Upsetting Dino Murby

 

Dino Murby, an aging and short legged dog, is visiting at the moment.  He is an easy guest – his main pleasures in life being eating and sleeping.  Much of the time he lies with his eye closed impersonating an elderly rug.  He also likes short walks.  I included him on an hour long trip the other day and, though he plodded on gamely, he panted so much that I spent the next 24 hours keeping an anxious watch, in case I’d brought on a heart attack.    Fortunately he has survived, but, so I don’t have to explain to Sue and Richard how I caused their dog’s death, I left him with Mike when I took Dolly for a longer walk yesterday.  And apparently he was extremely upset.   Once he realised that we had gone without him he stood in the kitchen howling . Mike had to spend a long time comforting him. Although it was flattering to be missed, Dolly will have to make do with short shared walks until Sue and Richard return. 

On Sunday I chopped up old cards.  I had a box containing all the birthday/Christmas/ congratulation/farewell cards we have received over the last 10 years.  I thought they might come in use for my grandsons for scrapbooking at some stage.  As they are now both too old to care about scrapbooks,  I spent several hours separating the pictures from the greetings to make new cards.  I consigned the discarded bits to the rubbish – thinking the recycling people wouldn’t want to pick their way through lots of bits of old card.  So this morning, the rubbish bag began to sing.  Somewhere from its black and mucky depths, it played “Happy Birthday” clearly and repeatedly.   Mike became very distressed.  I’m not sure whether he couldn’t stand the tune or whether he just wanted to retrieve the innocent card but he began to go through all the rubbish in a rescue attempt.  He found it.  It was right at the bottom.  He also rather smeared himself in jam.