27/11/11

Last weekend Mark came down to the Rescue to explain why he has been a bit tardy with getting some of the website updates online recently and eat Helen out of house and home see how we were all getting on and continually annoy Helen by constantly asking her why Jackson hasn’t found a home yet.

I always, usually,frequently,  sometimes try to be on my best behaviour when Mark is around because it is a Well-Known Fact that he awards extra Bonios to The Best-Behaved Dog Of The Day. Remarkably Obviously I usually win this much coveted prize because I make sure I behave when Mark is looking Spike and Deflating-Balloon-Dog Jackson can be relied upon to behave far worse than I do!

However this time the Rescue has been playing host to new DAWGdog Seamus who has very quickly gone from being a rather wayward rascal to being an absolute star. I say this myself as we get along great as he neither growls nastily at me everytime there is food around ( cue:- Spike) or constantly yabbers at my face every few seconds ( cue:- Jackson)

So the other day when we all went on a big walk in the New Forest Seamus was let off his lead with us for the first time. Since that part of the Forest looked a lot like Dartmoor, we decided to play Sherlock Holmes and the Hound of the Baskervilles. Of course, I was Sherlock Holmes as I’m obviously the cleverest and Seamus was my trusty side-kick Dr Watson:

SEAMUS AS DR WATSON

We had great fun tracking for miles across the Moor, easily outclassing the officers from Scotland Yard ( played by Spike and Balloon Dog Jackson), until we came to The Great Grimpen Mire. Unfortunately, Dr Watson wasn’t quite as on the case as he should have been at this point and  failed to recognise The Great Grimpen Mire until he fell up to his waist in it. Being The Brave Hero of course I immediately leap in to save him. The next bit didn’t go quite as planned – Dr Watson, being a small dog who had partaken of only a light luncheon, climbed out unaided, bearing only muddy trousers for his pains, wheras I ( The Daring Hero ) plunged deep into the mire and vanished under the surface, to surface sometime later covered in most of the very smelly swamp and stuck in thick gloopy quicksand-like mud.

Next thing I know, I’m being unceremoniously hauled out by Mark grabbing my harness without so much as a by-your-leave- Master-Mutley. I immediately showered him with a huge spray of filthy swamp lest he get any funny ideas about who was supposed to be the hero of the day whilst I valiantly tried to regain my dignity.
It wasn’t easy when my wardrobe had gone from dashing Sherlock Holmes attire via Swamp Thing to The Creature from The Black Lagoon in as many minutes:-

Yours Truly starring as The Beast From The Abyss

To top off the indignity we all had to have a bath as soon as we got back!!

Even me!!

Seamus didn’t like having a bath very much but he did like getting towelled off so he hid under my towel whilst I was being dried.

I didn’t like having a bath very much but I did like getting towelled off so I hid under Seamus’s towel whilst he was being dried.

To make up for it all we were both later awarded Best Behaved Dog Of The Day Prizes!

(unlike the next day when No Prizes were awarded because we were all Too Badly Behaved but there is no need nor space to go into all that sorry episode now…!)

1/9/11

I wonder if I’ll be seeing you all at the annual DAWGdogs Fun Day Dog Show on Sunday?

I hope so although I suspect that Helen will no doubt find many excuses have many good reasons not to take me.

The primary reason I suppose, is that I’d win all of the events and the other dogs would get jealous. Quite obviously I’d be the best at everything as I’m Top Dog.

Ahh! I can picture it now, bowing humbly on the podium whilst being showered with applause, rosettes, bonios and wolf-ette whistles from the adoring crowd, my broad shoulders hung with dozens of multi-coloured ribbons bearing such noble honours as:

The Best Dog Ever !
The Dog With The Most Bonios Ever !
The Most Handsome Dog Ever !
The Most Modest Dog Ever !
The Dog Who Barks The Loudest !
The Dog With The Cleanest Ears 2011 !
The Dog Who Looks Most Like Himself !
The Dog Who You Have Least Likelihood Of Getting To Wear Fancy Dress Without Sustaining A Nasty Bite !
The Dog Who Stole The Most Cakes From The Cake Stall 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 !
The Dog Who Has Just Caused The Most Destruction To The Agility Ring !
The Most Dastardly Dog Ever !
The Only Dog So Unhomeable That Helen Was Forced To Keep Him Herself !
The Dog Who Has Started The Most Fights !
The Dog Who Has Snaffled The Most Lunches That Didn’t Belong to Him!
The Dog Who Has To Wait Longest For His Dinner !
The Dog Who Has To Do The Most Chores !

Oh Dear Chores… that’s a point – if Helen does take me along I’ll probably be expected to work in my Security role, with my DAWGdog Security Hi-Viz vest on. Manning Dogging the gate, overseeing the parking, admitting my banned mates  for a Bonio under the paw when the coast is clear, turning away riff-raff, biting anyone I don’t like the look of, that sort of thing.

Hmmm,  I don’t fancy having to work all day, especially as it is on my Bin Day and I’ll have get up very early. Keep Sunday Special!

Spike will be going no doubt.
Spike always goes because he fawns a lot he is always very nice to all the other dogs and everyone who meets him and makes a fuss of them.

Smeagol Jackson will also no doubt be going so that people can see that he is far more friendly in the flesh than his photos would have you believe.
He might even meet someone who falls in love with him and offers him a home.
Actually Helen might ‘accidentally’ leave him behind for that very reason…..

Maybe we could set up a petition to make sure I can come along?

I bet if Mark was coming I’d be allowed to come to keep an eye on him and stop him getting into trouble whilst Helen was busy meeting people and dogs and judging events and handing out prizes and buying up all the cakes from the cake stall before anyone else gets there so that she can eat all of them herself again like she did last year.

