It's a Bob Blog

Now that I’ve been a dog-owner for nearly a year now (10 months actually  –eeesh, tempus fairly fugits, innit) I thought it was time to offer the wisdom I have accumulated to my three regular readers in case any of them are thinking of getting a mutt.

# thing 1 – big dogs take a lot of walking.

#thing 2 – big dogs take a lot of feeding.

#thing 3 – big dogs that take a lot of feeding fill poop sacs with alarmingly large poops. Think, enough to fill 

one of Jordan’s bra cups.

#thing 4 – if you take only one poop sac on your walk, said dog will do two poops – you take two sacs, he will do three. His ability to poop then grows at an exponential rate depending on the number of sacs on your possession.

#thing 5 – the poop that exceeds your ability to scoop will be done in the most public place possible.

#thing 6 – you will adopt an interval training routine which will involve you running at exactly this point. You will stop as soon as you are out of view. You will catch your breath. Eventually.

#thing 7 – the dog will always poop at the furthest point from a bin leaving you the pleasure of carrying the “article” for the longest time possible. You will swear he is smiling as he watches you carry it.

#thing 8 – you will catch walkers who are non-dog owners (What the feck is that all about? Walking when you don’t have to?) staring at your full poop sac with a long look of mild disgust.

#thing 9 – you will catch this look and give the bag a bigger swing while saying, with a huge smile, ‘You should smell his farts.’

#thing 10 – when buying jackets you don’t need to check yourself in the mirror because you no longer care what they look like. You live in Scotland so your priority is now wind and rain proofing. And enough pockets to carry a sufficiency of poop sacs.

#thing 11 – your jacket should also be dog-drool resistant. That stuff stains and gets EVERYWHERE.

#thing 12 – dogs really do reflect their owners. A friendly dog is always with a friendly, chatty owner. A crabbit, unsocial dog is always with an arse.

#thing 13 - boy dogs will always wait until you have visitors before licking their boy-bits. You will try to ignore this but the loud slurping noise makes it difficult.

#thing 14 – your teenage son will count the resultant erections (the dog’s, silly) and announce to all and sundry the number for each day.

So go forth, people and give a dog a good home. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Time Off

The Bob Blog

He’s getting bigger.

Other Stuff...

What else has been happening? I’m on holiday this week catching up with my reading and writing. Makes me sound like the class dunce, innit?

Also got a man in to do some work around the house, cos I’m hapless, clueless and lots of other kinds of “less” when it comes to DIY. My ex used to laugh at me (note the “at” part of this sentence) whenever I had a screwdriver in my hand – and no, that’s not a euphemism – she said I turned from mild-mannered Clark Kent kinda guy into The Hulk.

No, seriously I would go into a RAGE. And curse like a character from an Irvine Welsh novel. I blame the parents.

So for the good of my blood pressure and for the sanity of my loved ones I no longer attempt anything that requires a tool in any shape that’s different than a laptop. Or a fork, knife and spoon. Or a TV remote.

The Queen of Chaos (my twin sister) recommended a handyman that she has been using . He came round today to do some bibs and bots. His first challenge was to remove a light fitting that has been bugging me since I moved in 4 years ago. It hangs from the ceiling and almost reaches the floor in a series of cream canvas boxes. An Ikea special if you will. It doesn’t work. It has never worked and I friggin’ hate the thing. But being me, it takes a while to get round to doing anything about it. I can hear all of the women reading this going, gawd I’d hate it if my husband was like that.

If he is, my advice: get over it and get a handyman in.

The old fella worked in electrics. Every time he comes over he looks at it and ask me if I have a pair of ladders. The answer of course is – is that shaped anything like a laptop? To be fair, the old fella is just the right side of five feet so he has the disadvantage of assessing where the light fitting connects to the ceiling from the vantage point of a hobbit.

Handyman guy looked at light fitting. He studied the top of the light fitting where it touched the ceiling. I say studied, he screwed his face up in thought and looked at it for about 5 seconds. Where the light fitting touches the ceiling it is shaped like an upside down cup. He twisted this cup thing ...and the whole apparatus lifted off in his hand. It took all of a second to remove.  And no wonder it didn’t work because it was attached to a metal hook. There was nothing even remotely resembling an electric wire anywhere in the vicinity.

Oh how we laughed.

The previous inhabitants of this house must have just liked it as a kind of a feature.

Eejits.

Anyway, who gives a monkey fart about DIY?  I have a giant TBR pile, a book and a shitload of poems to write.

Laters

The Bob Blog

We decided that it was time the wee fella had a dog. A friend of a friend's dog just had a litter  of 14 and was looking for a good home for them. Don't know if we comply with the elfin safety regulations for a "good home" but we'll give it a damn good try.

The pups are too young to be separated from their mother just yet, but because we are GOOD friends of a friend we got first pick.

When we walked in to the large kennel housing the doggy family, mum was feeding. I didn't know whether to look away or throw water over her screaming - NOooo, and she has 8 breasts!

(For those of you who are crap at irony - I read an article recently about a breast-feeding woman who had water thrown over her by an arsehole who  - well, god only knows why these fuckwits behave the way they do.)

Anywho, the pups were a mass of writhing fur, latching on to a swollen teat while a brother/ sister tried to push it away. The wee fella looked at me and said, 'That looks cute and wrong all at the same time.'

The mummy labrador had 4 golden pups and 10 black ones. The wee fella decided he wanted a golden boy - dog is the correct term I believe - eeesh look at me, not even a dog owner yet and I know all the lingo.

The wee fella picked one of the livelier boys - see above - and is calling him Bob. Awwww.

While we wait for the pup, sorry Bob to open his eyes, grow a little more and get all his jags we have to come up with a Kennel Club name so that his pedigree can be registered. For those of you not in the know - excuse me while I act all superior - get me, doggy expert. I'll be on Dog Whisperer next week - the Kennel Club name has to be long-winded and dramatic. Like Roberto Dawnbreaker Persimmon Badinage. Or Lilly Shuttlebucket Apollo. Or perhaps even Sylvester Scraggyballs Breezebutt.

I'm struggling to pick one. I need something that suggests this dog is fun, lively, caring, comes from a good home and will never hump the legs of innocent bystanders. 

Choices, choices...anybody got a good idea for Bob's Kennel Club name?