Archive for June, 2007

Of course the worst was bound to happen – the Vet’s new girlfriend has become a regular visitor and the cat Biggins and I have been forced to accept her.

My last blog announced the entry into our lives of this woman, whose name by the way is just plain Fran – my hearing is getting me worried as I plumped for Fanny. Must get the Vet to check me out. Do they have hearing aids for dogs and if I need one would the vet be prepared spend the money?

Fran is a lady who fascinates the Vet, but constantly causes Biggins and myself big trouble - and has done from day one. She dislike animals – not just a little, but with a serious amount of hatred. We are both thrown out of the house whenever she visits on the excuse that one of us makes her sneeze. She cannot decide which one and the Vet is too weak to make a decision. I am certain that Biggins is the culprit, but we are equally blamed in the absence of definite evidence.

I did call a meeting of the gang to ask for advice. Not a move I make very often as from experience I know the boys find it difficult to think coherently for more than 10 seconds and then come up with the most stupid suggestions.

Needs must, however, so when the meeting came to order and they stopped shuffling into their places, licking their paws and finally finding a comfortable spot to lie down, I put forward my problem and asked for ideas.

Bad move, the boys did not let me down. Gus, the Alsatian and the most sensible (I thought) said I should nip her ankles on entry, Jock, the Skye Terrier, said constant barking while she was in the house might be the answer, while poor Percy the Chorkie, had the ludicrous suggestion that I should crawl on my stomach to her and make with affectionate licking.

These lads get worse. It is now left to me to find a suitable solution.

The more I see of that Biggins the more he strikes me as not being the absolute idiot I have always believed him to be. He has a really nasty spit and back hairs which stand up nicely. He can frighten most people.

Biggins could be the answer. We need to talk.

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The Vet has a girlfriend. This news was received the village with quiet disbelief, for he has always been considered the most fervent of bachelors without a thought, or even a need, for a female friend.

I have been busy contemplating what this might mean for me. Is this woman going to become a permanent fixture in the house? Or will she just be taken out occasionally by the Vet for a meal in the nearby pub. The answers are very important to my wellbeing - and possibly my future.

Much as I complain about him, the Vet has usually been a companion with whom I can rub along in reasonable comfort. This is because he is not around much during the day and in the evening he quietly watches television or reads his newspaper. I am therefore a relatively free spirit.

No one questions where I am and as long as I return in the evening for my meal there is no fuss. The “daily” Mary sees that I am watered and fed just as she sees to the Vet’s dietary needs by cooking a substantial meal each day which she leaves for him in the oven.

It’s an arrangement which suits us all. Even the cat Biggins makes no complaints. By putting up with the Vet’s vagaries of mood and temper the household gets along quite well.

Now there is this lady to be taken into consideration.

The relationship is quite new, so it is a little hard to judge what might happen. The Vet is being quite unctuous around her, fawning, rubbing his hands, offering really false smiles and generally behaving, at least to those who know him, like a child offered the full window of sweets on a shopping spree and dithering over the choice.

Her attitude towards animals is even harder to discern. Obviously, as she is going out with a vet, one must presume she has no violent objection to pets, but I received a cool reception on the first visit and Biggins did not as much as a glance.

My guess is that she has little time for us and is making a great effort to keep on the right side of the Vet by feigning an interest. I received a sharp pat on the head as she swept in from the front door, followed by a foot in the rear when the Vet was not looking, which could have been an accident, but I don’t think so.

It does not augur well for the future.

Obviously it is a situation which needs careful monitoring and Biggins and I have called a temporary truce while we decide on tactics. Together we are much stronger than alone and I have already decided to call a meeting of the gang as soon as possible to see what members can advise.

Of course, on closer familiarisation she might decide that I have much to offer and recognise that I make a much better friend than enemy.

Time will tell, but at least I am willing to give it a try providing she is too. But you can never tell with women. My experience of having one in the house is restricted to Mary and she is no problem.

The Vet’s girlfriend - I have not yet managed to fathom her name, something like Finny or Fanny - could be a different kettle of fish, to mix the metaphor somewhat.

I will keep you posted on developments.

