2022 June – Bali, Mum is Back, Wild Swimming, Circle of Life, Medieval Settlement, This Is How It Is

Bali

This is a picture of me looking fed up.

It’s because Mum has disappeared off to Bali to meet offspring #2 and left me behind – again.  I know, unbelievable.  I wasn’t even invited. This sort of behaviour simply has to stop.  Who does Mum think she is?

Mum has also left me in charge of offspring #3 and #4.    I am having to look after them in the style to which they have become accustomed.

Honestly, it’s exhausting.

They are a bit of a handful if the truth be told.

 

Here are some photographs of stuff Mum and offspring #2 got up to.

 

And here are some photographs of stuff I got up to.

 

Not quite the same is it?

As you can see,  I am mostly asleep because of the stress of it all.

 

 

Mum is back now.

I may have sulked for a while.   Mum deserved it, if you ask me.

However, normal service seems to have been resumed and so here are some photos of us out on our walks over the last day or so.

D’ya know what, Mum hasn’t even said sorry to me for going away.  Some people eh?   She’s lucky I am such a tolerant and forgiving doggo.

Although she may be pushing her luck tbh.

Mum is usually a night owl in the winter but seems to get up super early in the summer when the weather is nice and the sun is out, so we are in the wild woods usually before 7am.

I don’t mind, it means I get breakfast early too.  And then I get my post walkies treat early as well.  Then it is a food desert until dins.  But I’m mostly asleep, so that’s OK.

Don’t tell Mum that though because I am trying the ‘looking very sorry for myself’ approach at the moment.

It’s not working very well if I’m entirely honest.

 

 

Wild Swimming

Mum is still on this river swimming malarkey – she says it is kinda addictive.  And everyone who goes is just lovely.

Here are photos of some of the places Mum swims.

It doesn’t look very appealing to me although it is apparently quite warm in at the moment.

I don’t mind a bit of a paddle but I’m not much of a swimmer.

It will be interesting to see what happens to Mum’s enthusiasm in the winter won’t it?!  Water temperature 2 degrees – ummmnnn…. see how enthusiastic Mum is then eh?

Er…. ‘not very’ is my prediction.

Although Mum can be stubborn about stuff too, so it’s entirely possible she’ll be in there just to prove a point or something daft.

Yeah, you all know what she can be like …

Mum says I’m lucky she’s a little bit stubborn because otherwise she would have given up on me years ago.

OK, sort of a fair point, but still …

 

Circle of Life

This is a picture of me looking super alert after an ‘incident’.

Even I’m a bit stunned, if I say so myself.

There were too many cars in the car park near the wild woods so Mum took me to the medieval moat place for walks today.

As we turned the corner into the fields, a hare dodged past me and crashed into Mums legs before hurling itself at the fence and just squeezing through and into the medieval moat bit.   It was jumping like crazy and running like a mad thing.

Then Mum and I realised why, because a fox hurtled round the corner and quite literally skidded to a halt right in front of us.

All 3 of us were so shocked that we all just stared at each other.  The fox recovered fastest and took off.  Then I went absolutely nuts, whining and crashing about trying to get after it.

Or the hare.

Tbh, either would have done!

And that is why you are on a long lead Saffron isn’t it?

Mum has spent hours and hours and hours on recall training but it became increasingly obvious that the only time it would REALLY matter – i.e. that 1% life or death kind of scenario –  is exactly the time I wouldn’t respond.

Brain totally focussed on whatever I wanted to chase and not on Mum or chicken treats.

Mum, meh …

Chicken, meh …

Regardless of the consequences.

Just not safe to let out, are you Saffron?

Hence the long lead.

A triumph of Health and Safety over what Mum really wanted to happen.

 

 

Medieval Settlement

A bit more about where we were today when the hare and fox incident took place ….

Haven’t walked round here for a while. After the fox and hare incident, took the long way around the fields and came back to inspect.  The whole site has now been cleared – for what purpose and to show what?

Obvs all the wooden buildings have long gone and there is just a series of ditches left – now all fenced in so you can’t walk around and take a look and not really visible from the footpath either.  So set up as a sort of a museum rather than a heritage site it seems…??

The new fencing is pretty animal proof (mid to large mammal – excluding hares obvs although that was a bit of a squeeze!) and since the ditches have the only water available for miles, I’m not terribly impressed with that.  I would normally be able to have a little paddle and a post walkies drink but this isn’t possible now. Not sure why it is necessary to fence it all.

Most odd.

And completely inconvenient to me.

Unimpressed.

 

This is how it is

 

 

 

Saffron’s recommendations this month:

Music:

In homage to Mum’s sister in law, M, whose birthday it is this month we’re going for a spot of Duran Duran 😍  Also birthday treat to M, she got to see them in concert … lucky, lucky …

Here are a few tracks you might recognise:

Girls on Film (M’s fave❤ )

Is There Something I Should Know

The Reflex

A View to a Kill

Ordinary World

Hungry Like the Wolf

Rio

Planet Earth

Union of the Snake

….there are so many more but this will have to do for now ! 😊😊

 

 

Reading: (Mum’s holiday reading actually)

The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro, published by faber and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. Anything by this author is usually pretty good and this is no exception.  A slightly ethereal backdrop, fabulous writing as always and KI is great with a love story – which this is centred on – don’t let that put you off!   Alex Preston (Observer) ‘A beautiful, heart-breaking book about the duty to remember and the urge to forget’.    Yes, but so, so much more – delicate, intricate and haunting ….

And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini published by Bloomsbury. Another astonishingly consistent and wonderful writer. The Times has it like this – ‘A story of love, separation, friendship, compassion, exile, memory and the troubled history of Afghanistan spanning 3 continents and 60 years’.   Yeah.   Opening pages  ‘Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field.  I’ll meet you there.   Jelaluddin Rumi 13th century.

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi published (posthumously) by Vintage.   Aaaaah – seriously, just read this.

 

Film:

Catchin’ up on a bit of Sci Fi – and why not? Currently lots of good stuff on Netflix (Stranger Things etc) but can’t beat a classic eh? This is not exhaustive (and I’ve covered Matrix, Star Wars, Bladerunner, Termi and others earlier on) but hey, maybe try some of these out for size – and for fun?

I Robot

Ghost in the Shell

Sorry to Bother You

Attack the Block (Mum loves this hahaha and thanks to Clive for the recommendation years ago – nice one)

The Blob (a Steve McQueen classic!)

High Life (just odd tbh)

Metropolis

Silent Running (oh yeah)

The Fifth Element

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (yeah it’s sci fi!)

Ex Machina

aaaah….just scratching the surface here.   Feel we’ll have to come back to this category – there is so much more to enjoy… 😉

 

 

 

 

 

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