Squeezing Rubber Chickens

Yesterday was a bit of a dogfest as I had booked George and Meg in for a full grooming. I use a well known pet store chain as they are convenient but when I took them in , I put the groomers all in a tizz by not having William with me as some new teenage receptionist had booked him in for a groom instead of George.
" we were hoping to use William as a training test for one of the new staff" the head groomer moaned. " he's our best model"
I understood exactly why they wanted William for the newbee to practice on.... for William is the Welsh terrier version of David Niven. He's a gentle, polite little soul who won't move a muscle when instructed to " do as he's told" by the groomer
The other dogs are good natured certainly, but all have their own edge. Meg is a feisty bitch at times who is quick to spark. George is a loud comic who has a dislike for collies and strangers and Winnie, well Winnie was last seen quietly trying to pull bags of doggie treats from the bottom shelves of the grooming parlor's front desk.
No out of them all William remains the most laid back and when we are out, the most popular with strangers, for he is a dog that smiles gently with his eyes.
William calm and mindful this morning

Ever mindful of a sudden discount, I agreed to let them use William as a model and went to collect him from the car, only stopping at the toy section so Winnie could give the rubber chickens an excited squeeze which bordered in the end, on quiet hysteria
Dogs...they are as diverse and as fickle as children


See what I mean?



Christmas Advert

I do enjoy Christmas tv adverts
Most are sickly pap, but usually John Lewis and Marks & Spencer can be relied upon to produce a satisfying little production, worthy of a tear or two, especially if you've been hitting the cooking sherry.
I enjoyed the John Lewis penguin story. Marks' fairy story is so-so. and Sainsbury's World War 1 football story is just a bit over the top in a rather unsavoury way.
So full marks and prize for the best advert in 2014
Must go to Boots with their heartwarming story of a knackered middle aged nurse coming home after a fucking awful night shift......
Watch and weep.....

Vagina Head


I'm in the middle of lots of jobs today
Week shop, coal run, vets for wormer, 
Home to unpack then off
To the dog groomers
I was daydreaming on the nipper bus to town this morning
When I noticed an odd looking girl getting on the bus
with an enormous woolly hat with the words
VAGINA emblazoned across the front of it
I was so taken aback I took a photo
Now where are my glasses?

A Man In A Van

Just across a field length from the Ukrainian village a man lives in a van.
He's hidden away behind a hedge from the main road through the village, and is surrounded by sheep, by all accounts he has fallen on hard times.
I've met him a couple of times as he has bought eggs from me and he seems nice enough, but I often think of his situation when I am out with the dogs on their last walk of the night and I stare out over the black fields to see a tiny single light in the damper van window.
Some say that he is totally responsible for his present situation, who knows......but whatever is the reason he has left the family home to live in a van, the plight of " hard times" makes you think.......
Well, it's made me think.
How quickly can circumstances change in what we all would consider to be a normal life eh?
A sudden loss of a job, a relationship breakdown, a death, ill health, whatever the reason it is all too common for some of us to be reminded that we are not invincible in this world and that home is not always that " God given" fact that we always think it is.



Giving as good as I get.....

I just wanted to illustrate that sometimes humans win over aggressive cockerels ( see previous post)
And sometimes the cockerels win
Forgive the repeat blogs from 2013 but they kind of illustrate my point

" f*ck......I've Just Killed Bogbrush!"

Sometimes you just don't think when faced with a " difficult" situation
You just react.
And that does not always work out the way you would wish.

This evening, just as I was encouraging the tiny Useless little buggers into their coop
Bogbrush the aggressive silkie cockerel
Hurtled forward and started to kick the shit out of the tiny male bantam right in front of me.
Without a thought I swung the tin feed bowl I was holding and clacked Bogbrush smartly on the head with it to teach him a lesson in manners
And unfortunately this was the result


RIP Bogbrush
Life is hard sometimes

When you are a bully
There is always someone bigger than you

" The cold never Bothered Me anyway..."


Not having small female children around the house has meant that the delights of " Frozen" have largely passed me by However for some strange reason the hit song " Let It Go" has firmly rooted itself into my head, and so during various parts of the day, I can be caught warbling " here I stand......here I stay .........." And  " I don't care...what they'll say" when filling the water butts and feeding the ewes.
This morning I was in full voice when I was attacked from behind by the new cockerel Ginger Harry.
It's not the first time he has been showing his metal, and his attacks have been increasing in their intensity over the past few weeks
Some males just have too much testosterone for their own good , so when this fighting behaviour starts it is important to pick the offending cockerel up, and in a feat of dominance , walk around with him for a long time , tucked up safely under your arm pit.
I didn't manage to catch the bugger this morning, he was too quick for me, but as I walked back across the fields carrying a blue plastic bucket , he made the mistake to come in with all Spurs blazing for one final attack.
Not quite the best scene from any Disney film, I have ever seen,
But I battered the little bastard three times with the bucket
Without breaking a line of the chorus " Let it go! LET IT GO...TURN AWAY AND SLAM THE DOOR,!!!"


