update - better news

things are definitely on the mend. After 5 days of house arrest, during which I thought poor Murfs was becoming clinically depressed (turns out he was just bunged up due to having eaten a sock or two), the Paw is now good enough to allow him out without having to sit patiently holding his paw out for a sock - a plastic bag - another, bigger, plastic bag - another sock - all held on individually by the PO's best red rubber bands ... Hurray!

And Maddie managed to take out one of her stitches by herself but (on a double-barrelled visit to the vet) the vet took out the rest, so (apart from now having to rub nappy-rash cream on the site every now and again) she is free as a bird! - and I mean that literally, I heard her bark-bark-barking in the garden yesterday and assumed she was, as is her wont, running up and down trying to jump onto the garden wall after the cat. But no - she was actually perched on the wall barking at the poor cat, who was (judging from Maddie's hasty shuffles back every now and again), in the neighbours hedge fighting back with a well-aimed paw. Sigh.

Add to that the fact that Jimmy the rabbit (complete with festive red bow) was introduced to the other zoo-inhabitants on Christmas Day (Maddie appears to have been frightened of him, Murphy uninterested) and Gizzy has now formed a strange and worrying lurking habit outside Emily's bedroom door and you will see that matters have now stepped up to their usual mayhem.

So, New Year's Resolutions for 2011 - (1) deliver Jimmy back home in one piece as soon as possible. (2) build a searchlight and barbed wire facility round the back garden. (3) try not to finish off the Christmas champagne whilst making the Christmas peppermint creams (they're useless without peppermint flavouring).....

Happy Hogmanay!

it just keeps getting better...

so we've had our visits to the vet today and it's not good news - Murphy's paw has been getting wet depite our best efforts so isn't healing. So the bandage is off to help it dry out and it's 5 days' r & r - ie he's housebound. sigh. Poor Murphy is NOT happy.

Maddie on the other hand is super dooper! Well, she thinks she is - I caught her leaping over the wall in the garden yesterday - double eek! So she's on enforced confinement too! The surgery site is looking good though (apart from she's allergic to the sticky tape we used for the fourth wound-cover yesterday).

It's all go....stop...go...stop..stop...!

and then there were two..

We've been having an exciting time - Murphy is getting used to his paw, Maddie seems to have stopped trying to bite it - but then there are reasons for that! We had to put them in kennels just after Murphy's accident and of course he worked out that he could reach his paw because the lampshade wasn't long enough. He chewed and ate as much of the bandage as he could so the kennels, after a discussion with our vets and a visit to their own for more bandages, trussed up the paw again and we duly picked him up the next day and headed back to the vet for more re-dressing.

Meanwhile, the next day, Maddie was all booked in to be speyed and I duly took her in, cried when I handed her over (they must hire receptionists purely for their sympathetic and tactful natures) then got stuck in the carpark. No, it wasn't the dogmobile finally letting me down, it was another girl's car getting stuck in an ice-hole and blocking me in. So we duly dug and huffed and puffed and eventually a couple of blokes came and helped push and voila! Thanks guys!

But I digress.... so now we have two patients and two lampshades (sigh). And one of them can't go outside without a plastic bag and a sock (and two rubber bands and a fight to get them on) and the other isn't supposed to be straining her stitches.... well she's been upstairs about 8 times and I caught her today leaping up over the wall in the garden and back down again (aaargh! It must be about 4 feet from below). So clearly she's not feeling any ill-effects from her surgery! Not sure how pleased the vet will be when I take her in for her check tomorrow (about 6 hours after Murphy goes in for his re-dressing - I tell you I live at that place!) but what can you do? I'm doing my best.

And we also have another furry friend staying - Emily, it turns out, bought herself a house-rabbit and now doesn't know what to do with it as they're having viewings at the flat. So poor wee Jimmy (10 weeks old) now lives in a cage on a table in Emily's room. I live in mortal fear of his presence becoming known to any of the other 4-legged inhabitants of the house. I'm sure it can't be good for him, being left all by himself all day and night. So far we've remembered to feed him (well, Richard's remembered to remind me). Fingers crossed... (I'm told we'll only have him til Emily moves back to her mother's in February...)

Merry Christmas everyone!

a woman's strength...

oh dear, here we go again! Poor Murphy - and poor me! My female abilities to multitask tried to the limit! My two tasks today were to meet Tracy at 10 to get the research papers, meet Veronica for a coffee after and be at home for 3pm for a phone interview for a job. (meanwhile getting the dogs walked).

