Wednesday 30 March 2011

In trouble again

Flossie here:


I've been to see the vet again today. Rachel says she's turning into Mrs Pumphrey and that I should be called Tricky Woo.

Anyway, I had to go, because of all the blood.

Somehow, during our walk/gallop/swim/lollop in the park today, I cut my toe in a way that "a flap has to be trimmed".

I don't know what that means, but I have to wear one of Rachel's old socks for now, fastened with duct tape.


We are going in the car again early tomorrow. Rachel says something nice will happen.

That's all I know. Sleep now.


Rachel here:

Sedation and trimming of nasty ragged cut under her nail first thing tomorrow. The nice thing will indeed happen, but only at lunchtime when the Lovely Son arrives, just in time to come with me to collect her. As he did at Christmas.

Who knew owning a labrador would be so eventful? Or so vet-centric?

Tuesday 29 March 2011

A new aesthetic


Cheaper to get the slurry stains recently donated by Florence* cleaned professionally than to make a fire ceremony of the sitting room carpet in the back lane, and then either replace it or paint the rest of the floor. But cleaning it was expensive enough.

It was only cleaned last summer. An ageing Yorkie, a mud-bearing, sensitive-stomached labrador, and four cats who indulge in recreational barfing are less than kind to a pale wool carpet.

My next house is going to be floored throughout in garage-forecourt cement, each room having a central drain. I will hose it down every week with a pressure washer, and swab it with mega-stinky industrial-strength disinfectant.

That'll learn 'em.

(Yes, I do know that beautiful polished concrete floors are available and probably a very sensible option, but today, because I'm feeling slightly embittered, I'm going with the grimmer, more punitive version.)

*Not that I love the girl any the less for it, of course.....

Monday 28 March 2011

Slow, sometimes surprising

It's Jane's Flower Monday again - how the month flies by! 

From about the 15th until today, this has been happening to the clivia, slowly, slowly, as it does every year. 














Meanwhile, a succession of cheap supermarket daffodils come and go. What I love about them is that you never know what is going to turn up; the label simply reads 'British daffodils" and it isn't until they start to open their tight buds that you see what they look like.



These were last week's, but still going strong:




These are the current favourites:






Flowers. Good for the heart.

Sunday 27 March 2011

Orange joy


Flossie found a Disney toy in a back lane yesterday. Filthy (but what's a bit of muck to a dog?) yet untattered, it had been outside for a while, and not just dropped moments ago by a child. She carried it home, quivering with pride and delight.

And then had to sit crestfallen while the new treasure was put in the washer and dried to lurid fluffiness.

It had to pass the quality assurance test carried out by the in house Inspector.



And then she was allowed to claim her find.




Tosca didn't want to share it.


So it was all Flossie's.




She shares it with me. Thank you; it's a bit too drooly for me.





She carries it everywhere. Flossie's best toy.





I think she loves it.

Saturday 26 March 2011

Stop, look and listen

No, it's not road-crossing drill for children!


I've been rushing about this morning, feeling very harassed, getting the house primped for a viewing by two young, timid, new doctors, with no idea of what they wanted in a house, tiptoeing round in their socks (aw, bless, they worried about mud - in my house!!).

The furniture looked tatty, and the stain that Flossie left on the sitting room carpet hasn't cleaned up well, and won't be professionally cleaned till Tuesday. Spring cleaning is overdue for cupboards and tiles. Every time I wiped a surface, a cat jumped up on it to make paw prints. I found myself thoroughly disgruntled about everything today.

After the viewers went away, I brought the dogs back from Sandra's house - yapping and hair-shedding isn't the best accompaniment to a house viewing, and Sandra hides both for me. Then I made a cup of tea and read some blogs.

And this article from June at Aging Gratefully fetched me up short. Rushing, harassed, missing the lovely things? That could have been me today.

It's well worth reading this article, taking a breath, and looking around you - not at mud or dog hair, stains or grubby grouting, but at something beautiful just waiting to be noticed.

I'm off out with the dogs now. Spring is still Spring, even under leaden skies with a chilly wind at your back, and there is beauty out there.

Friday 25 March 2011

Dawn chorus


All is well; Flossie had a nice, long, uneventful sleep, and was full of beans for her first walk. Heavy hints were applied.


Wish I could say I'd had the same sweet repose; sleeping with one ear open for the possibility of faint whining at the back door isn't conducive to a restful night, and makes one very aware of the cheeping and chirruping that goes on between Hamish and Scooter from around 5 a.m.

It's their greeting and invitation to play, tails up, and they keep it going - with the dogs and the girls, never to me (sigh) - till it's time to sit on my bedroom windowsill and lash their tails malevolently at the chimney-perched birds or pounce on my feet.


Meep!


Cheep!


Chirr! Whirr!

Eventually, I gave in and got up. And that's why the dogs and I were in the dewy park at around 7 o'clock this morning. I know, hardly the crack of dawn, but early for me.


I'm considering an afternoon nap.....

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