Aaarrrrggggghhhhhh!!!!!

So much to do and so little time!!!

What to do first?  I'd love to spend more time in the garden.  The hens' enclosure needs a little re-think and some fencing re-positioning.  It's been too cold and wet so far, but in my mind I've pictured what I want so just need the weather and time.

I've cracked on with the ironing today.  The iron didn't blow the fuses (it's been doing that a bit recently, quite annoying, and an excuse not to do it, but the pile's too big, even by my dodgy standards...) so I got a good way through.  It's an unwritten rule to myself that I can't/shouldn't do anything in preference until the ironing's under control.  And, as those of you who know me know, I'm not a martyr to housework by any standards.

I do vacuum.  More than some, less than others.  Mainly because the dog hairs get everywhere, and it's embarassing when they're gathering along the hall skirting boards like tumbleweed.  I should probably do it every day.  But I don't.  And it feels like I'm forever going on at the children not to crawl/sit/fight on the floor because it's filthy...  I can't win on this one, although they do say that if children grow up in a dirty environment(!) their immune systems are stronger....  That's good enough for me.

The kitchen floor needs mopping again - I did it on Monday.  That's the problem with having a dog.  As soon as you mop the kitchen floor, and leave it to dry, the dog goes out and/or it rains, usually both....  I know how to fix the drought in the south of England - mop my floor!  It always rains within 12 hours of me doing it.

Roly's  bed needs changing again.  It's old and smelly - a bit like him now, really.  Oh yes, me and dogs.

So I'm not really a dog person - they're too needy for my liking.  So... we thought it would be good to have a dog for Phoebe to grow up with, but I was working part-time, and it wouldn't have been fair, and then, as luck would have it, in 2004, I broke my leg... (and that is another story!!!).  So I was off work for about 14 weeks (bad break), and it seemed the time was right to get a dog, train him up, and help me to recuperate...  And Simon said let's get a dalmation because they're good with children and he'd grown
up with them as his mum used to breed them.

We had also been bungled.  Yes, bungled.  A burglar came into our house, at 2am.  It was a hot summer (2003) and we'd left a downstairs back window open (stupid!!!) to let the air circulate.  This was in Twickenham, and our back garden was fenced off, but he came in nonetheless.  Moved our bin to stand on, and climbed in.  Luckily(!) I'd just settled Phoebe back to sleep and was having trouble drifting off myself, and I heard a noise downstairs...  In my drowsiness my first thought was "oh no, there's a fox in the house"(!).  On a couple of occasions we'd left the back door unlocked and when I went downstairs in the morning I'd found the door ajar.  So I thought there was a fox inside, snooping around.

I didn't go downstairs, however, I thought I'd check out the back bedroom window to see if the door was ajar, and then wake Simon up to help shoo the fox out...  However, when I looked, the door wasn't ajar, the bin was moved, and this fox had a torch which was erratically scanning and flicking over things.  Yikes!  So I woke Simon up, and we decided to switch the hall light on.  This precipitated the bunglar to leave the property by the same manner that he'd entered, and in his haste he didn't actually take anything!  The police were as good as useless, I'm sorry to say, they didn't turn up that night at all, and didn't get around to taking fingerprints for another two days...

Anyway, that clinched it.  A dog would be a useful deterrent, and would at least bark if intruders broke in in the middle of the night.

I had absolutely no idea how big dalmations are.  In my mind I thought they were about knee high.  No.  Well this one's not.  He's a hand high over your knee and 25kgs of mad muscle when we first had him.  He was a rescue - that's another story - and is now around 9 yrs old.  He's cost us a fair bit of money in his time - that's also another story - but, he's an integral part of the family and usually drives me mad.

He's quite needy.  He spies on me - when I'm doing the ironing(!).  He's like a shadow, but he tries to anticipate if I'm going to go out, he's always approaching the kitchen door, in case I want to go out.  How would he know????  But he's there, just in case.  Argh.!  He sheds hair year round, day in day out, as soon as you've finished grooming him, he sheds.  I hardly bother to groom him these days.  It's not going to make any difference.

I'm the one who takes him his walks weekdays and at weekends we try to do it as a family.  However, the children are less pliable, and more whiney, and don't like walking the dog in the rain, so it's a big pallaver, so quite often I'll whizz Roly round the park at the weekend, so it's done with.

The joy of dogwalking, however, is a pleasure I didn't anticipate.  I'll tell you more about that next time.

I've nearly finished reading The Ghost Road, so will get onto that now.  I had a chat with a fellow dog walker this morning, and she told me she'd just finished reading something by Ken Follett - so we had a chat about him, and I'll be putting Pillars of the Earth onto my list of books to read...  sounds epic.

You know, Spring really is here.  Apart from the snowdrops, crocus and daffs just popping their heads out, last week I saw my first....  postman in shorts!  Not long before the clocks change.

On that note I'll bid you good night and good reading.  Keep it sweet!  Kat