The meeting was cancelled so I went swimming (and took so long to get orgnised that I only managed half my usual amount), met Veronica for lunch then headed off to take the dogs out. Then things started getting a bit complicated... took the dogs out for their walk and to cut a long story short, realised Murphy had hurt his paw. So got them home, washed the offending paw and discovered it was worse than I thought - he was leaving blood all over the carpet/kitchen floor; so I had no choice - with 15 minutes to go before the interview I headed down the road, abandoned Murphy at the vets (he wusnae happy at being put in a cage while they waited for the vet to be free) and headed back.

So I had my interview (while daring Maddie to make a noise and half way through having to fetch her pink squeaky bone from under the sofa before she started barking at it), finiahes and shot back down to the vets to pick up the wounded warrier. It turns out he had a cut in his paw from ice! Small but deep - so we're back to the bandaged paw, the lampshade and the poor dog feeling very sorry for himself .. not to mention the fight we're going to have three times a day trying to keep his bandage dry on walks!!!

On the down side, Maddie is taking a while to accustom herself to the monster with the lampshade on his head... she's so far done nothing but bark and growl at him! C'est la vie....

pandemonium in the park

Well! Took the dogs to the park after dropping Richard off at work (as the snow's too much for his car so we need the dogmobile) and we were doing not too badly, apart from losing two tennis balls in the snow (Maddie's rubbish, she can never find them and by the time she's run round in circles using her nose as a dredger we've no chance of finding it!).

We met a boxer - Murphy thought about bullying him but he just looked at him so that was fine. Then we met them (Barney the boxer and owner) again as we headed for the entrance - Barney had found a large stick which he was clearly very pleased with... up stepped Murphy the "King of the Sticks" (in his own mind), who wanted the stick...

But Barney was having none of it! Murphy had a bit of a tug of war with him and they started growling at each other so I took the stick off Murphy (bribed him with a treat) but made the mistake of giving it back to Barney so the two of them went back at it, complete with growling and wrestling. Great! So Barney and owner (once they'd stopped after being yelled at) vamoosed one way and I took the stick off Murphy and put the lead on him. Then realised Maddie was bouncing round us bark-bark-barking... "shut up, Maddie!"

So I dragged Murphy off by the lead (he had it in his mouth so it was another tug of war - looked very professional, I'm sure!) and we made it back to the car...

I have to say we met another couple of dogs on the way who were lovely and we all got on well so it's not always so hectic!

snow

well the snow is taking its toll on Maddie - not that it's slowing her down at all, oh no! In fact it's sped her up, now she does wheelies ALL the time! But she does get snow balls on her legs; luckily Murphy helps lick them off as it takes ages and she doesn't take kindly to me yanking away at her fur!

yes!

I was right - almost. She just shot by with something wet and clothy in her mouth - my slipper!!!

So I've rescued it back and it's drying on a radiator - out of sight if you know who!

"whose woods these are..."

been another delay in posts... well the snow has now come upon us.. and the dogs are LOVING it! Took them to the park yesterday morning on the way back from dropping Richard off at work (only the dog-mobile works in the snow) and Murphy spent 10 minutes chasing Maddie round in circles, when normally he spend most of his time trying to ignore her! Then I threw a couple of tennis balls for them - the trick is to have Murphy end up with the old tatty one as he's going to eat it anyway (literally) and I want the new one for Maddie, who will actually chase it (although she takes her time giving it back)

More snow today and Maddie is celebrating by upping her wheelie level on walks. Have I mentioned she does wheelies? With an invisible bike, she doesn't need it! It's really very funny.

On the downside she nicked one of my slippers this morning as I had a lie in and I've not found it yet - I hope she hasn't taken it outside and left it there, I won't find it til the snow melts.

poor Maddie

or maybe poor me! I got the fright of my life when I got home at lunchtime, all set to walk the dogs (luckily having decided not to give blood after all, given the "substantially more than an hour" waiting time) and found Maddie with her face the size of a a melon! Needless to say I panicked totally, shoved Murphy back in the house and tore off with Maddie down to the vets, only to find she was away til 2, so I was directed to the nearest one with a vet and got there in double quick time. I thought Maddie's throat might swell up and she could die but once I got there they said it looked scary but that they weren't aware of that sort of thing ever ending in anaphylactic shock or similar.

