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Our dog is old. He remains small, cute and loveable, but is in equal measures smelly and increasingly infirm. The vet thinks he might have Cushings disease which, dissapointingly, is nothing to do with him turning into a vampire. To start the process of confirming the diagnosis he needs a urine test - our excellent vet Ian won't do a blood test until he has ruled out some of the cheaper-to-discover other things; this is one of the things I like about our vet, he won't rip you off.
On the way out of the surgery Ian hands me a small vial and cheerily says, "Just drop it off at the surgery when you've got the sample." That is all he says. He doesn't offer handy suggestions on 'piss gathering in dogs whose little todger is barely four inches from the floor.'
So, attempt number one. First thing Saturday morning I open the patio doors. Max, always eager for that blissful morning release we all enjoy, approaches the pot containing Clematis Nelly Moser. As he cocks his leg I am there ready and poised with a plastic breakfast bowl; but Max is too good for me. As I dive beneath him with the bowl he looks back startled (sorry I forgot to mention he is deaf as a post too). He stops peeing and trots on giving me a look of bafflement. There then starts a game of 'Dad chasing Max armed with a plastic breakfast bowl' around the patio - only I tire of the game fairly rapidly saying "Bollocks to it then". Of course as soon as I have uttered the fateful words, Max releases a gusing flow that must have lasted about thirty seconds, all of the time eyeing me and the bowl with suspicion.
Still, I have a plan: Max always pees on plastic carrier bags whenever he sees one on our walk. He also has a sense of humour and pees on anything placed temporarily outside to be returned indoors later - meaning I must wash it thoroughly. He particularly likes to pee on houseplants put outside for watering.
Here is the plan: I stand a house plant on a carrier bag so the pee will run onto the bag and I can tip it in the vial. Sure enough he approaches the plant and cocks his leg peeing beautifully up the side of the pot. The piss myseriously seeps away into some sort of pissy black hole - it is nowhere to be seen, let alone poured.
I sulk and wonder whether this is the sort of amusing anecdote that vets talk about, "Do you know what I told one of our clients today...next time I'm going to tell him to tape a bag over it, that'll be worth a laugh..."
So, Saturday afternoon Mrs C and I adopt a cooperative approach. He always behaves for his mum; so Mrs C takes him on the lead to a nearby park; we take him in the car because he doesn't walk far now. She sets off walking, I lurk behind, stalking with the plastic dish. He approaches a post, lifts his little leggy and releases a stream which I catch in the plastic bowl succesfully.
We congratulate ourselves for the succesful piss collection and then look up to see anxious parents guiding their tots away from the playground apperatus nearest the fence where we were gloating over our specimin.
Anyway, by that time the vet was shut so we proudly stored our little piss-pot in the fridge next to the skimmed milk...where you could hardly tell the difference (that little aside was for anyone on a diet, like me).
So now we wait for Ian the Vet's call for the next stage.
I was round at Sarah's dad's last Saturday morning. You may remember Sarah, my young friend who is a Police Officer. Over the as usual, excellent coffee I listened to her having what amounted to a mini-rant combined with a surprising crisis of confidence.
Risking Sarah's wrath for the sake of art - well blogging at any rate - I convinced her that she should engage in another cathartic jotting down of her experience.
Follow this link to read Sarah's account of tackling Domestic Violence.
"Hi Julie, you don't mind me driving while we're talking do you? Yes, of course I'm hands free. I feel such an idiot so I've just got to get home and explain to them, how it's all been a misunderstanding. It's Graham I feel sorry for, but then you know how things have been. I mean, he's just been so weird these last few months, what with his 'problem', then spending all that time in the study on the internet.
"I was happier when I thought it was porn, although of course I started worrying then that it was me that was the problem. What? Of course I know that it was him now, but you know what women are like, we blame ourselves, don't we?"
"That was how I fell upon what he was really looking at - the chemicals - if only the silly man had talked to me, instead of his stupid pig ignorant pride. He should spend sometime being a woman for God's sake, then he'd learn about pride. I mean, how many things do we women get wrong with our fannies or tits, I seemed to have spent half my life on a couch in my doctor's with my legs wide open!"
"Stop laughing, you know what I mean. Anyway, as soon as there's something wrong with their cock, they take it as an assault on their fundamental manhood and go all broody. Still, I suppose it's cheaper than a Harley Davidson. Jenny Grove's husband couldn't get it up, she let him have a Harley on a promise, and now he's getting it on with a leather clad YMCA biker boy plumber from Partington."