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It’s that time of year again – when the whole village goes quite loopy over their gardens. Opening up their lawns to the public is an annual event which causes great stress and even greater bickering among the participants.

Of course, we pets have tried to understand the benefit of inviting strangers into your garden and discussing obscure plants and their life cycle until dusk approaches and it is time to shut the gate.

But we have no in-built love of plants. One flower is pretty much the same as another to us and as for trees – they have just one purpose which I will not go into now. Although we can be inflicted with hay fever, we know which plants to avoid. With a little sniffing of the wind direction we quickly identify the seeds causing the trouble and find another spot to sleep.

The Vet, of course, does not believe dogs suffer from this affliction and refuses to treat any animal brought into the surgery by owners pleading for a pill or two to stop the sneezing and running eyes.

All in the imagination, he says, not being absolutely clear whose imagination he is referring to, the owner’s or the dog’s, and no amount of pleading will shift him. I, too, have had a sneezing fit on warms days but the Vet just tells me to “buck up” – his catch-all phrase for avoiding wasting money on medicines for his own pets.

The house cat Biggins – named after the Vet’s solicitor for no particular reason that I can fathom – fares little better. I have no sympathy for him and as far as I am concerned he can sneeze all day and half the night. Trying to get any response from the Vet is a complete waste of time, as Biggins well knows, so he would be advised to hold his nose very, very tight – preferably for a week or two.

I began this blog on the subject of open gardens but, of course, dogs are not welcome to these events and we are usually shut in the house. Many visitors bring their own pets and it is thought that disagreements would break out if we were allowed to roam unhindered in our own backyards at the same time.

So much easier, I always thought, if visitors’ pets were banned and we could enjoy our own gardens in peace. This belief that dogs will always fight for their own territory is a fallacy owners never seem to understand. Once we have identified the character and motive of the visitor, we “home” pets are quite content to let the strangers nose around. They must always be held on a lead, of course, as there is no sense in going too far with this freedom nonsense.

The rivalry between the gardeners is intense and we dogs have been privy to night-time raids by certain villagers on other gardens, gently lifting plants and flowers which are thrown in the compost pile back home.

No one has ever been caught in the act, although tempers sometimes became so frayed that one year the police had to be called when certain people were named, in public, as the perpetrators.

Nothing could be proved, but bad feelings ran high and the vicar’s wife refused to make tea and cakes in aid of the church restoration fund. She was heard to mutter some very pointed remarks about money going missing. Again, just rumours, but enough to set tongues wagging for a few weeks.

Why can’t people be more like us dogs: kindly towards others, slow to anger and up front with any accusations. What do I hear in response from readers? Never mind, I am entitled to a little exaggeration from time to time.

I was having a chat with my best friend Gus, the Alsatian, the other day and the topic wandered from subject to subject, as it is apt to do if nothing of great importance was raised, until we reached the question of sense of humour.

Most owners know roughly that their pet dogs have a sense of humour and point to the evidence of a vigorous wagging of the tail. That’s not nearly enough, we dogs maintain. The movement of the tail has many meanings (please refer to previous blogs), only one of which indicates we are having a hearty laugh.

Gus has a fine sense of humour and always impresses on me how important it is to look on the light side of life. This, he claimed, helped to keep a balanced outlook. I had to confess that I felt I was somewhat lacking in the basic sense-of-humour department. A giggle or two was fine, but I found my duties as gang leader and deep thinker, precluded me from joining Gus in what humans call a “good belly laugh”.

I put that down to a strained puppyhood, a time when I was under constant scrutiny and denied the advantage of running freely around on my own. The Vet considered my upbringing as essentially doing exactly what I was told.

His favourite way of tutoring was to give a sharp order followed quickly by a loud slap of his hands. Whatever he thought this combination would achieve, I really don’t know, but it certainly did nothing for me. I heard the order clearly enough, but the hand slap followed so quickly that I was never able to carry out what he wanted in time to keep him happy.

Remember, I was just a young pup and loud noises confused me – I have got over that now thanks to some therapeutic conversations with the more intelligent members of the gang, most of who, sadly, are now deceased. Add to the mix of shrill commands and sharp handclaps, the large walking stick the Vet carried, and used for pointing out the direction he wanted me to go, I was an intimidated pup.