So she got steroids and antihistamine jags and we have more pills for her and so far it's gone down quite a bit but not totally. I should say at this point that throughout this, while she was a bit subdued, on the whole she hasn't been massively affected by this.

I think Murphy must have realised something was wrong (he must have picked up on my panic at least) as I was going to work out what was for tea but ended up having a bit of a love-in with the dogs - I had Maddie on her bed and sat with her for a cuddle and Murphy wanted in so I played with him too - but when I wanted to get up he kept putting the paw up "don't go, don't go" so I just had to sit there and stroke him til Richard got home (and read a magazine to pass the time!)

PS I must also say that this picture (taken at the vets) is bad but the pictures don't show how bad it actually was. Poor Maddie.

a streaker!

murphy gave me a bit of a turn a couple of days ago. I was running along the railway line, which passes a golf course at one part - the first tee to be exact - and happened to look down as I passed it. I saw 2 guys who had just tee'd off and were looking down the fairway (luckily). Behind them I suddenly saw the silhouette of our Murphy, streaking across the tee! eek! SO fortunate that they'd already tee'd off as I doubt that would have stopped him on his way to the woods nearby!

the best and the worst

Murphy had an inspired day this week - I had run along the railway line with them and back again and was doing my stretches before heading back to the car. Murphy is patient and sits around with me (most of the time) but Maddie tends to wander off (through the nearest garden!) so I had a brilliant idea and attached their leads together, Murphy's attached to his harness and Maddie's to her collar. Well, Maddie pulled and pulled until eventually she pulled the harness off over Murphy's head.

She then started to edge off along the path; Murphy knew she shouldn't be going and followed her, keeping pace with the harness as she dragged it ever further away. He was quite worried - kept looking at it, looking at me and went and nudged her a couple of times too - all to no avail.
I then saw a cat further up and knew that she'd take off, leads and harness and all, if she saw it - so I started calling to her to come back. She sped up a bit and Murphy still kept pace, clearly getting ever more worried.

By this time I'd finished my stretches and started off after them - Murphy, after thinking abotu it and sniffing at the leads and harness as they were dragged along, took decisive action and picked up her lead in his teeth and put the brakes on, holding her back til I got there. What a clever boy! I was so impressed and pleased with him! Good boy, Murphy!

Til we got home and while I was drying Maddie in the vestibule Murphy started doing that thing that all pet owners know means their beloved is about to throw up - rather than have him throw up onto the doormat which would be difficult to clean, I threw a towel down in front of him and he used that. He'd obviously been surreptitiously snacking on either horse or dog poo - large amounts thereof! - and reaped the consequences, as did we all. Sigh! Towel now cleaned off, hosed down and sitting in the garden til it stops raining enough for me to remember to take it in and throw it in the washing machine. Bad boy, Murphy!

it's a good life

well the day started off well, with me chasing maddie up and down the street..(sigh). I wouldn't mind as it was 9am so nobody around, only she had escaped from the garden (B & Q here we come) and was after the cat. That means she was bouncing through everyone's back gardens, barking away.. not what you want at 9am on a Saturday!

Tonight I took Murphy and Maddie up to the playing fields to throw tennis balls for Maddie. Murphy gets bored with that so ran for the first ball and then spent the time eating it. All in all he lost one ball (or ate it), ate the second and Maddie destroyed the third. (sigh. again.) They weren't proper tennis balls, they're pet toys and they don't withstand much enthusiastic masticating!

Then Murphy decided he didnt want his lead back on so we had a tug of war with it (which he won) before I dragged them off down the road... - dogs, who needs 'em?!

Riverside report

I was a wee bit late this morning so murfs and mads got a bit of a bum deal- they were put into their walking harnesses and put in the car then I had to go and pick up Feen so all they got was a ride in the car then home. Oops- so I took them down the river later on, I ended up very wet and not a little muddy! Still I was getting over it and the walk would have passed off without incident til we got back to the carpark - not the usual one as it was full- and maddie decided to go for a wee wander instead of getting in the car. Unfortunately she's never really learned about hedges so today her lessons began... Tried to treat it as a wall and climbed up it but when her "flyin leap
and a scramble" tecnique got to the top we had a problem. Her weight pulled the hesg away from the wall and she fell down between the two! Never one to meekly await rescue, she tried the same techniqe to get back out, accompanied by a new one of simply pushing... And ended up stuck half way through the hedge with her head poking out! I was considering pushing her back in to lift her up but she decided brute force was the answer and just went for it- freeing herself ( into my arms and thence the car, tout de suite!), leaving a very woebegone and battered looking hedge hanging off the wall and with holes in it. I tried to fix it but not really possible, so I snuck off and hoped nobody was watching. Oops again. I think we'll avoid that carpark for a while!

canine capers

first of all, I acknowledge it's been five months since I put something up here - I've given up apologising as there's probably no-one to apologise to, and what am I saying sorry for? Not boring you for five months? I've been too busy keeping Facebook updated and trying to get my assignments in on time; then when I have plenty of time I always thonk of something else to do (can't think what at the moment).

