A Good Night's Sleep

I have to report that The Owner's new bean bag is indeed a very comfortable and warm place to rest your weary bones. 

Yesterday The Owner managed to coax some life out of a particularly recalcitrant computer after several days and a whole lot of money spent arguing with it. So by last night he was feeling the relief and opted to go to bed a little earlier than usual. The computer seems to have learnt its lesson as it is still working and he has already given me a headache as he thumps away on the keyboard above me here in the office this morning. 

Last night, as if in some way to offer recompense for disappearing off to bed and leaving me, he gave me a mint flavoured chewey stick with the usual caustic comment of "Here you are dog breath!" which I pretended to ignore. Now I like to take my chewey sticks somewhere nice to chomp on and don't enjoy them so much when chomped just any old where, and that was when the idea hit me. The Owner, you may recall, has a new bean bag upstairs in our second living room. Now I quite like it up there, even though I am not really supposed to be upstairs. The windows are much lower and if I sit on the floor by them I can survey the scene across the farm as I plot my next patrol. So I waited a few minutes, with my chewey stick in my mouth, and tried to ignore the dribble which was escaping, until I thought he may be asleep. I thought about adopting the full-on charge up the stairs but instead went for the stealth approach. One paw on one step.. wait.... then another paw on another step..wait again, until the climb was complete. It all went well and the sleeping behemoth I know as The Owner, was still snoring for England in his bedroom, I had made it! So I clambered up on to the new bean bag and decided to put in an extra turn around before laying down, just for good measure. Then I enjoyed a good old chomp on my chewey stick. It was good! I noticed also that curled up on the bean bag I could see across the fields all the activity during the night. I noticed a very active badger run which I have made note of for a quick patrol later, just in case there is any badger poo, for the rolling in. Also I noticed a fox, who apeared to be, well, performing. We don't get too much fox poo around here to roll in so I have made note of that too.... then slumber overcame me. It was a pleasant nights sleep, and warm, so I slept well and nearly got caught out this morning when The Owner started to stir. So I scurried on down stairs and quickly curled up on my duvet to make it look as though I had been there over night. The result was convincing I thought, but it was never witnessed just how convincing my efforts were. The Owner, just out of bed, was bellowing from upstairs. "JACK" he said (I use capital letters to emphasise his volume) "COME HERE!!!". I am getting the feeling already that I am in trouble. So I crept up the stairs, as much on my belly  as I could manage. When I got to the top I poked my head around the corner of the stairs with a little wag of my tail, just the tip you understand, to see The Owner, hands on hips, fresh out of bed (not a pretty sight first thing in the morning), pointing in a very accusing manner at the bean bag. "Is that something to do with you?" Old Hawk Eyes had spotted the end of a chewey stick lying in the middle of the bean bag. Damn I missed some! I thought about going and getting it from the bean bag and finishing my snack but thought discretion would be by far the better option and crept downstairs again. Hopefully with his computer working now at a furious pace he will soon forget about where I spent the night. Otherwise it could be  long day here in the studio.

Filling The Bean Bag

Having cleared up the first attempt at filling the bean bag and still having the best part of three quarters of the bag of little white 'beans' still to be transferred into their final destination The Owner was becoming inventive. With a fist full of cable ties deployed about the bags and a self righteous expression upon his face he started to pour the 'beans'. After a few minutes of pouring, the bag of beans was empty and the bean bag was now kind of full (ish) and The Owner stood there with a self satisfied smug look across his face of a job well done. "There you are Jack", he said, "I knew I could do it!". I'll let you be the judge of that I think.....

The Bean Bag Has Arrived!

The Owner had really impressed me after the arrival from his new best friend Barney yesterday. He rummaged around in one of the boxes and found a piece of paper. The kind of piece of paper that he usually only reads after it has all gone horribly wrong and whatever it was would no longer work out of utter confusion over which button he had pressed and what he was expecting it then to do. He then READ the piece of paper!!! This was a first! He then went on to his favourite website for finding out how to do things, Youtube, and watched several short videos on how to put the contents from one box into the contents of the other box. "That all looks simple enough!" he said. Which to be honest is usually the precursor to things becoming quite complicated, as a rule. I noticed on the videos that the operation required two people, and whilst The Owner may be the size of two people in so many ways, he is just one. There then followed many phone calls which were all very similar. "Hi, are you busy in the morning? Hello? Hello? Hellooooo? Huh, lines gone dead!" There then followed the statement I always dread, "Well it can't be that hard with just one of you. 

