shouldering on

i know my loyal readers have been following the progress of my shoulder with interest, so i thought it was time for an update. this photo is an old one. although herself has been documenting my progress with her camera, i know that many of you are of a gentle disposition. the sight of my now unclothed shoulder might be a little too much for you. so i will try to keep the medical details a little vague.

about a week ago the evil wonderful vet took a sample (this bit is deliberately vague) to send to the lab to see what bugs are living in my shoulder. yesterday he rang herself with the result. it seems i have something called stafflocockus. not to be confused with staffordshire bull terrier, which would be much more painful in your shoulder.

it seems this is good news. there had been a risk that i had something called mrsa which would have been much worse. it also could have been a bit grim for herself, who had bathed my shoulder without covering up a cut on her finger.

anyway, the stafflocockus should respond to one of the many pills i am on.

so now the bad news. as my wound isn't healing this may mean there is another problem stopping my skin from healing.

now for the even worse news. if it doesn't heal up soon i may have to have plastic surgery. this will involve a trip to suffolk, a four day stay in hospital and a bill of about two thousand pounds. which, for my overseas readers, is enough to buy you quite a decent car. as herself has just sold quite a decent car to pay off the credit card bills this news caused a certain amount of alarm. herself will have to do quite a lot of cleaning and gardening to pay for me to have a plastic shoulder.

so there is a lot of pressure on me to get healing. i may have to do extra dog yoga...

a pear-shaped day

this morning, while my boy was in the shower, herself and i were sitting at the table, laptopping. the clack of the keyboard was interspersed with "have you got your hair wet yet, lovey?" and "have you put the shampoo on your hair yet?" as my boy has the habit of going into a mesmo when in the shower.

"are you writing about your pear-shaped day yesterday?" enquired himself, looking up from sandwich-making.

"no, we're writing our 'fun monday' post," replied herself, skating over the fact that today is tuesday. so i am finally getting around to writing about yesterday. and i still haven't written about the chicken-shed yet...

yesterday started badly. i should have known it would. my boy had new trousers. this is because he has been growing like a weed and the old ones only just qualified as trousers rather than shorts. regular readers will be aware of my boy's dislike for new clothes. he likes his old, soft clothes. i can relate to that, being a chap with delicate skin.

over the course of the weekend herself prepared my boy for the new trousers. they were washed and dried and talked about. but monday morning saw my boy shrieking that he simply was not wearing the trousers and that they were like knives. after negotiations that would have put the united nations in the shade it was agreed that there would be a trouser rehearsal that evening and that my boy could fish the old trousers out from under the recycling to wear just for the day.

then herself popped into himself's school to make a minor change to the website (she designed it for them and therefore tinkers with it now and again). because she is a bit under the weather she managed to screw up the whole thing, resulting in her having to re-do the template and then re-do all of the 76 pages.

later, on the way to fetch himself, she noticed that the car was out of diesel. she pulled in at a garage to get some. just as she got out of the car a man sprang out of nowhere and locked the pumps. he told her there had been an incident and that they had to shut the garage. so after she picked himself up the peeps limped along on the last spoonful of diesel to another garage before going home.

mondays are when herself does her cleaning job. since the financial ruin she has been cleaning and gardening for some friends to pay for our grub. so off she went to clean. she was doing their windows, which involved going into the garden to do the outside. she thoughtfully shut the french windows to keep in the heat and found she was locked out. her phone, bag, keys and everything were on the inside. luckily these friends live within walking distance of our house so she walked home, attracting some odd looks as she was wearing her t-shirt which says "i never finish anyth", even though it was very cold and most people were wearing thick coats.

later we had to go to the wonderful vet (i am no longer allowed to call him the evil vet as it would appear he might now and again read my blog). my lady friend has been jealous of all the fuss i am getting and has developed sore eyes in order to grab some attention. we had to go in the car because i can't walk very far with the gammy shoulder. no sooner had we left the house than we were in almost stationary traffic. it took nearly an hour to get to the vets, a distance that would have been a half hour walk. this was because they were digging up the road. herself could not phone the vet as her phone was locked in the friends' house, along with her bag. so we were very late indeed, but at least this minimised the amount of time there was for me to be poked and prodded.

later still herself went round to fetch her bag. our friend informed her that she needn't worry about cleaning the outside of the windows anyway as some blokes came and did them...

