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12 September 2023 (Tuesday) - Going Walkabout

I slept reasonably well, which was something of a result, But I was still wide awake far too early. And these days it is now dark at "far too early o'clock". I got up, pootled about, made toast and watched an episode of "Shameless". I'm now into the eleventh season and am realistically only watching it because I've got so far it would be a shame to stop now. Sadly all the interesting characters have left and the plot (such as it is) is seriously beginning to struggle.
As I watched I sorted my undercrackers. They are getting a tad threadbare; maybe it is time to get some new ones before word gets out that I need new ones for Christmas.
 
I had a very quick look at the Internet; some born-again Christian was spamming the Atheist memes page that I follow. This chap is a strange fellow. Hailing from the USA he is a great advocate of the American Dream and of making as much money as he possibly can at the expense of anyone and everyone else. However he sees no contradiction between his political and religious views. I suppose this is what "faith" is all about; desperately hoping that shit is sugar and ignoring all evidence to the contrary. Certainly works for this chap.
 
I had a quick Munzee session then set off to work. As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about the collapse of the high street giant Wilko. There was an interview with some woman who was something big in the union to which most Wilko workers belonged. She was lambasting Wilko's management for not having a business plan and not embracing change and generally criticising them for very specific failures. Amazingly pretty much everything she said that Wilko's management should be doing was *exactly* what the railway unions say their management should *not* be doing and are fighting them about.
Funny old world.
This was followed by an interview with some business guru who (quite frankly) just spouted meaningless catchphrases saying that Wilko needed a forward-going vision which would complement its portfolio. Possibly by telling the portfolio it had a smashing blouse? Some of these people wheeled onto the radio really do just spout utter tripe. Mind you I expect they get paid far more than I do...perhaps that is somewhere else that I've been going wrong all these years?
 
I did my bit at work and drove home. I hadn’t intended going for a dog walk after work as the weather forecast had thunderstorms from two o’clock onwards. But as usual reality bore no relation to the weather forecast. I took the dogs to Orlestone, and just at the furthest point from the car the puppies zoomed into the trees. Having been doing that all walk long I thought nothing of it, as they usually re-appear a few seconds later. This time it was a little longer before they re-appeared.
Three quarters of an hour.
They must have seen a rabbit or a squirrel or something and given chase and got lost. I walked around but couldn’t hear them at all. Eventually a passing dog walker said she’d heard something crashing about in the woods a few hundred yards away and I went in the general direction she said, blowing the whistle periodically.
Eventually I saw Morgan on the edge of the trees. He looked at me with a very uncertain expression, so I called to him and he sprinted up to me. He was whimpering and crying; obviously frightened by his experience. Bailey appeared a minute later (bold as brass) as though nothing had happened.
As we walked back to the car we met “er indoors TM walking in to the woods. I’d called her when I’d got to the “dogs missing for half an hour” stage.
 
Once home we had a bit of scoff, then whilst “er indoors TM went to Zoom at her mates I had a look on the Internet at collar-mounted dog tracking devices. It soon became apparent that they are all crap. They cost a small fortune, they need a monthly subscription fee, and the tracking device talks to your phone’s app via the Internet… Which is all very well all the time you are connected to the Internet. There’s pretty much no signal at all in most of Orlestone Woods or Kings Wood.
There are cheaper ones which work via Bluetooth, but with a (in the woods) range of up to ten metres I’ll see and hear the dog before the tracker does.
I shall keep my eyes open, but GPS dog trackers seem to be a lot of money straight down the toilet…

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