So much for my summer break with raven here at Cocburn Hill outside edinburgh. Arrived from the long train journey to be ‘greeted’ by a ghastly wire-haired terrier called Chester. He barked and licked and bared his teeth and has been a nightmare all weekend.He even jumped on my back last night and we had one hell of a stand-off. So I’m spending a lot of my time skulking in dad’s bedroom, though I’m geting lots of visitors and even some lamb bits last night. Though this morning was better as the terrorising terrier stayed in the lounge while I had breakfast with raven and toddled outside for a lovely run in the garden, so things are looking up. I still love Scotland, I just can’t stand chester and probably all border terriers.Â
Prospect Park audio check out the audio…
seasounds.mp3 simpy and I have just spent a great weekend in Hastings. Old school chum Christian and his wife Louise have lovingly restored an 1860s town house located on a hilltop with amazing views of the english channel by all accounts. The house is on 4 levels – Simpy and I took the top floor, all wooden floors so Simpy’s bed was a melange of beach towels.
Glorious late October weather took us around the clifftops and local beaches; also to Rye and Camber Sands, memories of a drunken lads trip 10 years or so ago.
No wind and the sea almost like a millpond. Check out the audio.
Dave dozing
Birmingham England is not the most attractive city in the world – yet we always have fun there. It is the (hopefully) temporary home of sister Sue and her husband Gavin; they have actually lived there for years, though hope to move to pastures new before too long. Anyway, the weekend just gone was a regular trip for Dave, his guide-dog Reuben, Simpy, and myself. Dave likes to doze in Brum – as the audio file here will testify. Much playing of 60s music (She’s not there by the zombies a particular favourite of mine), excellent home cooking from Sue – I took on wine control. Gavin is a whizz with I.T. so mouldy old videos become transformed into shiny DVDs. Dave had a great role in a 1998 ITV drama – The Unknown Soldier – about life post WW1, which is well worth a view, even though I defy anyone to not shed a tear at the end.
also took the plunge with the new iPod shuffle – though best feature is the brushed chrome case (£14 extra) which makes it feel like a slim zippo lighter in my pocket. And glad to report it works – Lancet podcasts duly transferred and not sounding too bad…Bobby Darin/Mac the Knife, Sinaid O’connor, Dmitri Shostakovich…
Simpy and Reuben are great mates and had a ball in Brum. Simpy decided the weekend was far too restrained so rolled in fox dung at the first opportunity in the appropriately named Moseley Bog. Stinking like an old french chese, I dragged him into Sue and Gavin’s back garden for the only known intervention – shampoo with tomato ketchup. The Guide Dogs trainers imparted this pearl of wisdom years ago – and it does work. Pink and peeved, Simpy sulked outside for an hour before I washed him down with warm water. He now smells vaintly of a hot-dog stall rather than of an old fox sewer – and to top things off we hitched a ride home in first class with scarcely a fellow passenger within earshot…maybe the fox was lingering after all.
And extraordinary antics at the Oval – met plenty of merry Englishmen at Vauxhall on the way home from Brum – possible the game may be over as Pakistan failed to take the field after tea, feeling insulted after the umpires declared that the ball had been tampered with to encourage reverse-swing bowling – Faith I’m sure you are following this clearly…
OK realise that Simpy’s french adventures are yet to be posted – soon we promise – but today started with a trip to Rory, our charismatic Irish vet in Clapham. Simpy has a souvenir from Picardy…a tick near a very sensitive part of his body. Oh la la. “What a big bastard”, proclaimed Rory as he hauled Simpy onto the examination table – the tick you understand, not Simpy. In two ticks of a tick’s tail the blighter was out. Rory shocked the yummy mummies in the waiting room by displaying la tique for all to see. Mon dieu. And the great irony, of course, is that Simpy could only get back into the UK last Sunday having had treatment contre les tiques – which cost a mighty E65 for a 3-minute veterinary consultation. But I’m getting ahead of myself – more details in the audio dog-blog of our french visit. This assumes I can work out how to upload an mp3 file onto the dog blog.