fun monday

well dear readers, it seems herself has been persuaded to enter into another daft blog thing. there are a number of daft blog things around in cyberspace; usually they involve answering daft questions about yourself. but this one involved taking pictures of herself's bedside table. as though we didn't have enough on our plates at the moment, what with practically living at the vets and trying to move house!

anyway, i think i have the rules right. you have to take pictures of all your clutter and then tell the world about it. then you have to fiddle around putting in links to all the other people who were daft enough to do the same. so here goes. this first picture is what is known as an overview:



from the left you have the peeps' dressing gowns, a pile of books, herself's phone, which doubles up as an alarm clock, a bottle of olbas oil (herself is malingering with woman flu), a box of tissues, a basket full of stuff which i will show you later, herself's laptop, the corner of the red quilty laptop bag that the wussy laptop needs to keep warm, and herself's bag, which is really a fishing bag and even has a waterproof pocket in the middle in case you need to keep a dead trout away from your laptop.

now for the close-ups:


this is the back row of books.


and this is the front row of books. i think i am going to have to have a word with her about the health and safety implications of what clearly constitutes a fire risk.



and this final picture is the contents of the little basket. clockwise from the top: herself's splints, which she has to sleep in because of her car-pull tunnel wrists, some vitamin b pills, some pills to stop herself crying all the time, some pills to stop her heart beating too fast, some earplugs to drown out the rumbles of the snoremonster, a monocular for watching the birds that come to bathe in the pond just outside the peeps bedroom and a bookmark which probably should be in one of the vast pile of books.

so there you are, the secrets of the bedside table. now i have to do a link to aoj at the lurchers, who is hosting fun monday. and i think i have to put all the other people somewhere too so you can all go and nose around their bedside tables...

a film by my clever boy

polo anyone?

dear readers, i must apologise for the long silence in these parts. as you will recall, i have something of a gammy shoulder. it all started with a little misunderstanding between myself and my lady friend. it seems that in spite of copious doses of pink pills for pale pooches i am still harbouring a myriad of microbes (i have been honing my writing skills whilst i was indisposed - the preceding sentence is what is known as alliteration).

anyway, the long and the short of it is that i have had to have another operation. this time it involved the evil vet removing quite a bit of my shoulder and stitching up an even longer scar. i have another drain which is rather messier than the previous one. we had to go along this morning for the evil vet to make sure i was still vertical. he had a little peek at the scar and said i would need a bit of it sorted. there was talk of staples and guns but in the end glue seemed to be the answer. this was a bit of a relief.

while we were there herself rather foolishly mentioned to the evil vet that i have a blog. not only that, she is planning to send him the address. so i will have to stop calling him 'the evil vet' and think of something more flattering, otherwise i might find my paws glued together which would make it even harder to become a famous writer. i thought an anagram might be good. however, herself pointed out to me that 'the vile vet' would be equally offensive. so i will call him 'the live vet'. but you will all know what i mean...

anyway, as the peeps are trying to sell the house, my wound, drain and bloodstained t-shirts are something of a problem. it wouldn't do for people to come round and find me lying on my bed (which herself has thoughtfully kitted out with red sheets to hide the worst of the carnage) pouring gore out of a pipe. it would take a person of a very robust nature to pay attention to the finer points of domestic architecture in such circumstances.

so my lady friend and i are placed in the car while punters mooch round the house. i spend the time wearing my sunglasses and praying that none of the local dogs go past and see me. we have run out of sensible t-shirts so i have graduated to my boy's old school polo shirts. as you can see from the photo i look a right lemon. i think the collar is a step too far. how am i supposed to keep any credibility when i look like i sing in a choir?

bouncing back

one of the advantages of having a blog, dear readers, is that even in the middle of the most difficult circumstances one can comfort oneself with the thought that when it is all over it will make good blog fodder. such was the case this week.

as my readers from the uk will know, it has been wet. there has been rain of biblical proportions. this has coincided with the 'clearing the drive' project. one pile on the drive was a large trampoline. when the captain and mrs captain left for sunnier climes, they gave the peeps their trampoline. my boy loves to jump, as can be seen from this photo. the plan was to erect the trampoline in the front garden. however, not long after the trampoline arrived, herself was signed off work. plans were hatched in an effort to avoid ruin. the plan most relevant to the trampoline was the 'build a house in the front garden and sell it to pay off the mortgage' plan. clearly there would not be room for a house and a trampoline in the front garden, large though it is. so the trampoline stayed on the drive, getting very wet.