After a few weeks of this charade I could see the Vet was getting increasingly tense and ill-tempered and I had a real fear of receiving a whack from the stick. When I failed to achieve the standard of discipline he expected through this peculiar style of teaching, he said it was time for “a proper” school.

So off I went every Sunday morning, not with him thank goodness - he said he was too busy catching up with his book-keeping, which rather surprised me as he is less numerate than I am. Instead, I went under the stern eye of Gus’s boss, Mr Parkes, the former village butcher, who volunteered to “put some sense into my head”. He told the Vet that he had succeeded in turning Gus in to a very obedient pet by attending the same school, which shows how little he understood his dog.

Actually, and surprisingly, the school was the making of me. It was run by a kind lady of middle years, Mrs Ashcroft, who knew how to get the best from her pupils. Every time they obeyed a command a little titbit appeared from her jacket pocket and was eagerly consumed.

She thought this was the cause of the obedience, but in my case I would done what she asked without any inducement. It was becoming pretty obvious to her and the other pupils that my intelligence far outshone every one - and so I started on the road to recognising what I was capable of in terms of bending others to my will.

By the time the course ended a few weeks later I was fully trained in the senseless obedience tests and able to persuade my fellow students that there was much more to life than “sit, fetch and lie down”.

Had there been a follow-up course, say equal to university standard, who knows where I would have finished up – perhaps something equal to a human prime minister. As it was, I was content to be a large dog in a pack of small hounds.

I have been getting the impression lately that gang members are becoming somewhat impatient with my insistence on always being right. There could be a mini-revolt in the air.

I believe it is being driven by Percy the Chorkie – a mix of Yorkshire Terrier and Chihuahua. I have always been of the opinion that there was nothing to fear from these hybrids – I often refer to them in private as Half Brains. Half of this breed and a quarter of that with a final quarter of who knows what, does not bring out the best in canine character. Percy was invited into the gang because I believed he posed no threat to my rule.

Now I am beginning to have second thoughts. How else can his sudden change be explained? He came in as a most docile creature, happy to do as I ordered and seemingly not bothered about his position in the gang’s hierarchy which, let’s face it, was bottom of the pile.

He has now become argumentative. At the last meeting I suggested that gang members should meet at least twice a week in the same barn we have been using for years. A quiet spot well out of sight from prying human eyes, it is warm in the winter and cool when we get those isolated warm days in July. Plenty of draughts as the woodwork is far gone, but that does not matter when hair as thick as ours is the order of the day.

Percy’s view was that it failed to meet the minimum standards expected by the gang. We should find a new venue, he droned. Anyway, twice a week was too often. He wanted to gather once a fortnight as, he claimed, there was nothing new or interesting to discuss at more frequent meetings.

I took this as a bid to usurp my power and found some forceful arguments against his opinion on where and when we should meet.

The last thing I wanted was a long discussion and a vote when my authority was being challenged.

I have often heard the Vet advise his close friends, some of whom were on the parish council, that the way to destroy opposition was through telling a few porkies. Never mind the rights and wrongs of the argument, just lay into them with hints of money misappropriations, planning application shenanigans or accepting bribes. Nothing too accurate, so there were no legal comebacks or court cases. Judicious phrasing would do the job, he claimed.

Works every time, said the Vet, who has never served in any public office and had no idea what he was talking about.

Of course his listeners completely ignored his advice and went behind his back telling everyone he was losing his grip. Always good for a laugh in the pub providing the Vet was not in earshot.

My problem was how to adapt his stupid advice to my situation.

I decided on ridicule.

Hybrids were not really dogs in our image, I told the assembled gang. They were not accepted by the Kennel Club or other high-class shows, they had no people prepared to speak up for them and their intelligence was suspect.

That should do it, I thought, and watched as the gang slowly nodded in agreement. Not one came to Chorkie’s defence and he left the barn with head bowed and tail in the drooping position.

Rational and (almost) truthful argument won the day again. I’m still in charge.

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