Tales from my handbag

Dogs. What are they for? What do they want from us? Why the smell? Last night I got up close and personal with a bull terrier called Moo, and I have to say, I quite enjoyed it. Ever since our Blackie licked Nivea Cream off my knee then licked his bits (I think it was that way around), I’ve had a soft spot for dogs. And when I say ‘dogs’, I mean proper dogs - the ones with deep voices, a musty whiff, and the flexibility of Olga Korbut, enabling them to chew their genitals with ease. Oh those heady summer nights of 1976 when the family visited Dorset in a Sprite caravan and Blackie had an irritated ball sack. How our caravan rocked to the rhythm of his chomping as the poor mutt struggled to relieve himself of his terrible affliction. Thinking about it, I reckon he might have had dog VD; well he did put it about a bit. Dogs eh!

I don’t want to boast but I am abundant in my back garden. My tomatoes are heavy on the vine and my butternut squash is filling out nicely. However, all is not as it should be; at night I have a prowler - a squirrel who has been filling his flea-ridden body with MY tomatoes. What gets me is that he/she/they, don’t eat a whole tomato and move on, oh no; they have a furtive nibble here, a quick chomp there and sometimes, just for fun, they might indulge in a bit of skinning - just because they can!  ‘It’s not a bloody buffet’, I shriek, chasing the hairy burglars down my garden path. I thought squirrels ate nuts but it seems during these economically challenging times, animals are expanding their gastro repertoires.  This summer, for example, I had wood lice eating my strawberries - and my pet dog Blackie used to eat Nivea Cream. But that’s another story…