Brexit

When I first heard the word Brexit I assumed it must be a dog biscuit, a nutritious one but vile to eat, as most dog food is. (For myself, a gently steamed morsal of chicken is more to my taste than anything stored in a large paper sack.) It was only when the Female started phoning friends and almost in tears saying, 'I just can't believe that people have actually voted their way into a recession,' that it struck me that so much emotion could surely not be roused by a simple dog biscuit.

It was then that a particularly political poodle friend, who I meet down in Hove Park, explained to me that we were pulling out of Europe. I immediately pointed out the practical difficulties of doing this. You can't just change Continents at will, I said, to begin with there are geographical constraints which would make it difficult. The poodle complemented me on my wit then said, to be serious, for a French dog like himeslef, Brexit was nothing short of a tragedy.

Well, I felt none the wiser; somehow we had voted for a recession and done something that would be tragic for all species inclined to be French. I then approached a husky, not a friend so much as a acquaintance, and asked him if the talk in his household had been fixated on Brexit as well. 'Good lord, yes,' came the reply. 'My people are thinking of emigrating. They say they feel European and no-ones going to stop them continuing to feel European.'

This seriously alarmed me. There had been no talk of emigrating in our household which meant I presume that once we pulled out of Europe we could end up anywhere, in the Pacific, perhaps, wearing grass skirts, or in Asia where they had restaurants which served dog meat. I too began to feel alarmed and when out in the park I was sure that the ground was grinding and shuddering, getting ready to pull away from it's Continental friends.

Then somehow the excitement died down. The Olympics got under way. The talk of recession receded, the alarm that had threatened the canine community in Hove Park became a thing forgotten, the Female's appetite for puting on the news every five minutes declined and boring but blissful everyday reality returned. 'What of Brexit?' I asked of my poodle friend. 'Oh that,' he sniffed as he cocked his leg, 'lets face it, it's not going to happen.' Thank goodness, I thought, I had no wish to end up on someone's menu.

Making sure you sleep in the family bedroom

Since my last post I have been inundated by canine enquiries as to how I managed to inveigle myself onto the family bed (albeit having to cope with the trauma of the heated duvet). Well, reader, I started with an advantage because our’s is a bungalow with all the bedrooms on the ground. Only a loft conversion housing the living quarters is upstairs so that made a mockery of the ‘no upstairs rule’. For goodness sake, my bowl resided in the kitchen upstairs, the telly, which I snore in front of every night, was upstairs, the sofa which so ably lulled me into snoring was upstairs. 

So upstairs I lived, leaving the main bedroom vulnerable as they could hardly introduce a ‘no downstairs’ rule when I had to be let out each night to have my pre-sleep barking session. I ably exploited this loophole by spending entire nights (I must emphasise the word entire) laying siege to my quarry. I whined, I wheedled, I mewed like a kitten, I trembled every time the door opened and I was told to shut up. Eventually the Male resolve crumbled (his was the last to go, the Female was ready to give in after about five minutes) and I got my way.

End of story you might think. But no, another obstacle materialised. An old brushed cotton sheet with a tear in it was thrown across the brocade duvet cover as my paws were thought to introduce unnecessary garden elements onto the pristine aqueousness of the cover. This I managed to bypass by insouciantly plonking myself on the one bit of the bed not covered by the brushed cotton which was the Male’s pillow. Although regularly ejected from said foothold, sleep overtakes us all, and when this happened the sheet miraculously slid down and I could feel the silky brocade wrap luxuriously round my perfectly toned curves. Bliss zzzz.

Grooming. 11.4.2016

Sharon turned up today in her 'Dial a Groom' van and I knew the shaggy locks were a gonner. Ho hum, Spring is here.

All winter I wore my coat long, developing a hirsute aspect not unlike that of a Highland cow. As any of you who have achieved proximity to one of these bovines will know, sprinkle said animal with a bit of mist, or perhaps something stronger, like driving rain, and the oils in the coat start letting off the most delicious pong. In my case the pong of natural oils is often augmented by that of fox urine which I like to dab behind my ears if I come across the opportunity for a good roll.

The problem with this special winter aroma is that it makes it almost impossible for me to cope with the Female.

‘Oh my God, you’re disgusting,’ she’ll say as she gets back into the car after I’ve been waiting patiently for her to finish the weekly shop at Tesco.

‘No way are you jumping up next to me on this sofa,’ she’ll gasp as I try to edge up shiftily in the hope of not alerting her olfactory organs.

‘I simply won't sleep with that on the bed,’ she’ll pronounce as I come into the family bedroom after my evening bark-off in the garden.

Little does she realise how privileged she is to have me sleep with her now that she’s acquired a heated duvet. I either have to move over to the side as the Male, who gets as hot as I do then sticks his feet out, kicking me in the process, or I have to melt off the bed like a Salvador Dali clock. 

If, on top of that, the person you are lying next to starts groaning and feigning nausea, it makes one wonder why they don’t get up and move to the spare room. Pongy and proud, that was me, now I'm smooth shaven and as golden as a chicken nugget.