Let me explain. In one box there was a bean bag and the other was the beans, although they didn't look that edible to me.. So we make a start... put elephants trunk end of bag inside bean bag... and then stand up. Elephants trunk end of bag falls out of bean bag.... so do half the beans in the bag before he noticed. He stood there for half an hour scratching he head trying to work out how he was going to get all the escapees rounded up and back into the bean bag, particularly when all the little white beans didn't like him so much and rolled away when he put his hands anywhere near them.

It took nearly an hour but he managed to corral the little white "Beans" in the corner and get all the escapees into the new bean bag. He still has that defiant 'I can do that' look about him at the moment and although I really should be going out on patrol about now, out of shear morbid curiosity, I can't help myself, I am going to have to stay and watch the circus unfold.

Superdad to the Rescue!

Yesterday we had a very busy day and not all the trouble was mine you will be so pleased to know. Yesterday we had lots of visiting hoomuns on the farm, all walking around eating Cornish pasties. I am not understanding why they aren't called Wiltshire pasties because Lady Dairy Hoomun made them as far as I can tell. One of the visiting hoomuns came on a motorbike and The Owner stood in the doorway looking on at the motorbike in a very appreciative fashion. I was fearful that he was going to go and talk to this motorbike hoomun in an attempt at hoomun bonding by regaling him with all his motorbike stories about all the motorbikes he has never had. Fortunately motorbike hoomun jumped off his bike and scurried round to the loo. I did venture in to the loo once and have never been allowed back in. Well if he had refilled my water bowl when I asked I wouldn't have needed to look for an alternative would I? Anyway, the morning descended into the normal monotony as he bashed away on the keyboard as I tried hard to snooze under his desk. Sometimes it can require great concentration to snooze under there when he is at his most animated! Coffee was a little later than usual so when he got up and picked up his mug to go and make it I was feeling the urge, so I did my little dance by the door to go out. He threw the door open for me as he walked past and I shot out. I hadn't quite realised how urgent it was becoming until then, so I rushed to the closest thing I could find that gave me enough elevation to be useful for weeing up. I was just getting to that 'aaaaaahhhhh' moment in mid flow. You know, the point where the pressure has lifted enough to no longer be painful, when The Owner appeared at the studio door and seemed to be quite agitated about something. It would seem that the black thing in the yard that I was using for my relief was in fact Motorbike Hoomuns helmet and apparently not for weeing on. I scuttled off and sat in the old pig sty where I could see the motorbike but was not immediately visible from it. Motorbike Hoomun returned and picked up his helmet, so I sunk a little lower in the straw, he put it on, I sunk lower. He took it off again... lower still...and looked at his helmet.... I can't get any lower, but I'll try. He took one of those girly wet-wipes out of his pocket and wiped his helmet over as he scanned the horizon for the culprit. The Owner was busying himself at drawers that he hasn't opened in years, so he could have his back to Motorbike Hoomun I suspect. Fortunately he didn't see me and even in his more argumentative moments I suspect that this was going to be one argument that The Owner wouldn't have won. 

Then, yesterday tea time Owners Daughter turned up. To see me obviously! Do you know why I like it when Owners Daughter turns up? We go in her car to a pub, that's why!! Cars are my favourite and pubs are even more my favouritest thing to visit. So she went to her car and opened the door. Well I could scarcely contain my excitement and leapt straight in. She wasn't impressed with my muddy pawprints on the seat... and said so.... loudly. So I jumped nimbly over the back.... hmm....the back seat was full of paintings. This was not going well! I think The Owner can repair most of them with some of his special duct tape. Seating arrangements formalised, she went to turn her car around. Now from where I was sitting the view was not all that clear, although I couldn't help but wonder if we were going just a little too close to the edge of the ditch..... yes, yes we were going too close to the edge! Everything came to a grinding halt followed by her favourite word. "Oops!" The Owner jumped out and took control and deftly removed her car from the ditch and spent the rest of the evening referring to himself as 'Superdad'. Much to the irritation of everyone in the pub as he told them all for the third or fourth time how he had saved the world from nuclear Armageddon at the very least. Today he is looking through the back of the wardrobe for something he can turn into a cape. I am just grateful he hasn't felt inspired to complete the outfit with a pair of tights with his underpants on the outside. I don't believe he has any of them without holes in so it is for the best I think.