"I'm serious, at least Graham was trying, in his own way to get help. What? Oh yes, sorry I didn't explain that bit did I? I thought he'd become some sort of religious zealot and was buying chemicals to make a bomb. So I had a moral dilemma for all of about two minutes, then realised I was never going to be one of those strong silent women who support the cause. So I shopped him to the terrorist hot line."
"Yes, really. They were really nice, offered me somewhere to go, said they'd look after everything. Then this morning on the Today programme there was this thing about Hydrogen Sulphide and how they think it can help get a man a hard-on. Then it came flying at me and hit me slap bang in the face....stop it! You know what I mean. The poor darling was trying to make his own DIY Viagra with a schoolboy chemistry set."
"What?...Oh, very funny, you must have been waiting weeks to use that one...yes I see what you did...Ardour, only with an aitch, very funny."
"Anyway, I'm just pullling into our street now. Oh my God, they don't do things by halves do they, there's about fifteen Police cars and an ambul...oh shit, you don't think? No, of course not, they'd have an ambulance just in case. Don't suppose they can take chances if they think there's a bomb or something. Oh God, oh God...they've taped off the street, I'm parking here and running down to the house - are you OK to stay on with me? Great."
"Still there? I'm jogging down...Hang on Julie, I'm being stopped by some schoolboy in a uniform... you oaf, I live here... get your hands off me you little...."
"Julie, stay on won't you, I want you to hear all this, I'm nearly at the door...No! I live here and you have no right to...can you believe the cheek of that bastard, I hope you are getting this Julie, OK I'm in the house.... ... ... Oh...My...God..."
"Shit oh shit oh shit oh shit...Julie? There's blood ...What? No, I'm his wife, where is he?...Oh no, Graham! Graham! No!.."
"What do you mean you thought he was going to shoot you? He's never even fired a gun, let alone had one in the house. He what? Just turned around and you thought?...How could you possibly think...Oh no, you don't mean...oh no, please no."
"Where is he? Is he in here? Get off me, this is my house and my kitch...Oh God Graham...please no..."
"Thank you officer, I just never expected to see...no of course, I shouldn't have barged past like that. But couldn't they have zipped up the, what do you call it? Yes, what a horrible phrase - body bag. What do you mean it wouldn't zip up? Oh, I see."
We don't get out much round here, so when I had to go to London for a meeting the other day, it was an event. Not least when I found out that travelling with an executive level colleague meant we got to go First Class - I have never travelled First Class before, in fact I don't think I've ever done anything First Class before!
Picking up the menu from the nicely laid table my executive colleague asked,
"What are you having for breakfast?",
I replied,
"I'll probably just get an egg McMuffin or summat when we get there, it's bound to be dear on the train."
"No, silly" she said, "It's all included."
But even then it took a short interrogation of the waitress before me and my other non-executive, yokel colleague actually believed it; and then in a style that truly betrayed our class, we continued:
"Right then, we'll have one of everything"
And then in an aside, my fellow yokel added,
"And I'll be taking some stuff for the kids too..."
What a lovely way to travel, well done Virgin Trains. The journey from Manchester to Euston took just two hours. The new Pendolino train was fast and smooth, the first class service was, well, first class: free food, free paper and as much lovely coffee as you wanted (and before you say it, yes I know it's not free really, but it felt it because work was paying!)
Anyway, if I was self employed, I'd certainly consider it worth paying, if only because at the end of the journey we didn't feel like you'd actually travelled all that way.
We were fresh and rested, ready to do business - and that's what we did, partly thanks to Mr Branson and his posh train.
Collecting the latest results of Amazon's dreaded one-click ordering at weekend, a wave of sadness enveloped me as I realised that the mail collection office was actually Oldham's room of lost loves.
The young man passed my parcel through the hatch, and as I reached in I spied rows of pigeon holes stuffed with envelopes, many of them patterned with hearts and coloured deep red.
"What are all those?" I asked,
"Oh, they're all the cards that nobody has come to collect 'cos they had the wrong postage on them." he replied.
"Isn't that sad" I ventured,
"Dunno, you wouldn't catch me coming to collect a card that needed paying for."
So all those embryonic loves, those heartfelt yearnings remain lying there in the dark, for the want of a few pennies. And what of the emotion that was poured into those envelopes? The hope that accompanied the lustful longings? Somewhere someone is crying into their pillow wondering why they have been spurned, ignorant that their fate lay in one simple mistake of misjudging the size (of the envelope - before you get any smutty ideas).
I considered whether I'd risk a gamble of a few pence and a possible wasted journey to see what mysteries the left mail office had for me. I decided I definitely would. Yes, the young man was rather hard-hearted, if you ask me.
Then I realised where I'd heard his accent before, yes, that was it. He was from Barnsley or near by, where they must have a very large Room of Lost Love.