Now I'm trying to cut down on the dissertation, still 15,000 words to lose... in the meantime Murphy has entered on a new period in his life - gigolo. Having spent about 8 months being bothered, bullied and beaten to the ball by that monster puppy Maddie, she's now come into season and decided she wants Murphy as the father of her own puppies! I haven't broken it to them it would be the miracle birth (or nightmare) and it's certainly not putting Murpy off trying.

I've been typing away on the subject of libraries, theological collections and the aristocracy of Scotland, with the two of them humping away immediately behind my chair... it's very distracting! Yesterday they were in the garden at it (unbeknownst to me) and got into what apparently is a common fankle - coitus interrupted - or not, more like! High drama on a sunny Sunday morning! Why am I always the only one in the house when these things happen? Anyway, I got the two of them apart and they went off to lick their wounds etc. Not that they remember it today, we had to keep them apart this morning. I had them on either side of the glass door at the back and they were lovelorn - nose to nose through the glass... luckily the mood's worn off this afternoon, she's back to chewing Richard's slipper and Murphy's back to dosing by (or on) the sofa.

Tune in next week...

life in leeds

I realise I haven't updated this for a while - I've been kinda busy and still am; plus I'm now away from my beloved Murphy, Maddie et al so no new stories to tell about them. I am in sunny Englandshire and have spent the last 10 days or so finding my way around and trying to get my assignemnts done at the same time as working.. luckily I seem to have got my head around what I'm doing here at work - University of York Library - so it's not taking too much out of me intellectually (luckily as I've spent the last week or so trudging my way through my budget for one of my assignments - and still not finished!)

However I can proudly say that on the seventh attempt, last night I finally got home to Leeds without taking any wrong turns! Every time I go somewhere new I am reminded how truly awful my sense of direction is...

Onwards and upwards!

PS Murphy would LOVE it here on campus, lots of grass, a few lakes and millions of ducks, geese and swans! I'm not sure how long he'd last before they threw him out, mind you.

blogging

guess where I am? in class, learning about blogs! and yes, apparently it takes a lot of discipline to keep regularly update it. I should know! btw, I've bought one of those tennis-ball throwing handle things (as I'm a rubbish ball thrower) and yes, Maddie loves it! She's better than Murphy at bringing the ball back - Murphy brings it back, just won't give you it! Maddie usually brings it back but sometimes abandons it a way away and you have to go get it.

She of course has more energy in the mornings so Murfs has adopted a new system - he lets Maddie rush off and get the ball, then aims his run to cut her off on the way back and takes it off her. Poor Maddie...

oh well

he turned up this morning - Julia was walking round with him (I mean the bullyman) when I got there, so I kept going and went into the woods with the dogs. We had a nice walk and back in the usual time. Although Maddie may miss her romps with Isla we probably went further than normal so at least it's more exercise for me!

Ran into Elizabeth (from choir) on the way home whose had similar trouble with her dog Rosy (a mild mannered staffy)and she sympathised - said whoever heard of an aggressive spaniel?! We agreed that some people are stupid and shouldn't have dogs. I felt better after that - it does help to feel someone's on your side.

So I think I'll go into the woods from now on, it's easier and I'm less likely to have an emotional trauma in the mornings!

followup

well I made it round the next morning - Richard persuaded me and came with me in case that guy was there again. (he wasn't). I do however think the others do think Maddie is aggressive. It depends on your definition of aggressive. If you think it means playing roughly, too roughly for some dogs, then yes. but if, like me, you think it means deliberately attacking other dogs with the intention to harm them, then no, she's not.

It's how it looks to other people, and we tend to put human values on dogs and expect them to behave like us, which of course they don't. We are practising "recall" with her so she'll come back when we call, which we will do when other people are giving out treats and if that dog and owner come round again. I also put her on the lead this morning as she was trying to do the same to barney, another spaniel puppy her own age (Isla the boxer also went onto the lead at the same time so it wasn't just her).