herself would have sold the trampoline, but she could not see that anyone would want a very wet trampoline, even though it is waterproof, so she found a lady who has some bouncy children who wanted it. the lady has a very small car so herself offered to transport the trampoline in the trailer.

so thursday found my lady friend and i in the back of the car, watching the circus. young rokit is not allowed in the back as he cannot be trusted to behave, so he was in the passenger seat. as he did not have much of a view he contented himself with eating himself's sunglasses and removing the clip from the fire extinguisher, no doubt in the hope that the car would be filled with foam and give us all a laugh.

the rain on thursday was horizontal. herself and the trampoline lady battled the elements and eventually loaded the trailer with all the poles and canvas and nets. the trampoline was duly delivered to the lady's house.

now all that remains is for the dismantled shed to be collected by a mate of herself's who has bought it from the peeps, the last load of junk to be taken to the tip, and mr rokit to spread the rest of the gravel. then the peeps will be able to give a passable impression of people you might actually want to buy a house from...

a lick and a polish

well readers, it seems that selling a house does not just involve putting a sign up outside and waiting for someone to turn up with their cheque book. oh no. your have to make your house look smart. in our case this has involved herself turning into a tornado. yesterday she cleaned all the windows, cleaned the house, secreted the vast amount of camping gear in various corners, cleared a pile of junk on the drive and started spreading the ton of gravel that had been delivered by a large truck the day before.

by the evening she was exhausted and her hands wouldn't work. she has a thing called car pull tunnel. this is something you catch from towing cars with your bare hands. it means that she has to sleep with her hands in splints. himself kept saying "i can do some of it, let me help." herself refused point blank. he helped her dig up some plants a few days ago and went a very worrying shade of grey.

help was at hand in the form of mr rokit. he and rokit arranged to come along today and spread the rest of the gravel. in preparation for this herself got up early and spent a happy hour or two clearing the huge pile of junk off the drive. herself is in the habit of piling things up with a view to taking them to the dump and then getting distracted. so the pile grows. there was a very large heap of rotten wood which was no good for burning, a brazier with the bottom burnt out, some horribly slimey melted cardboard harbouring various wildlife, and all sorts of other joys. herself finally got the trailer loaded.

himself said he would come to the dump. this would have meant also taking my boy. at the moment, with all the stuff that has been going on, they are more troll-like than usual. herself therefore snuck out of the house on her own and headed for the dump. when she got there she remembered why another person was useful. she does not have very good trailer-reversing skills. not to be defeated, she collared a dump man to help wheel it into a space. she attracted some funny looks from fellow dumpists. in anticipation of getting covered in grime and slime she had not had a shower and therefore looked like medusa. added to this, the sort of person who does serious dumping of the type involved today is invariably a man. shifting rotten wood and slimy cardboard is not a ladylike occupation.

eventually, after a lot of huffing and puffing the job was done. but as she threw in the last fence post, her glove fell into the huge skip. in fact not her glove, but a glove belonging to our friends on the corner. these gloves have been in her car since she took a bunch of stuff to the dump for them. luckily, in fact extremely luckily, a dump man was standing next to her holding a fishing rod. maybe the dump people employ a special fishing gnome to make the place look nice. the dump man swiftly recovered the glove for herself, who thanked him profusely and told him it was the first good thing that had happened to her all day.

things improved further with the arrival of rokit and mr rokit. rokit had to be restrained from giving me the usual cuddle as he might have caught my shoulder pipe. but it was good to see the little chap. and mr rokit made short work of the gravel, putting the feeble efforts of herself rather in the shade. so the peeps settled down to a plate of chilli feeling much cheerier, leaving young rokit and i to chew each other's ears under the table...

on the mend

hello dear readers! i am still a little weedy so i will keep this short but i thought it might be wise to let you know that i have not let my blog fall into the hands of maniacs. my lady friend is new to the world of blogging so has a little yet to learn. and as for my boy - he will have to hide when himself finds out that he has been described so accurately!

