The Tenth Blog of Augustus Lazarus Cooke – Gus: January 2011

 

  This is me sitting on Frodo's head. My eyes aren't white, you know. Mrs H tried to make them look right but she couldn't.

Hello everyone! Happy New Ear to you all! I don’t know what that means and none of us animals or Humans has got new ears but all the Humans keep saying Happy New Ear and looking cheerful about it so I think it must be a good thing.

We’ve had such a busy time with lots of people coming and going (and so much food) but the really exciting bit was that us dogs went on holiday for a couple of days. Our Humans took us out in the car - not the dog car, we’d already been out in that when we went to the forest for a long walk – but the really comfortable car that we don’t usually go in.

We were in it for hours and it was dark when we stopped. I didn’t know where we were, though Frodo and Jenna recognised it. They wouldn’t tell me ‘cos they wanted it to be a surprise. Imagine how happy I was when I found that we’d arrived at Tia and Foxy’s house. They were ever so pleased to see us, I can tell you. We all rushed around and sniffed about in their garden and then Gillian gave us our supper. We were so busy we didn’t see our Humans leave. When we went to bed we slept with the children. I was with Marnie and Jenna was with Callum. Kiri had Foxy and Tia, and Frodo was in Gillian and Paul’s room. In the very early morning Frodo started howling and woke everyone up. He was missing Mrs H but he soon settled down again.

The next day lots of people came to see us and say hello, then we all went out for a walk, but we couldn’t go off our leads. We had lots of fun playing in the garden later on, though. All the Humans kept talking about New Earseve and us dogs didn’t know what they meant. They seemed happy so we decided not to worry about it. They went out later on and left us in the house but it was nice and warm so we didn’t mind and they weren’t gone long.

On New Earsday our own Humans came back after it was dark and took us home to Berkshire (I think it’s funny that we live in *Berkshire – well, we do bark, but so do dogs that live in other parts of the country!) We were so tired that we slept all the way. It was nice to go and stay with Gillian and Paul but it was really good to be back in our own home and Winston was very pleased to see us.

It’s been very quiet in our house since we all came home again. Mrs H has put the small Christmas trees out in the garden. She says they’ll be much bigger next Christmas. I wonder if they’ll grow as much as I did – she’ll never get them in the house if they do. I’m ever such a big boy now. When Frodo and me went to see Kate-the-Vet to have a check-up and a booster (whatever that is) we had to stand on a platform that told the Humans how heavy we were. Frodo was 33 kilos and I weighed 31 kilos. I expect I’m more now. I expect I’ll be heavier than Frodo soon. I don’t think he’ll care though. I knock him over sometimes but he never grumbles. I really like Frodo. I sit on his head sometimes but he doesn’t seem to mind - well, not very much. I think he’s super. I don’t think I’ll ever be just like him ‘cos he’s a Dalmatian and I’m a Labrador. When I was little I thought I might grow large white patches and look like him. That was because I had some white hairs on my chin – I know better now. I’m not sure about Jenna, though – her chin’s getting quite a lot of white on it.

I like playing with Winston. He’s only a cat and ever so much smaller than me but we rough and tumble – well, I rough and he tumbles. He missed us dogs when we went on holiday for New Ear. He said it was ever so quiet.

Frodo did some falling down last night. He doesn’t do it very often and I always think he wants to play but my Humans tell me to keep away. Afterwards, he staggers around for a while, crashing into things and knocking things over and then he goes to sleep. The Humans tell him he’s a poor boy, a good boy, and make ever such a fuss of him. They always look a bit sad when Frodo falls but Frodo doesn’t bother – he can’t even remember what’s happened.

Jenna’s going to the vet today. She likes going there ‘cos everyone talks to her and makes a big fuss of her. She gets biscuits, too. Frodo and me got biscuits the last time we went. I liked it there and Frodo’s so used to being there that he doesn’t worry about it. Kate-the-Vet was ever so nice. Her hair tasted good and so did her face. Frodo doesn’t lick the vets – he says it’s not polite but I say, how else can I tell the vets I like them? Anyway, I’m sure they’d rather be licked than bitten – I’ve heard that some dogs bite people. That really isn’t good manners. What in all dogdom are they thinking of?

Time for supper now. Chicken chunks – yum!

Hwyl fawr am nawr! (That’s Welsh for ‘Goodbye for now!’)

*Berkshire is pronounced Barksheer.