If I think people are getting onto her case unnecessarily I'll take her and Murphy into the woods and avoid them, I don't need the negativity. In the meantime I hung out some more towels today - the big bath sheets - and she didn't like it at all - refused to go outside! My aggressive puppy was scared of the washing....

the down side

Not a good day today - a couple of days ago a bloke Julia knows came up with his dog while we were doing our daily perambulation of the track. The dog's some kind of Staffy or staffy cross by the looks of it; anyway, Maddie went and chased it and all the other "wee" dogs joined in (3 of them and possibly isla, the boxer as well I can't remember). We called them away as the dog was getting inundated.

today he came up again and Maddie again made a beeline - this dog doesn't play, it just lies down (doesn't roll over so not as submissive as all that!) and Maddie basically chewed her ears. I pulled her away and she went back - at which point the guy started yelling at me, saying my dog was aggressive and I should have her on a lead. I actually thought he was joking at first, but it quickly became clear he wasn't. I was trying to tell him she didn't do that to the other dogs, said I wasn't trying to have an argument with him just saying she wasn't aggressive. That didn't help and he continued to yell at me so I picked Maddie up and said I was going home - he continued to yell at me as I walked away, I was in shock.

The others just all stood around and didn't say anything, it all happened so quickly but they wouldn't get involved anyway, you don't in that sort of situation. I want down to the end of the path leading in and sat on the ground and cried - I was in shock then very upset. Cried all the way home. Richard says he'll come up with me tomorrow but i think that could make it worse. I actually don't want to go back up there again, I don't want to run the risk of meeting him again, he was very bullying and looking back I can see there were signs in my previous meetings with him with the others.

And there's always the chance that the others think Maddie's aggressive too but haven't liked to say so. I don't think she is, I think she was doing to the dog what she does to Murphy and actually does to the other dogs too (well isla and archie) - chewing their ears and playfighting - but they all run away or chase her or play back but this dog just lies there.

It's quite ruined my day (well, when I remembered after classes) and I really don't know what to do tomorrow. I might take them up through the woods or somewhere else, or I might let Richard take them for their morning walk. Or I could brave it and go back but be prepared to put Maddie on the lead if that dog returns (actually I'd take them into the woods, they need to run around), I don't know.

Any ideas?

March hare!

Lord, I dont' know what's wrong with that puppy! She's suddenly STARVING all the time - and has realised that she's now big enough to get at least her head onto the kitchen counter and more than that for the dining table. So she nabbed most of the chocolate crispies on Sunday (luckily they were the cheap ones with not much chocolate on them) and today finished my lunch while I was cleaning up after the cat (who had thrown up her food - eaten too quickly - into her water bowl, in case you're interested!)... Tonight she had her head almost in Murphy's food tin as it got left on the counter and I had to move the dirty dishes away from the edge of the dishwasher-top as she was succeeding in her own clean-up operation!!!

weather...

makes it very difficult at times... all this snow - again - then the rain, and more rain. but it hasn't got rid of the snow! Not up at the track or in the woods anyway, yesterdy and today it was the weirdest thing - like walking through a slush puppy! The ground is still frozen, you see, and although it's too warm to snow it's too cold for the snow to melt so you get about 3-3 inches of water sitting on top of the snow and when you walk on it it mushes down into slush. With hard-packed, frozen snow underneath in many areas! It just makes it all that slightly bit harder... poor Murpy's walks have been a bit on the perfunctory side.

Maddie loves it though, the only differenceis that she races through all these HUGE puddles and then jumps on you. Her paws seem to be very sponge-like, they certainly leave lots of water all over you! (and mud when she's been under the tree in the garden terrorising the cat (three times tonight - I had to carry her in each time before she annoyed the neighbours with her constant barking at her)

progress report

well Mrs T does seem to be getting a bit better - a concerted effort to go back to taking her out every hour seems to be working, more or less. Of course, there's always a drawback and it seems to be her continued fascination with the poor cat - despite Gizzy's swipes at her she doesn't seem to have been dissuaded from tormenting her, sigh.

..I've just realised she's chewing the top off the bottle of champagne in the winerack - guess we'll have to drink it now! (well, after easter once Lent's over)

ON a different note had a surfeit of church today - the usual 9am mass at which I was cantoring (and forgot the words to the allulujah) then immediately onto the Guide Thinking Day service at the bottom of the road. At least we got coffee and biscuits after that one! Amazing how many people I meet at these things I know from dogwalking...

