I feel like a...

time traveller... from this 

a little light tapestry in the garden of the cottage...

to this, the glorious weather we had...

to this, 

one damp dog home at last after this morning us picking her up from the kennels.

As you can see she wasn’t very impressed with the shower given to her as a welcome home present... boy did she niff!

‘Your face is on...

the tea towels you can’t cancel it now!’

was said to Lady Di on the eve of her wedding day.

Yesterday morning sitting up in bed I said to Hubs, let’s cancel the holiday and stay home, that way Ellie won’t have to go back to the kennels.  His reply was we must go, I knew he was right.

We took her talking up what a lovely time she

would have.  She was pleased to see Emma and with all the strength I could muster we said goodbye in a light hearted tone.

I saved my tears for the car driving home.

This morning the house seems strangely quiet without after just four weeks, a vital member of our family.

If the weather closes in as it can so easily do in the Highlands, we could always come home earlier than planned!?!

We might have...

cracked it!  With the help of this 

plinky-plonky machine.

In last week’s ‘How to Spend It’ magazine, yes, I know a girl can only dream!?!

This was featured by Technopolis, a page I read avidly even though by my own admission I am a TTF... a total techno phobic... I know, I know it should be TTP, however I thought I would grab your attention so much quicker with an F!?!
Sad, but there you are!

The idea is it completely calms dogs with its ‘music’, you can even have it on inaudible to the human ear.  They make them for horses and cats.  I am fully aware that those of you who may, just may have the impression I’m a daft tart will be rolling your eyes in amazement with the thought 

‘There’s one born every minute!’ however I give not one jot when it just may help a tortured soul who life this far hasn’t treated well!

Yesterday, it didn’t work it’s magic in the car, so our expectations for our leaving her today wasn’t great.  I turned it on half an hour before we left, charged her kong with goodies, put my scarf on her bed and with the minimum of fuss drifted away.  Just an hour 
later on our return, we parked up the road and I looking for all the world like a super sleuth slithered down the road making not one sound.  The silence was deafening, we stood for a couple of minutes by the gate... nothing!  It was only when the key went into 
the lock of the gate we heard a woofle.

Success!  

It was  very hard to drift in nonchalantly  and not make a big fuss... but we did it!

Our training goes on...

Adoration is a...

hard task master I decided.  Everywhere I go I am followed by...

no, no, not George Clooney, or Johnny Depp or even Cillan Murphy.  If I was, I would be over the moon crowing to the world and the handful of followers I have about what a bright, gleaming, beaming 22 carrot (carat) full-on personage I am!?!  However true life isn’t as glam.  My shadow these days is a furry heap who dogs my every step.

We both didn’t sleep well last night for worry about Ellie.  Especially as we know she is going back to the kennels she came from for our weeks holiday.  It unfortunately is the only solution to the problem we have about her being such a nervous traveller.  Her separation anxiety surely can only get worse.  Her not accepting himself is also of huge concern.  A kinder, gentler man you couldn’t wish to meet.  He must unwittingly remind her of her aggressor: the builder came up with that one and maybe he has a point?  Who knows?  She will be assessed by a behaviourist while there. We are supplying copious notes on our maybe naive views of her problems.  We both fully accept we are the ones that on our return will need the boot camp training regime for thicko dog owners!  At least when we get back we can finally get in place a fast track obedience training course for us all.  Ellie will be the star of the class leaving himself and me on the naughty step or sat in the corner facing the wall with pointed hat on heads...

We were swept...

along on a sea of drool, pretty much like the owl and the pussy cat.  All we were short of was a flaming pea green boat!

Mind you we have ourselves solely to blame!

Every weekend we do it, well to be more exact we overdo it!

Today we decided as our surgery was open for the old duffers flu jab we would for the first time, leave Ellie home alone.

I drifted out first, without a by your leave, himself followed ten minutes later.  We met up like ships (got a nautical theme going here?) that pass in the night, me having been done, him just biting the bullet going in.  We sat outside our local coffee shop, quite like old times before the dog’s arrival.  She still isn’t brave enough to venture into town yet.  Being the Food Festival, the town was heaving, the church bells were pealing and the great and the good of the surrounding Shropshire hills were there en masse, today just wouldn’t have been a good introduction to town for her.  As we got to our gate we heard her bark... Oh dear!  Our neighbours were out luckily, whether driven out by her we’re not sure?  We will enquire when we next see them.