here is a picture of me in my t-shirt. i asked herself to take it from the non-bloody side in order not to offend those of my readers of delicate sensibilities. i have a long cut in my shoulder with many stitches in. behind this is a pipe about the size of a pencil which sticks out from either end of the stitches. it is to let the nasty stuff drain out of me.

this shoulder thing, as my lady friend has explained, happened as a result of a little misunderstanding which led to me behaving in a less than gentlemanly fashion. finding herself without a hat-pin to stick in me, my lady friend used the next best thing, her teeth.

the only snag was that when she moved in with us she had rather grim teeth. they were inflamed and infected and not like on the toothpaste adverts at all. so whatever ghastliness was on her teeth was injected into my shoulder. over christmas i felt like i would never lift my head off the bed again. herself had to ring the evil vet on christmas morning as she thought i might die. luckily my lady friend had some meds for the teeth so that got us over the christmas hols but i wasn't getting better, hence the op.

i gather i can go onto a different t-shirt soon which will be good - i think maybe red. a man came to the door today. he took one look at my blood soaked clothing and went very pale...

a guest post from joker's boy

hello readers. this is joker's boy here. i've been invited to do a guest post as the poor old thing is poorly. this is about when we got phoebe.

it started off with we went out to auntie bernies fiat punto because it was the holidays and my mum had taken my dad's car to go and collect phoebe from devon. so the only form of transport we had was this old fiat punto or as my dad called it a chocolate teapot. this is a saying. if you put hot water in a chocolate teapot to make tea it would melt so you wouldn't have any tea.

so my dad said that we had to take this to go to his work and he was going to drop me off at rokit's house who lives near my dad's work. so we went out and got in the fiat. it took a while opending the door because it was all frosted up but it broke free. so we got in and closed the doors and the engine wouldn't start so my dad rang my mum and i went back into the house to wait until the breakdown man came.

the breakdown man came wearing a yellow jacket that said AA on the back and he had a big truck, well a sort of van. and then he got the car started up. so then we went out to the car and said thanks to the bloke and all and then we got in the car and drove off. it was all right and i said to my dad "don't you think its a bit dangerous having ice and only a little hole to see through" and he said "it's fine, you just have to guess what's there".

so then we got up to the big roundabout and we stopped in the traffic jam and the engine cut out. my dad was swearing and cursing and he tried to start the car several times and i re-assured him that we weren't going anywhere so he said "get out, lets push it onto the verge". so we pushed the car onto the verge and my dad called my mum again but not the AA. but my mum's phone cut out because she went down a hill, although we didn't know this until later. my dad thought she had hung up because he was being obnoxious and didn't want to talk to him while he was in a state.

so then my dad swore and cursed again so i said we should stay in the car and call the AA but he insisted that we would leave it there. he doesn't like telephones.

now would be a good time to mention that the car was full of fake guns that belonged to me. they were in two large black boxes. my dad said "no, we can't take them with us. we will leave them here." he was panicking. he said "we'll get the bus home". there was a bus stop just nearby which was handy.

so then we walked to the stop and my dad looked at the timetable and there was a bus in 7 minutes. so then the bus came and we got on. the driver was a bloke in his 30s. he said "one adult and one child" and he gave us tickets and then we paid and we went and sat in the seat 2 rows behind him.

we looked quite odd sitting on the bus. there was my dad looking like a terrorist who had a beard and sunglasses and me with a load of fake grenades and a baseball hat and sunglasses and a combat jacket. the only passengers on the bus were me, my dad and a strange woman who was quite discreet about her appearance - she looked like a russion doll. so we went towards home and then we stopped at another bus stop and there were 3 old ladies at the bus stop. the first one was an old version of my mum's friend, mrs prof. then the second one was slightly dimmer but still quite active and the third one was a vague old lady who was very old and had a trolley and a bus pass.

the first old woman said "oh, for gods sake mildred get on" and then said to the rest of the bus "i have to walk her all the way here you know, she's such an idiot". the second old lady got on the bus and then the vague old lady called mildred got on the bus. they went behind us and sat down. the vague old lady obviously didn't want to be near the naggy one sat near us. the naggy one said shouted "oh for gods sake mildred sit down!" the driver looked round to make sure everything was ok.

as we went round the corner another bus passed. and the second old lady said "ooh, there goes the horsham bus!" she sounded really excited. my dad said to me "these women probably know all the bus routes round here".