My Visit to An Archaeology Dig

The Owner has developed a keen interest (as he tells everyone who is daft enough to listen) in archaeology. I have no real understanding of what archaeology is except that lots of strange hoomuns rush around in fields digging holes and unearthing things that someone else had broken and thrown away many years ago. They then rush around and get very excited and put the bits of rubbish in plastic bags and take them off somewhere. I assume they must be taking them to the recycling centre and disposing of them properly. This is what The Owner says he does with his stuff when anyone can hear him talking as he says it is his civic duty. I know that he often digs a hole and just buries his rubbish, presumably so that someone else, presumably an archaeologist hoomun, can then dig them all up again in years to come and get very excited about his discarded Shiphams fish paste jars. So I can see how this all works, I just don't see why. Well, yesterday a fine opportunity arose to satisfy my curiosity and desire to understand much of the hoomun condition. The Owner got in the car, I like cars, and announced to the world that we were going on an archaeology dig. It sounded impressive! When we got there The Owner joined in with all the other Archaeologist Hoomuns in getting very excited about some broken old pot, so I went on a quick patrol of the perimeter. Now I have noticed in the past that they get particularly excited when they find some old bones and they all get put in bags too and taken away, presumably to make into a nice soup for their supper when they get home. Now the bones I can understand the need to bury them for a while first, as they do improve with age. But in the course of my explorations I happened upon a hole in the ground and at the bottom of the hole was bones... loads of bones!! So I thought I would try and join in with the excitement and take one back to the Archaeologist Hoomuns tent for them. As I approached with the bone in my mouth an Archaeology Lady Hoomun who had breath that would descale a kettle at a thousand yards got very animated and started shouting "It's the Femur! It's the Femur!" Well my name isn't Femur, that I am aware. The Owner has never called me that anyway; he has called me many things but never Femur. She rushed over and snatched the bone from my jaws! Well there was no need to get possessive over it! There are many more in that hole over there, I thought, so I went to get another one. The Owner was instructed to go and "Get 'That Dog! and put it somewhere where it can't cause trouble". That Dog?!?! Expect repercussions! So I was put back in the car where I apparently can't cause any more trouble. Can't I? I wouldn't want to put too much money on that!

Draining The Somerset Levels

Oh this weekend I have had such trouble with The Owner! Although to be fair he may have a different version of events for Saturday. I was in the garden, enjoying the sunshine, down in Dingly Dell as you ask, and seeing if I could assist the water flow through the stream there. It was a wet and muddy job but I felt a certain sense of purpose to the whole mornings work and I felt I may have been getting somewhere by digging down to make the stream deeper. Well, The Owner is always ranting at the BBC News about dredging being needed on the Somerset Levels to lower the water levels so I was quite proud to think I may have been helping the water on the Somerset Levels too. About lunchtime I noticed The Owner making rangements on the phone but I continued my mission unconcerned. I had moved on to the stream running down the side of the path to the cottage which wasn't quite so muddy. You notice how I used the past tense there? I was stirring it up a little, but it has to get worse before it gets better doesn't it? Well that's what The Owner says although in his case most of his projects get worse and then sort of lose their way and stay worse. But don't tell him I said that. The stream... I noticed The Owner wander down the path as I was hard at work and a car pulled up in the layby and The Owner opened the car door. Well he was clearly not intentionally going to leave me behind was he? I leapt out of the stream, forgoing the shake to remove excess water (I could do that in a minute once I had caught up with The Owner), and ran down the path and launched myself forth, passing The Owner as I entered the car and hopped nimbly over the back. Now I can pause to shake I thought. It seems that this car was a taxi and Taxi Hoomun was not impressed about something. He asked me to get out and left both The Owner and me at the side of the road. He did return later and gave The Owner a bill for valeting the inside of his taxi. Not sure why, but I was getting the distinct vibe that we may not be using that taxi company again for a while and that The Owner was somehow blaming me for the whole scenario. Hoomuns, huh?

My Valentine Parcel

Postman Maul made me sign for a parcel today! Yes, another parcel (that's what he said too, only he used another word as well that I pretended not to understand). In my Valentine parcel was a card... a valentine card... for me! Ok, it didn't actually say Valentine on the card anywhere, but it was a card and it was sent on Valentines day so in my book that counts. Oh yes, and The Owner too but he doesn't count, it was addressed to me. Little heart shaped biscuits for me and one Bonio shaped with Jack written on it... well ok, so I had a quick chomp and there is only the K left, but you get the idea don't you. There was also a pack of heart shaped chews for The Owner and the observant among you may have noticed a little tear in the side of the packet where his fat little fingers have already been in the side of it and winkled one out. There was also some cakes in there but he has squirrelled them away, out of my reach, before I can get anywhere near them... but I can wait.