Ellie is certainly a very clingy dog, especially with me, which is flattering in one way, although I do want her so much to be a big brave dog.  And it is only four weeks today that she arrived, so maybe we are expecting too much too soon?

We then thought it would be good to get her out in the forest.  She drooled and foamed at the mouth, there and back.  On top of us 
leaving her earlier on, not a good idea we belated decided!?!  What clots we both are!

Have you ever...

thought you must come across as one of those clever sods that folk think she’s been there, read the book, got the tee shirt, seen the blooming film even? Well I had that levelled at me yesterday and I honestly didn’t know what to say!  It’s preyed on my mind, I must admit.  It was from family so they knew, as I do try to play my cards close to my chest, for fear of being perceived as too full of myself. Should I try and turn back the clock and pretend none of it has happened?  All my life I have had a happy go lucky outlook, seizing opportunities, even the grotty ones and trying to turn them to my advantage.  In the main it has worked.  Trouble is I do tend to speak my mind and on this occasion I should have kept it shut. I told the person I was upset and the reasons why.  Maybe I should have stayed shtum 

As Simon used to say...

‘Better to be thought a fool than open one’s mouth and prove it!

I can’t erase my past, it’s a very strange 

feeling to have it used against me as form of trying to make me guilty and for what?

All it did in effect is knock the affection I had for the person and sadly not look at them in the same loving light.

Where did I go wrong?

Ellie still thinks I’m wonderful so that’s okay!  She hasn’t got a clue about what’s gone before, she loves me for me.

Dogs have that happy knack.

I have a...

dog, sadly not a garden that would feature in the Secret Gardens of Ludlow, as indeed it has in the past.

I am rapidly coming to the conclusion the garden designer’s garden I fell in love with is now developing into a yard.

The two somehow don’t seem to go together?

We suggest she goes out to do her wees, she thinks she’s being told off and skulks in the shrubbery. Nibbling the stalks by way of the soothing of a dummy.  Tracks are being laid like the ancient Inca Trail.  Holes are dug to hide bones and toys, evacuation is the name of Ellie’s game.  Think I will buy her a metal detector for Christmas in the hope of a long lost pot of coins?
Stones also hold a fascination for her, which  I hide as a tummy full of pebbles would be a costly trip to the vets.
Water also holds no fears as yesterday out on a walk I showed her a sheep trough, the unspoken message was to have a drink.  Oh no, something got lost in the translation and she promptly hopped in and sat down!

A fun dog which surprisingly enough I haven’t compared with my much loved and still missed chum: for that I am pleased.

Not her, but you get the idea.

I have a thing...

about things!

Moths are my all time foe.  Old cottages seem to harbour them, they lurk in the ancient timbers, they munch on my clothes.  My body goes into spasms of evil as I spy them innocently sitting on the bedroom wall.  I sidle up in super sleuth mode, my finger quivering with the anticipation of splat.  
My technique has been honed over years of experience on the killing fields.  Gently, ever so gently I press my finger on them before they’ve even had time to think lambswool to the slaughter.  My walls are a testament to their demise, Salvador Dali would be proud.

As I prepare to unpack my clothes and put them away in my super new fitted wardrobe, my thoughts obviously turn to a moth moat, a moth exterminate system.  Being a chemical free ageing hippy I only want to kill them kindly, you understand?  

Any surefire ways would be gratefully received.

I’ve staggered in...

in a total state of...

COLLOPSE!

Himself is at the dentist, so off we troll to the Green Cafe for our usual flat white.

All good so far, the table we have sat at on the two occasions we have been there was taken.  This didn’t go down very well, so instead of sitting surveying the outside space she holed herself up under my chair and tight into the corner.  I sort of got the feeling it was because we were one short.  A little bribery and corruption didn’t work its usual magic.  When it was time to go we shot out like a human cannonball.  Most were amazed that I had a dog with me.  They watched our departure with cooing and aahing,  whether it was at the sight of my stout legs going round at nineteen to the dozen, similar to a Tom and Jerry cartoon, I dunno?  As we left I suggested she wait and we compose ourselves: it sort of worked!

