9 June 2022 (Thursday) - Before the (Extra) Night Shift

With no need to be up early I slept far longer than I have done recently. I woke to find Pogo growling and snarling at the puppies who were running round the bedroom floor clearly so excited to see him.

I skipped brekkie and took the dogs out right away. As we drove to the woods the pundits on the radio were interviewing Michael Gove. When you think that he led the “Vote Leave” campaign together with Boris Johnson, he hasn’t done anywhere near as well since Brexit as you might think he would have done. He was being interviewed in his capacity as Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (there’s a made-up job!), and having made a convincing case about how difficult it is for anyone to buy a house these days (first time buyers need a deposit of sixty thousand pounds!) he then was utterly flummoxed when it was pointed out that this was a result of the twelve years of Conservative fiscal policy that we’ve just had. I’m not saying that Labour would have done any better, but this is the problem that any government faces when they’ve been in power for a long time; there comes a point at which whatever they do is seen as “too little too late”.

 

We got to the woods where we met some other dog walkers, and the puppies ran up to say hello. Pogo went with them; not to say hello, but (oh-so-obviously) to keep an eye on the puppies and to make sure the other dogs weren’t mean to the babies. Pogo is so funny like that; he doesn’t really like the puppies, but he is *very* protective of them.

We walked out usual circuit. All was going fine until fifty yards from the car park when I decided to put the leads on. I blew the whistle; the dogs came for a treat, and I was just about to attach the leads when some idiot came bumbling up with his two dogs. He’d heard the whistle, wondered what was happening, and on seeing treats being given out thought his dogs might like some. I explained what was happening, and he said that whistle training was a good idea as his dogs never came back when called. As he wittered on so Pogo and Treacle were growling and shouting at his dogs. I explained that they are both protective of the puppies, and that they don’t like other dogs around when treats are being given out. This came as a surprise to the idiot who felt it rather odd that any dog would have an issue with their treats being given to a total stranger. After five minutes of waiting for this idiot to piss off I eventually bundled my pack back the way we’d come just to get away from him.

 

We came home for a bath. And having had a bath and the obligatory mad five minutes that follows bath time. I then made my toast… and now that it has been completed for a couple of weeks I’ve come to the conclusion that I really don’t like the new kitchen. Despite the cost and the upheaval of installation, I’d go through it all again to have it put back how it was. But I’m in a minority of one on this (as usual) and so will just suck it up.

As I scoffed toast (with dogs snuggled up around me) I could smell something. A very familiar something… Treacle then had another bath as she still stank.

 

With the laundry hung on the line I spent  the morning watching more episodes of “Orange is the New Black” as more laundry washed. And with that hung out too I went to bed where I slept despite Pogo and Treacle making themselves comfortable on top of me.

 

And so off to the night shift… an extra one. I volunteered to cover this one (at short notice). I had this idea that I would rather do one night shift than two late shifts. Was this a good idea?

Let’s find out…

No comments:

Post a Comment