and get rid of the flamin’ thing but nothing works. Oh sure, I can’t pull with it on which is what he wanted, but where’s the fun in that? I am very disappointed in him … he just doesn’t seem to appreciate that doing my impression of a freight train is fun!!!! So there we have it … another bit of fun ruined by him. I rather like it when he’s at work because I’m not sure that Daddy Richard has worked out how to put it on so I don’t tend to have to use it. I will admit it doesn’t hurt and it isn’t even uncomfortable but it ruins my fun!
The astute amongst my loyal fans may have noticed that I have a stick in my mouth in the photo above. Well, there are only so many things a dog can give up at once! I’m definitely not coming off sticks ‘cold turkey’! I know I’m not supposed to use sticks but they aren’t that bad for me if I don’t chase them and they aren’t thrown for me and I have to be able to keep some of my fun! Actually I looked up ‘cold turkey’ on Fidopedia but the explanations as to why it is used so widely seem very unreliable and loose to me, so I decided not to propagate them further here! Anyway after my morning walk he went off again claiming to be ‘working’ so that I was left again with Daddy Richard. I do like spending quality time with Daddy Richard but every now and again it is nice to snuggle up … even sometimes with him! When he came home from work on Tuesday night I just felt like a cuddle. I mean, I know that he keeps ruining my fun and I know that he’s grumpy and moans all the time, but he’s all I’ve got so I guess that sometimes a quick snuggle is OK. Mind you, I’m beginning to get a bit suspicious about this ‘work’ thing. I’m flamin’ sure I sniffed a whiff of ‘dog’ on him and it definitely wasn’t my own aroma. Oh don’t worry, I’m onto his little tricks – he claims that there’s a greyhound called ‘Cush’ at one of his clients but he swears blind there’s nothing going on! I’m going to have to watch this very closely indeed. I’ve got my eye on him and I’m keeping my nose well and truly on him. I definitely have suspicions and, let’s face it, I am rarely ever wrong because I am the cleverest dog in dogdom (as well as being the handsomest, obviously!). I’m just not totally convinced he isn’t being unfaithful to me and playing around with other dogs! I’m sure that was greyhound I could smell on him!
And so the week has gone on. He claims to go off to ‘work’ after my morning walk. Sometimes he comes home for my lunchtime walk and sometimes he doesn’t. That is another sure fire sign that he’s been playing around! On Wednesday when he went off to Crawley to ‘see a client’ he came back about 4 hours later with a whiff of ‘dog’ about him. I know for a fact that the client in Crawley doesn’t have a dog … it’s a flamin’ chocolate factory! So where did the whiff of dog come from? Oh, of course, he had am excuse all lined up ready for me didn’t he! He claims that he went to see another potential client and that they had a dog. Yeah right! Mind you, it was a coincidence that Daddy Richard went off later in the afternoon too and came home at the same time as him but I’m not convinced. This time it wasn’t even a whiff of greyhound either. Daddy Richard seemed quite pleased that they had picked up a new client which was nice but I still have my suspicions. I don’t think Daddy Richard would cover up for him but I’m keeping a very close nose on him nowadays! If I find out he’s been playing around there’ll be hell to pay!!!!
On Friday morning it was proper cold! Daddy Richard had gone off for one of his breakfasts meetings, so I took my morning walk with him. You could actually see my breath in the air as I breathed. It was proper cold! Oh, it all came out then too! I flamin’ knew it. He forgot to put my ‘figure of eight’ lead on, so I had the ability to pull if I wanted to. There I was, admiring my breath in the air and it all came out in one go! Whilst he’s been claiming to be ‘working’ he’s been seeing Cush the greyhound, then there’s Roxy the German Shepherd, then there’s Reggie and Ronnie the Bichon Frises! I mean, I wouldn’t mind so much if it was just one but Cush, Roxy, Reggie, Ronnie and who knows who else he’s been seeing! I was not at all happy about that! I knew he’d been sneaking the odd bag of treats out of the house in his pocket and hoping I wouldn’t notice but this?! I was disgusted! I dragged him up Oxted Road and along Church Lane and then down Bay Pond Path at record speed to make him understand just how angry I was. And it was only a few nights earlier that I had snuggled up to him too! I’m really not sure how long it is going to take me to properly forgive him! And the worst thing of all is that he’s going to go on seeing them too! I suppose that’s what they call an ‘open relationship’ but it’s going to take a bit of getting used to, I can tell you!
Mind you, on Friday afternoon he was supposed to come home early because Auntie Zena was coming to do the Christmas tree. Neither him nor Daddy Richard are allowed to touch their Christmas tree because Auntie Zena is a world expert at decorating Christmas trees and she’d tell them off if they tried to do it themselves! He didn’t come home early though, so it was down to Daddy Richard to get everything down from the loft so that Auntie Zena could work her magic. He claimed to have not been able to get away but I reckon he was keeping a low profile after the morning’s revelations! I did give him a jolly good sniff when he finally appeared at nearly six o’clock but I couldn’t smell any new doggies on him and I think I know where he’d been by the aroma of scrap metal about him. When he eventually arrived virtually all the decoration was done and Daddy Richard was struggling with a chicken to debone it ready to turn it into dinner (chicken biryani). Auntie Zena and Uncle Simon were staying for dinner and then it turned out that my bestest friend in the whole wide world, Jake, was going to be coming too! Daddy Richard asked him to debone the rest of the chicken which had two outcomes – he inevitably started moaning about “being at work all day and then having to start again the minute I get through the door” and I got the bits that they wouldn’t want to eat! He then took over cooking the dinner and added a ‘channa dhal’ to the meal because Daddy Richard asked him to cook that too. He eventually stopped moaning when he was handed a large gin and tonic and I think a good time was had by all. It was lovely to see my bestest friend in the whole wide world and although I know he came for dinner, I’m pretty sure he really only came to see me. I even lost interest in the over cloth I had pinched and dragged into the lounge so that I could be with Jake!
So, that’s it. Christmas is officially coming. The tree is up, the lights are on outside and this morning we went to Café Connect which had a definite Christmas feel to it. The weather was horrible as we walked to St Nicholas Youth Centre via Oxted Road, Church Lane and Bay Pond Path but it gave me an opportunity to pull like a freight train again! Then when we got home he went off with Uncle Malcolm because he has to go to the hospickle every other day for treatment and Auntie Sue was busy and her car had broken down and … oh you get my gist! Anyway, so I was quite happy to spend a bit of time at home admiring the Christmas decorations but, when he came home they had a quick bite of lunch and then they went out and left me at home whilst they went to the Baptist Church Christmas Craft Fair (I told you Christmas was coming!). They weren’t too long though and when they came home we went straight out for a walk which was all rather good – even if the weather was just as horrible as it had been earlier! It was all a bit much for Daddy Richard I think because he had to go and have a lie down. I did find his glasses and pop them upstairs to him but he was fast asleep so I brought them down again and hid them in the sofa. He has finally got up again now (I think there is a hint of fillet steak, homemade béarnaise sauce and a salad that might have encouraged him) and that can mean only one thing … walk!!! So, for now, must paws … ????
