27 August 2019 (Tuesday) - New Forest Day Five

When we came back from our little walk yesterday Fudge took himself straight to bed, and looked at us in amazement when we didn’t go to bed ourselves. He slept like a log last night; I found him crashed exactly where he was when I went to bed last night. Treacle however was a different story. As I went to bed I saw her fast asleep on the dog blanket on Charlotte’s bed. At two o’clock she dabbed and dabbed at me. I thought she wanted a tiddle; she just wanted to play. I eventually dozed off and got up just before seven o’clock.

I made myself a cuppa. I’ve done this successfully for the last few mornings; today as I poured it, the kettle decided to spit boiling water everywhere. I’d never seen anything like it. It spat water vigorously and violently as though it was a living thing.

As I waited for everyone else to spring into action I had a look at the Internet. They’ve got one down here in the New Forest, but it doesn’t work quite as well as the one at home. Bearing in mind that yesterday was a bank holiday I had been hoping to see what people had been getting up to. I saw two sets of photos that people had posted, and an endless stream of adverts for rubbish I would never want to buy. And I was again plagued by ad advert asking me to spend good money to go on a course to learn the difference between blessings and curses. Religious nuts wind me up. They walk down the road and find a fifty-pence piece and call it a blessing. They then tread in a dog turd and call it a curse. And these people are allowed to vote and do jury service.

I took the dogs outside where we didn’t bark *that* much. I went on a turd-hunt round the garden and didn’t find any. I didn’t think there would be any, but you never know what those dogs do when you aren’t watching them like a hawk. Mind you I did find several sticks (Treacle has amassed quite a collection) and I found the broccoli stalk that Fudge has been chomping on. I left them all for now.

I programmed “Hannah” for the day’s excursions. For such a supposedly high-tech hobby, the GPS units seem to run on software which is ten years behind the times (at best). I’d use my phone for hunting Tupperware if the GPS didn’t have the one overriding advantage that it comes on a lanyard which I can hang round my neck.

We had a rather good brekkie; you can’t beat a Full English. As we scoffed the nice man from the Environment Agency arrived to do something with the well in the garden (as nice men from the Environment Agency do). We watched him lower a probe down, and wind it all back. I’d been looking forward to his visit all week, and was rather disappointed. But he did say that the well in the garden was thirty-three metres deep. That’s rather impressive.

Having scoffed we then drove out to East Martin. Bearing in mind the heat of the last few days and the weather forecast we’d planned a shorter walk for today. Within half a mile we were sheltering from the rain under a tree, and seeing how they’d got it utterly wrong, the BBC’s weather app had changed its predictions to coincide with reality.

We considered our options. We could abandon our walk, or we could hope for the best. We hoped for the best, and the rain soon cleared. The temperature remained rather lower than predicted, and we had a good walk. It was a shame that Fudge had to run off after a pheasant (twice), but if he doesn’t chase the F-birds, who will? We soon retrieved him; it only wasted ten minutes. Quite a quick retrieval bearing in mind some of his previous episodes.

Once back at the car we drove out to the Compasses; a rather nice pub. It was a shame that the locals in the bar gave the distinct impression that you were intruding in their living room, but locals do that in pubs all over the place. We then went on to find another pub actually in the New Forest so we could see all the horses doing their thing. A five-minute drive took about half an hour as “Psycho Dobbin and his Equine Associates” wandered up the middle of the roads with no regard for their own safety. And where there were no horses, “Insane Buttercup and her Bovine Compatriots” got in the way as best they could.

We found the Alice Lisle; to be fair to the place it isn’t a bad pub. It was a shame that we had to get to the bar a few seconds after such a “delightful” family. Does the entire tribe need to go up to the bar to order drinks? Especially as not one was allowed any choice but was given what mother said they would have.

Pausing only briefly not to crash into a cow we came back to base, had a quick shower, then went over to the pub just over the road. We’d had dinner there a few days ago, and it was good. It was good again. The mixed grill was too much for me, but I shared it with Fudge and Treacle. The crème brule was good too; I didn’t share that.

We came back to base, broke out the Blokus and after doing the worst I’ve ever done (my new tactic didn’t work) I went to bed. I had been falling asleep over the board.

I was worn out. But not too worn out to take a few photos.