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Woof-a-doodle-day - Lady Doods here doggy blogging on behalf of Pack Mistress who has a very sore head and can’t move off the sofa - not through drink I hasten to add, which in the past has all too often been the case, but because she was involved in a bit of an accident, caused, she is telling everyone, by me. This is what happened. I’ll get my turn of events in before she does. As you know, me and Lord Smudge have been banned from the park for chasing sheep on the neighbouring farmer’s land so we are now confined to what PM calls the urban wastelands. This is a patch of rough land populated by telegraph poles and crisscrossed by a concrete path which is littered with shards of broken glass. It’s not as bad as she makes out however. There is a babbling brook, although true to say not a bluebell to pee on nor host of golden daffodils in sight. A scattering of dandelions hither and thither, although the local hooligans took care of most of the wildlife by setting off random fires thus turning vast areas into smouldering black pyres. But at least we can still have a dip in the river.
Its woofin hysterical watching the OAP’s trying to get down the steep descent which leads to what they call ‘the beach’ but is in fact a pile of stones by the side of the river. They have made an improvised rope, knotted to Smudge’s lead, which they use to stagger down the slope. Once down, out comes the flask, the blow up cushions and the bubble wrap - Packman sits on that but there can’t be any air bubbles left in it by now. There’s one big flat sloping stone they call ‘the table’ and that is where they have their tea and cake (courtesy of Princess Tululah the dashing dachshunds mum).
Anyway, on the day of the afore mentioned accident (your honour!) me, Smudge and Tululah were joined by three robust labs, one of whom likes to keep a brick gripped permanently in his chops for reasons best known to himself. As it turned out we never made it to the river. The OAPS were meandering along the concrete path at their usual leisurely rate and us dogs were circling alongside wishing they would get a woofin move on. I don’t remember what came over me exactly, but I suddenly charged blindly into the back of PM’s legs and knocked her flying in a backwards somersault. Maybe I should have gone to spec-savers!
She went down like a skittle. Crunch - that was the back of her noggin as it hit the concrete path.
At first I thought I’d killed her. I tried to lick her better but I was roughly shoved out of the way whilst the other OAP’s tried to get some sense out of her. None forthcoming, but to be honest, they’re all as daft as each other. They hoisted her up by the arms, carted her back to the car and Packman whisked her off to A&E. That was the last I saw of her for a few hours.
You should see the size of the lump on her head, it’s massive. Luckily there were no broken bones, but the doctor told her she must take it easy for a few days (i.e. no dog walking, feet up on the sofa watching Three in a Bed etc.) and we had to watch her every time she nodded off in case she didn’t wake up. If she didn’t wake up, the doctor said, she had to go back to the hospital. What a daft thing for the doc to say - she’s always nodding off and sleeps the sleep of the dead (I know from trying to wake her up in the mornings) so how were we supposed to know the woofin difference?
So that’s the latest shaggy dog saga, resulting in the fact that life is as boring as buggery till she gets better. Two days on she still can’t walk without her old lady stick and keeps calling me a big orange donkey which isn’t very polite, or true, seeing as I am a labradoodle with an impressive pedigree, which is more than she can say. She keeps muttering to her friends on the phone that dogs and dog walking is a dangerous as well as an expensive business considering the sheep and the fact that it’s the second time she’s ended up in A&E through dog related causes (remember my ol’ mate Marley who tried to rip her hand off?) Maybe she’ll pack me off to the dog’s home like Marley, or the Labradoodle re-homing centre. There is such a thing apparently. We Labradoodles can be hard work; we are what’s known as high energy dogs. Well, it’s her own stupid fault; she should have got a Pekinese or some other kind of handbag dog, a woman of her age and in her condition.
In order to survive a bump like that she must have a wooden head as well as a wooden heart. In fact, when I think about it, she’s always tapping herself on the head and saying, ‘knock on wood’. I think it’s supposed to be something to do with bringing good luck, in which case I’ll just have to knock on wood (or her head) and hope she doesn’t send me off to the pound.
The above painting is of PM and her sister. It took her forever to paint but was turned down for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. She got the rejection letter the same day she had the accident.
“Another bloody knock on the head,” she swore, but that was nothing to do with me. Here’s hoping she gets accepted the next time, otherwise she says she is going to give up. She’ll just have to knock knock knock on wood and hope that she gets accepted the next time and I’ll keep knocking with her - but not knocking her over, otherwise she might find herself knock knock knocking on heaven’s door and we wouldn’t want that.