they went on and on about the buses for the rest of the journey saying they were too bumpy and they should have taken the back roads. then we arrived at our bus stop and got off and so did the old ladies. the naggy one said "mildred, get off the bus! he can't go until you stand up!" so then the vague old lady got off the bus and me and my dad went over to the car park and stood by the recycling. i don't know why we did this. maybe the smell of the wine bottles comforted him.

then my mum phoned up so then he answered the phone and explained where we were. so then after that i was cold and my dad said "no, we'll stay here". i said "why don't we go home?" and then he had this idea that someone from his work might come and get us. he doesn't think clearly when he gets in a state. so then i was saying how cold i was and he said "no, not yet" and we would wait until someone came and got us. at this stage i reminded him that no-one from his work knew where we were. so then he said we should stand in the sun to keep warm but i was still freezing. our of the corner of my ear i could hear the old ladies yattering still.

so then we headed off home at last through a field where there was a white horse and i was freezing. and when we got in i had a hot bath and a nice cup of tea.

it was worth all the trouble because we got a lovely new dog and my mum has been saying ever since, what did i tell you? listen to your old ma. which she says when her mad plans turn out ok. so that's my post. hopefully joker will be better soon. he is wearing a yellow t-shirt to cover the pipe coming out of his shoulder and the t-shirt is all covered in blood but apparently this is good as it cleans out the wound which had gone really gunky. ik!

a guest post from phoebe

hello. i am phoebe, joker's new lady friend. he has very kindly allowed me to write a guest post on his famous blog. this is because he is indisposed today. he has had to go to a place called the evil vet to have his shoulder stitched up. the shoulder thing arose out of a little bit of a misunderstanding between dear joker and i. when joker and i first met we got off on the wrong paw. he did not realise i was a lady dog. i suspect this was because i was a little stinky, having been living in accomodation that was not really up to scratch. anyway, joker mistook me for some other sort of animal, possibly a skunk, and took against me.

a couple of days after i moved in we were on the beach. i was still on my lead as i hadn't settled in enough to know which people belonged to me. joker came running up and sank his teeth into me. without thinking i whipped back with my own rather sharp teeth.

no-one noticed that they had gone through his skin as he didn't bleed at all and it was not until a couple of days later that it became obvious that he had been injured. on christmas eve my good lady owner noticed that joker was wounded and bathed it with salt water. but on christmas morning joker was really poorly and looked like death. so my good lady owner gave joker some of my pink pills for pale pooches and also some of the drippy stuff that stops you hurting. she rang the evil vet to make sure this was ok and they said to bring joker in after christmas.

in spite of more pink pills the shoulder was still a bit grim so joker has gone to have it cleaned up and stitched. he will have to wear a t-shirt for a while to protect the wound. i hope to persuade our boy to take a photo of him in the t-shirt.

anyway, that is the background to why i am writing a guest post. now for the actual post. i'll tell you a bit about myself. i'm a lurcher. i am middle-aged. i am very slim, due to not having had enough to eat for a long time. now i get masses to eat so i expect i will soon be piling on the pounds. i am very pleased to have found a home with joker and his people. they seem very nice, if rather odd. odd things happen here the whole time, which are interesting although sometimes a little stressful. yesterday, for example, a lady came. it seems she is a hair slayer. she painted my good lady owner's head and wrapped shiny stuff around it. then she put my good lady owner's head in the sink and poured water over it. then she put her in a plastic tent and cut most of her hair off. i tried a bit but it was a bit tickly to eat.

i think i will like it here.

on the move

dear readers, it seems that we are about to move house! as regular readers will know, the peeps have been in the financial wars lately. herself has been off work since july with stress, brought on in no small part by the horrible characters that she has come across in her job. just before christmas, with impeccable timing, her boss wrote to her to tell her that, even if she ever got round to hauling her sorry arse back into the office, her job is being made redundant.

the ever-resourceful peeps thought through the various options. pay the mortgage and keep a roof over their head, but don't eat. eat, using the money that they would have used to pay the mortgage, but get the house re-possessed. neither grabbed me, i have to say. i like my creature comforts as much as i like my grub. then they had a brainwave. they would build a house in the front garden, sell it, and use the money to pay off the mortgage. that way we got to eat and have a roof.