I started to relax.  It really is amazing the noises, the people that appear is if by magic from the very fabric of the ancient stone walls.  Cars backfire, a postman noisily emptying the post box then stopping to read the post therein as we attempt to pass!  Roaring off in a hurry conscious of the time to make up, by him being nosey!?!

Ellie has a very clear idea by now as to the way she wants to go home, I have other ideas in order to ring the changes, all part of the training?

The walk along a very narrow lane was spooked by the aforesaid postie now delivering mail.

He was clearly out to get us and making a first class job of it too!  Into the mix came a very snooty Patterdale with owner kennel club registered closing in fast at our rear.

By now all training was not only put on the back burner, it was incinerated.

Ludlow college was spewing out students (11.30... lunchtime?) who moved as one wave in total disregard of one panic strucken dog towing an old crone!  Gone are the days when I idly thought I used to cut a 

swathe with folk falling in awe in my wake!?!  Invisible is what I have now become, and rightly so, most might say!

We shot down our little road leaving skid marks of shoe leather in our wake.

Not one of our better trips!

1. Ellie is worn out with it all and who can blame her, just as well you can’t see me!

The princess and...

the pee!

Ludlow Court Circular is happy to announce 

H.R.D...

Her Royal Dogness 

has had a pee on the lead for the very first time.  Plans are afoot for a tree to be planted to mark the spot.  My old boss is going to deign to get out his gold shovel to plant a suitable specimen...

Dog Wood seems appropriate.

The equerries are on the case to find a suitable species for the next momentous happening... Any suggestions would be gratefully received...

I’ve got myself...

a job.  Not any old job, this will be me...

doing something worthwhile.

A good few weeks ago Ludlow Community hospital had a fund raising day.  I volunteered my services to the League of Friends.  The following day I got a call from the organiser
‘Would you like me to start on Monday?’
I stupidly inquired.
What I had completely not realised in the intervening years since last I worked as a volunteer in a hospice, things had changed.

I needed criminal investigation clearance, proof of identity, two character references a TB scar identification check, still waiting for that!  All before I was allowed to don pinny and drive a trolley complete with samovar.
Silly me!  

Well today was...

a day we would all rather forget?

Why, you might idly wonder?

After yesterday’s visit from the rescue centre, our worries were firmly put on the back burner.  Our fears at what a ham-fisted job we were making as new dog owners was put to rest.  Photos were taken to show just how chilled Ellie was for all to see back at the centre.

We went to bed mightily chuffed with ourselves.  This morning Ellie who is afraid of men decided once again that husband wasn’t to be trusted?  Where that came from during the night, who knows?  

Still on a roll from our top of the class marks, we decided to go once again to our favourite coffee stop by the river.  All 
good... so far!  Instead of coming home after watching normal well balanced(?)people at play we decided to go for a walk in the woods.  A bright Sunday morning, last weekend of the school holidays... WHAT WERE WE THINKING OF!?!  The world and his wife was at large: crossing the bridge we met with old couples out for their daily constitutionals... all okay, although the bridge is narrow so no escape.  Walking low down along the river was fine, lots of interesting sniffs, tracks, maybe otter runs, or at the very least alligator trails!  All was going a breeze until we decided to come back high in the wood, where the the mountain bikers, whizzed, folk with packs of dogs off the lead, wolf like howling jack russells crossed with hyaenas, gave full throat.  All 
hell was let loose high in the Shropshire hills.
Surrounded by four off road and off lead, vocal terrier type bits of gristle, yapping and snapping, their owner trotted out the hoary old chestnut...

‘They only want to play!’

Struggling back over the bridge himself with almost dislocated shoulder,
 me with gammy knee, the dog turbo charged.  We made for home, full of
 dismay as to how wrong we could have got this morning’s little escapade!?!

Yesterday we felt we were featuring in a film version of A E Housman’s ‘A Shropshire Lad’.  Today a remake make of ‘Apocalypse Now’... in 
just the space of 24 hours.

Ellie this afternoon chilling with Cyril Squirrel!  All’s good in the world again!