Repairing A Gusset


This is the view I am looking at right at this moment.
Its one of those wet, misty mornings in low bright sunshine.
The sort of morning which makes driving on slick roads almost impossible .
The Ukrainian village looks damp, with many of the hens perched on their runs in a bid to keep feet dry and warm.
Hens hate having wet feet.
did you know that?

I am sat on the bedroom window seat darning a hole in my trouser gusset. The rip was a product of not being able to cock my leg high enough over the pig fencing.
Its now time to return to weightwatchers, me thinks.
I thought this yesterday morning, when I found that I had been locked into the cottage by accident. Chris is working in South Wales, so left the cottage early, locking the back door behind him.
After a frantic search for my house keys, I realised that I had left them on the garden wall!, so I had no other choice but to jump through the only ground floor window which I could squeeze my fat arse through.
Now in front of the living room window is a selection of pots, herbs and roses, so in order not to trample anything, I had to stand on the sill, and jump around four or five feet onto the lawn.
Sounds doable ?
Sure!
So off I jump, with all the grace and agility of a fourteen stone blancmange and promptly fell onto the wet lawn leaving a long muddy slide trail as I went.
A crashing 747 would have looked more in control.
and so, for that split second when my face was pushed into the grass, I knew , it was time to get a grip

Like many people in the "middle age" I have always had a tendency to put on weight. I dont comfort eat but I do love my food too much, and this coupled with the fact that I dont walk as much as I did ( ageing terriers and bulldog) has allowed my weight to creep slowly back on.

Now I am not bleating here. Losing weight is simple enough and isnt hard when you get into the right mind set.
Its not rocket science!
If you dont want to find yourself arse over tit on the front lawn?
get a little fitter!
So fitter I shall get,
End Of.

Ps/ seeing that its a nice day, I am now off to deliver eggs, collect some coal and will pop in to see if the Lesbian smallholder Bunty is alive and well.After five days, my cold has seemed to have finally passed!

The Walking Dead Episode 6 Consumed & Winnie Sulks for Effin England

"
Melissa Mc Bride as Carol and Norman Reedus as Daryl
I wish he'd get his hair cut!

It's been a long while coming, but finally The Walking Dead's two most favourite characters have had their time in the sun with a joint episode all of their own. The Daryl & Carol phenomenon must be somewhat irksome to The Walking Dead's original writer Robert Kirkman, for he is not at all responsible for  their conception and subsequent popularity with tv audiences. 
Ok he did think up the character of Carol Peletier , but his Carol was a very different and unsympathetic character from the one we see played by Melissa McBride in season five. Redneck Daryl Dixon ( Norman Reedus)was not one of his original characters either, yet the two peripheral roles, both losers and survivors of domestic abuse, have been catapulted into Strong and popular leads thanks primarily to the acting talents and chemistry between McBride and Reedus
Their time together on screen has been somewhat patchy and brief, yet both actors have managed to portray a fractured friendship between two very damaged souls that shows depth, feeling and a thankful absence of sentimentality. 
Put quite simply, the pair WORK.
It is this real sense of connection that has had fans of pair  vociferously declaring that if they are killed off, riots will ensue.
Consumed had Daryl and Carol returning to Atlanta in search of Beth, and the episode has a certain pace of its own as Daryl gets to understand some of Carol's motivations since she went all " kick ass" in season 4. It was also interesting to be back in the city after so much country based adventures
We are coming full circle so to speak !
( I adored the fact we see the pair enter Atlanta down the same road Rick rode in series 1and just as the pair pass the department store where Merle lost his hand..there stands the tank where Rick was trapped )
I like that the tables have been turned a little within their developing friendship and it is refreshing that the country boy is now Providing emotional support to the earth mother. As Carol reminds him in one of their quieter moments that....."you're a man now"
That's why the tv audience has taken both to their hearts,
We have watched two monosyllabic  damaged people grow up like real people.
Quite a feat for an action based, zombie killing apocalypse tv show  eh?
Consumed was the best episode to date!

Ps Winnie's still sulking..she's refused any physical contact and only reluctantly came for a walk at 10pm
It's now 11 hours since we heaved her sorry arse into the bath
She's a gay man in a bulldog body