plans were drawn up and an application made to the local council. it seems you can't just build a house in your garden these days. the neighbours were not all that keen. the peeps have a lovely front garden with some very colourful (and indeed very useful from my point of view) trees. a house would have been something of an eyesore. the planning officer was not all that keen either. this week she rang the peeps and told them that the idea is a non-starter.

the peeps went into something of a spin. as i have already mentioned, anxiety levels rose. no-one slept. himself felt iller and iller. stress leads to high blood pressure which is no good at all for the dodgy kidneys. herself got shriller and shriller, which is no good for anyone's ears. my boy did his best to maintain order but beefburger people do not cope well with uncertainty. their beefburger tendencies get a little more pronounced. in my boy's case this has involved not being able to leave the house without being tooled up to the gills with imitation firearms and grenades and talking endlessly about the best method to use to murder the planning officer.

yesterday the peeps had a long talk and decided to move house. this will cut the mortgage down to a level they can actually afford. once a decision had been made herself swung into action. she attacked the internet with gusto, deluging estate agents with e-mails and phone calls.

this hyperactivity has paid off. the peeps have found a house, near to where himself works. it has a garden for myself and my lady friend to enjoy. it has a bedroom for my boy and one for the peeps. it has a wonderfully smart bathroom and kitchen. it even has light switches that dim (my boy loves these - i suspect that he will spend many a happy hour adjusting the lighting). and the best news of all - it is bang over the road from my good friend young rokit! i will be able to wave to him from the front window! i will even be able to pop in and visit him whenever i feel the need to have my ears chewed. and he will be able to pop over to visit me when he needs a man to man chat.

so, dear readers, things are on the up at last! i have to go now, i need to make a start on my packing...

nocturnal rambles

this missive is being written in what is commonly known as the wee small hours. they are so called because lurchers, and indeed people, often feel the need for a wee in the middle of the night.

herself has never been much of a sleeper. this is no doubt partly to do with himself's snoring. he is so loud he can make the windows shake. i always dread a particularly bad snorathon as himself is unceremoniously evicted from the bed and comes in to sleep on the sofa. the sofa is about 2 feet from my bed, so i have to spend the rest of the night with my paws stuck in my ears, a position not conducive to slumber.

at the moment there is an air of anxiety around the place which has spread to all 3 of my peeps. none of them is sleeping properly, not even my boy, who can usually sleep through the house being hoovered, so long as herself doesn't actually hoover his bed. at about midnight herself got up to spend a penny (this is a saying, dear readers. it is a polite way of saying 'go for a wee').

she came across my boy in the kitchen. my boy has been practicing what he calls 'stelf' which involves creeping about and appearing out of nowhere, scaring the living daylights out of everyone. herself duly jumped out of her skin (another saying, dear readers, don't panic. and please try not to visualise this.) the noise woke my new lady friend. she has the bladder of a mouse so needed to go out to spend a penny now that she was awake. she has long toenails which clatter on the floor. this woke me up so i thought i might as well join her. midnight found 2 lurchers, herself and my boy looking up at the sky.

things settled down a bit and peace was restored. but not for long. at about 2am a snore resonated round the house. herself sighed and got up for another wee, having been woken by the snore. my lady friend of course had to do the same, with a lot of clickety clackety toenail noise. this time i was too weary to escort her.

everyone went back to bed and things went quiet. but not for long. himself's dodgy kidneys mean that he has a lot of horrible chemicals floating around his body. one of the side effects of this is his skin itches. in public he has to be restrained from itching his back by rubbing it against things like a horse. (i should probably say 'in the manner of a horse' to make it clear that he does not actually rub his back against passing horses, but i have great faith in the intelligence of my public).

once himself was awake he started to itch. this jiggled the bed around, as well as driving himself mad and keeping him awake. so he got up and came into the living-room to watch telly. he likes watching a thing called sky sports news, which consists of really ugly men and really pretty ladies (who herself says obviously got the job because of their vast knowledge of football). along the bottom of the screen is a running stream of words with football scores. down the side is another set of numbers with other football scores. and then you have the ugly men/pretty ladies talking to you about football. himself not only takes all this in but can repeat it word for word to anyone who can't run away fast enough. who said men can't multi-task?

so i am forced to sleep with my paws over my eyes to keep the light out, rather than stuck in my ears to drown the snoring out. is it any wonder i get a bit grumpy sometimes?