As you can see the weather continues to be clement. Luckily the dogs love it!

CRAZY!

she's driving me NUTS! Has started having "accidents" indoors again - accidents my backside! She's doing it on purpose, every time she doesn't get to go out with Murphy or doesn't get her own way somehow. Rarely does anything while we're out, only when we're in. Richard had barely left tonight (in fact he was still in the vestibule putting on his many layers, preparatory to taking Murphy out) and after a blameless day and within a timescale of about 3 minutes she wee'd on Murphy's bed, attacked the cat and spilt the treat tub, eating the lot. Add her uncanny ability to levitate over the babygate at the bottom of the stairs and she is Mrs T alright!!

oops

I've let it slip again... and that's not the only thing I've let slip! dropped the puppy treat tub last night - you've never seen two dogs move so fast! Richard said Murphy was just helping but that's would only have been true if he'd been hoovering up the spilt treats. It was the tub itself I couldnt get him out of!!

training trials

oh dear.. as I have Guides on a Thursday Richard has to take the puppy to her classes. But it's me who trains her all week and she knows I'm really the boss. So poor old Richard gets terribly embarrassed as she refuses to do what he tells her. We'd worked hard on "paw" and "roll over" all week and she had them down pat (in fact she doesn't even wait for the command, she sits and waves alternate paws at you til you give her a treat!) but she wouldn't do it for Richard. In fact, for the off-lead training she instantly ran to the door and stayed there...

Richard is used to Murphy having been top of his class for his puppy training (not that he pays any attention now).. so it's a hard pill to swallow. More work required!

housework hell...

Poor wee Maddie - I was hoovering the living room and found her curled up at the back door, shaking. She really doesn't like the hoover. Possibly my fault as that's the first time I've had the time or inclination to hoover since we got her (3 weeks before Christmas!) - I know - very bad housewife but when it's me against 2 teenagers, one man, 2 dogs and a cat there's no real motivation to be cleaning the house every week, you're back to square one two days later!

When I opened the door to her crate (which I'd shut while cleaning the kitchen floor) she went in there and seemed to be happier - Murphy was between her and the hoover by then so maybe she felt safer.

we thought we'd lost her...

truly - the worst afternoon of my life

we took the two of them down to the beach, we thought they'd like it. I turned out it was blowing a gale and freezing, the waves were HUGE! and the tide was going out...

Richard went down to the water's edge by a groyne and the dogs went with him; I walked away across to the other groyne, it must have taken about 20 seconds, but when I turned back she had gone...

Richard wasn't looking and didn't see her go, where was she?

we spent about half an hour going up and down, calling her, I nearly drowned Murphy walking along the top of the groyne to into the sea, he followed me on the beach til he was having to swim and the sea was so rough..... Richard went up the top and looked on the road and the other sections of the beach.. nothing

we had to assume she had been caught up and swept out to sea.. I broke my heart (cue wading into the sea, kneeling on the beach, tears) ... how could this happen? how could we do this?

eventually we went back home, just frozen, in shock. the 3 of us - me, richard and murphy.

When we got home Richard looked at his mobile (which had been charging at home) -

- and there was a phonecall! From someone called Matthew! Who had found her! (alive and well, if very tired and cold)

What had happened?

It turned out in that 20 seconds we weren't watching she had taken off and followed two joggers - about 2 miles all the way down the beach to the other end.

They didn't know what to do with her but this Matthew has 2 spaniels of his own (although not currnetly staying with him as he's renting) so took her in, watered her and dried her ... and when we got there she was asleep on the sofa, cosy as you like.

We're not going anywhere near the beach, ever again!

Happy New Year!

new day, new decade.. my god, where has the last one gone? That one was all about Aberdeen, I moved up here exactly 10 years ago. Now look at me, I even sound vaguely Aberdonian! (emphasis on the "vaguely") I was up bright and early at 7.30am to let Maddie out, then couldn't get back to sleep (lots of gunk sitting in my chest so started coughing) so took everyone out (well the canine ones) - met one of Julia's pals with a 8 month old lab-cocker sp cross - he and Maddie took a liking to each other so we wandered round and they tore round in circles... needless to say she's conked out on her cushion now - yes!!

Happy New Year!