My psychic dog

Incredible!  How psychic is my dog!!!

A couple of times over the last week she hasn't wanted to go for a walk even though our other dog has gone quite happily.

Yesterday she came up and jumped on my lap at the computer and was physically shaking as much as she did with the fireworks last year and yet there were no storms around, no loud noises or anything to be worried about.  

After a few minutes I heard OH downstairs and called and asked him if there was anything for her to be frightened of and he said nothing he could think of.  He said he was just about to take them for a walk over the fields.

Both dogs and OH went downstairs but as he got her lead she came back up again and jumped on my lap.  In the end she could be persuaded to go.

They went for a long walk but on the way back they had to cross a bridge over a deep ditch between 2 fields with hedges both sides so you can't really see what's over the bridge in the next field.

Our little dogs were off lead and just going over the bridge when they suddenly met 3 huge dogs coming the other way, also off-lead (young dogs and not vicious or anything, but boisterous and totally overwhelming to our little ones - OH recognised one as a Newfoundland and he said the others were almost as big).

Anyway it frightened our dogs so much that one turned tail and ran for home but the other one got trapped by the big dogs on the bridge and fell off - 8 feet down into a couple of inches of water but the ditch is totally overgrown all round.  

OH and the man with the other dogs couldn't see her or find a way to get down at first, although finally managed it and luckily she was more or less where she fell rather than trying to follow the ditch.

So was that the reason she was so frightened before she even left the house and why she didn't really want to go? 

Why Oh Why!

These things always happen to me!

I'm tired and just on my way to bed, so at the last minute want to put some hand cream on.

But the tube is almost empty and no matter how much I squeeze nothing will come out.

So I squeeze from the bottom as if I am milking a cow (well I imagine, as I've never actually done that of course).  Still nothing comes out.

Next I try folding the bottom over to try and make it come up like in a toothpaste tube - but no, they make the tubes so that they wont fold over.
Now this is definitely so you don't get the full amount clearly labelled on the tube to use at all!

Now I should at this point go and get the scissors to cut through the tube 2/3 of the way down to get at the cream inside and use the top 2/3 as the lid - but can I be bothered to go and get the scissors - oh no!

So I give it a few sharp shakes downwards to hopefully throw the cream down to the opening - it works a bit and a tiny amount comes out - sooo I shake it down some more, open the end and give it a big squeeze.

Yep, you've got it - I get a whole dollop out - way too much!!!

No amount of rubbing gets it to absorb that much into my hands, so up go the sleeves and I try rubbing the surplus into my arms too - still way too much.  

So down come the pyjama trousers and I now have enough cream left to moisturise my legs too!

Now if only I had just made the effort to get those scissors I would have been in bed much quicker and had enough hand cream left for another 3 weeks!

So what is the point of having a burglar alarm!!!!

As you know I am an owl – I go to bed late and often get involved online so end up going to bed really late…..!!! 

Well last night at 3.30 the house alarm went off over the road.  As my computer room is upstairs at the front of the house, I looked out straight away to see if I could see a van or anything suspicious.

OK I didn’t have my distance glasses on as I was on the computer but I could see the house and the road pretty clearly even though it was dark although the bushes in the garden next door slightly hampered my vision at ground level.

There was no movement, no van parked outside or even in the part of the driveway that I could see, although I couldn’t see all their front garden because of bushes and I couldn’t see the driveway up the other side of the house.  But no figures hurrying away either.

I kept watching presuming that something had triggered the alarm inside and the owners would turn it off in a minute but no, ten minutes later it was still going.

By now I thought I really should do something about it and as it wasn’t an emergency I rang 101.  The lady on the other end took my details (which seemed more important than what was going on over the road for some reason!) and I told her what I knew.

While I was speaking to her the alarm stopped, although that was probably because it was set to stop after 15 minutes.

Anyway, she told me that the police don’t investigate when house alarms go off - even though it was 3.30 a.m. and it seemed that the owners couldn’t be there or they would have turned it off.

She just told me that if I saw anyone running away or a vehicle drive off to ring “the 9’s”.

Well unless I had night vision binoculars to hand and could tell them the make and registration of the vehicle, then I rather think that would be a waste of time too as by the time they got here the burglars would be well away.

I kept an eye on the house and about 5 minutes after the alarm had stopped, a light came on in a downstairs room which was on for a good five minutes or so and by the time I went to bed ten minutes or so later the light had gone out but the security light round the side was on.  But still no fleeing burglars to be seen, so I can only presume the owners had finally been woken by their alarm.

So…… what I have learned from last night’s episode is that burglar alarms are a complete waste of time and if you are a burglar and you set an alarm off, then just sit tight and carry on with ransacking the house, as the police wont bother you.  Then, by the time you leave, the alarm will have stopped and even on the off-chance that it had woken a neighbour, they will be tucked up back in their beds and be well asleep again by the time you leave.  No worries about turning lights on in the house either to make your job easier, as it is even more likely to make neighbours think that the alarm had woken the owners.

I decided a well-lit outside of the house, possibly nice crunchy gravel, and of course dogs, are much more of a deterrent than a burglar alarm.