It’s true, it’s my birthday! I got up this morning and opened my cards and my presents and we went for a lovely walk. Just the usual, along Salisbury Road into Oxted Road and then Church Lane and back down Bay Pond Path and up the High Street. It was nice and dry and really mild and I decided not to pull too much so that I could savour all the smells and enjoy my stroll. As we got down to the bottom of Bay Pond Path we bumped into Auntie Angela and I thanked her for my card. She commented about how handsome I am – which of course, I am – and I looked up at her with my big brown eyes and pretended that butter wouldn’t melt! She doesn’t believe him when he says that I’m naughty. Auntie Jo bought me some lovely duck fillets. He says I mustn’t eat them all at once but I don’t see why not. It just isn’t fair sometimes! Anyway, they’re my treats and I’ll eat them when I want … they’ll soon learn to give them to me if I bark loud enough!
It hasn’t all been mild recently though. The other morning it was cold enough to freeze the … why do they call me monkey sometimes? And anyway, I haven’t got any of those … the Dog’s Trust saw to that even before I met them! I don’t really mind the cold, I have a really good fur coat but he always moans about it being cold (mind you, he moans about most things!). Daddy Richard doesn’t mind the cold either – he always wears short sleeved shirts, even when it is cold enough to freeze the … oh enough of that! Anyway, when it was cold he wrapped up in about 64 layers of clothing and we went for a lovely walk – the good thing about it being cold is that there is hardly ever anyone else around so I get them all to myself. There has been some talk recently of getting a new trainer in to stop me from pulling but I haven’t seen any sign of it yet. I haven’t actually been pulling quite as much recently anyway. He came up with this rather ridiculous idea of using treats to stop me from pulling. Basically he holds a treat just out of reach and I have to concentrate on it until I get it so I forget to pull.
I have to be honest, it does work. The trouble is he makes me walk flamin’ miles (well, at least 50 metres!) before I get a treat. I’ve soon worked that one out! I’ve got a new game. Instead of having to walk and concentrate on the treat which makes me forget to pull, I’ve invented a much better game than that. I refuse to walk until I get a treat! Once I get one, I eat it and then I stop again! It takes hours to go for a walk. He gets all frustrated because he has to go to ‘work’ which makes it even more fun! Mind you, talking of ‘work’ he spent all day yesterday sitting at his pooter ‘working’ – goodness knows what he did. Daddy Richard was doing lots of ironing but I don’t know why. And there’s another thing … every time he comes back from ‘working’ elsewhere he stinks of dog! Now I’m no expert (surprisingly!) but I reckon he’s definitely at it again – playing away instead of with me! Almost every day for the last couple of weeks he has come in smelling of Radar. Don’t get me wrong, Radar is why friend but it comes to something when I catch him stacking up on treats to give him! I did hear on the woofline that Ronnie hasn’t been very well recently – he’s a frison biche and he lives with Radar and Reggie and Roxy – which was sad. He had an operation but it all went wrong so he had to go and see the Supervet and that seems to have fixed things. Apparently he’s much better now so I’m pleased about that.
When he goes to do that ‘work’ thing I get to spend some quality time with Daddy Richard. It isn’t that Daddy Richard doesn’t do that ‘work’ thing too but he does it at home so I get to be with him, Daddy Richard takes me out for a walk at lunchtime and he doesn’t moan at all about me pulling like a freight train. In fact, he doesn’t really moan at all, other than when I’m jumping up and nipping at him because I am so excited about going out! The other night Auntie Zena and Uncle Simon came for dinner. I use the term loosely because he had been doing that thing he does by mucking about with perfectly good raw food and ruining it. He called it chicken dhansak, I called it a completely ruined piece of quality chicken that had been ‘marinated’ in stuff, mixed with other stuff (including onions which are poisonous for me) and then heated up so that it was impossible for me to eat! Anyway, he moaned (there’s a surprise!) when it took Auntie Zena about 10 minutes to get into the house properly because she was on the floor cuddling me and playing with me. He said it would be better if Auntie Zena came in more calmly and then played with me once she was in the house. She did that when she came today and I have to admit it was much better for both of us!
I think I may have mentioned in the past that I’m supposed to be giving up the sticks. Well, that hasn’t been going that well. I mean, giving up isn’t easy. I’ve tried the patches (but I always found a stick there), I’ve tried the tablets (not literally, I’m not that adept with an iPad) and I’ve tried cold turkey but nothing is working … although the cold turkey was very tasty! This morning, since it was my birthday, I can’t say I was allowed a stick but even he didn’t moan that much. As we walked up Oxted Road I found a rather tasty stick and decided to lay down and have a jolly good chew. It isn’t like I don’t know what I’m doing – I am four years old now! I am a little worried that, even though it is my birthday, they have been a bit too nice to me today. I’ve had two lovely walks and they’ve both been very nice to me – even him! Still, in my view there is nothing better than taking advantage of them being nice so I’m not complaining! In fact, thinking about it, I might be able to get them out for another walk so, for now, must paws … ?