Then again ….

if I’m left alone at the Rescue there will be lots to do…

My dinners and treats to scoff guard…!

The other dogs’ dinners and treats to scoff guard…!!

Helen’s dinners and treats to scoff guard…!!!

A blissful few hours of peace and quiet in
my big comfy bed without Spike and Jackson constantly hogging it…!

or actually even better …!!

A blissful few hours of peace and quiet in
Helen’s comfy bed whilst she’s guaranteed not to be able to catch me at it!!!

I’m rather looking forward to it all again now!

24/7/11

Bin Day is an event which I’m sure you all are used to by now, but have you ever actually stopped to think about it?

I have bin ( sorry! ) been thinking about it a lot this morning.
We are all used to the bin being emptied once a week and the council moaning over this and that which they will and won’t take if they feel like it despite the fact they’re paid to do so by us in the first place and perhaps it would be better for them to only empty it once a fortnight now as it would be easier for them but really it would be better all around if they only had to empty it once a year and then they could spend the rest of the time putting their feet up and drinking tea.

We know the rubbish now needs to be sorted into recyclable, non-recyclable and compostable but I bet most of you don’t know that it is my job to empty the bins out at the Rescue. Oh yes I get all the posh jobs me, sometimes I think Helen would even have me cleaning up my own poo if she could !!

For some reason lost in the mists of time Bin Day at the Rescue has always been on Sunday, so this morning, just like every Sunday morning I’ve had to do the bins.
No chance of a nice lie-in for me at the weekend, oh no! No breakfast in bed for poor old Mutley, no ” I’ll just have a nice snooze for ten more minutes and then perhaps another cup of tea before I get up “.
So today I deliberately made a lot of noise about it, banging the bin and repeatedly calling out ” Keep Sunday Special !!” in a loud voice to vent my frustration and make Helen feel guilty about making me do such a demeaning job on what should be my Day Of Rest.
I must have struck a raw nerve, because when she came down ( to get more tea!! can you believe it?!!! ) instead of thanking me for doing such a good job so early in the morning, she seemed as cross as she always is on Bin Day.

I’ll never understand why she’s always in a bad mood whenever she gets up on Sunday mornings…

10/7/11

Today I must admit that I’m rather surprised to find that my Diaries are so popular that everyone and their dog in the whole world are Pat is eagerly awaiting my next instalment!

So as you join me out on my walk on this lovely summers Sunday I suggest that we take our ease and I’ll tell you what’s on my mind.

Are you sitting comfortably?

Then I’ll begin..

Since I’m now on the internet more these days I’m still amazed at what can be found on it. Obviously all dogs, especially young pups need to be careful when waterskiing surfing the internet that they don’t accidentally click on anything that might lead them to a page containing a picture ( or even worse still a video) of a cat. This can lead to an Instantly Bitten Computer and a Stern Telling Off Later.

But despite these dangers there are some Very Interesting Things to be found whilst nosing around online. Since today I don’t intend to do a fat lot more than sit here in the forest and later perhaps have a snooze I don’t expect that will make very entertaining reading for my fans, so instead I’ll share with you some of the Interesting Things I’ve found this week on t’interweb.

Obviously, the thing on my mind most apart from ” When is Helen going to give me my dinner” and “Can I start a fight with that person  and/or their dog without getting told off?” is Bonios. I’m a Bonio connoisseur, a collector, an expert obsessive and yet even I find new things to obsessively hassle, moan, grumble, talk and bark about until Helen finally gives in politely mention to Helen that I would rather like if it would not be to much trouble and my pocket money can stretch to them this week.

My favourite web page at the moment is this one:

http://tinleybarn.co.uk/bonio.htm

because of this:

I ABSOLUTELY MUST HAVE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE would be rather partial to one of these

I have been staring at this for the past three days could watch this for hours!

Then I discovered the following on ebay – a bonio shaped tin!!

and then another one!

and instantly my Boniosense noticed that the two were different!

This got me so excited that even to think about it now makes me start drooling again! (Excuse me a moment whilst I wipe my mush) How many more could there be? Are they full of bonios? Why haven’t I got both of these already? Is it my birthday soon?*

Unfortunately both auctions had ended ( Sorry for being in a bit of a bad mood about this yesterday everyone ) but I’m appealing to all of you to keep a look out at car boot sales and the sort of shops where Helen seems to spend aaaaaaaaaaaaaages rummaging when I’m are waiting impatiently outside for my dinner.

Then I found this photo of an abandoned farmhouse in the Brecon Beacons!

source and copyright : http://www.flickr.com/photos/58917176@N00/5685024808/in/photostream/

How incredible is that?! That beautiful old Bonio box just left to rot and decay like that! It is such a shame! I want Helen to take me there right away and rescue it!

I could spend all day sharing these marvels with you and I know you’re all as fascinated by them as I am but I’m getting a bit peckish so I’ll just offer up one more:

An answer to that oft-asked question ” Are Bonios today smaller than I remember them being when I was a pup?”

http://www.aminiaturemarvel.com/details.asp?productid=1463

Right! All this talk of Bonios has got me hungry so I’m off to scold Helen, but please let me know if you are aware of any other Interesting Bonio Things or can share with me your own online bonio hunting adventures!!

* Don’t worry I’ll let you all know when my birthday is coming so that you’ll have plenty of time to buy me nice bonio things!

UPDATE 24/7/11
Foot Paw note:
I’d like to thank everyone who has provided me with New And Interesting Bonio-related Items to search for,
particularly Kasey who sent me details of this wonderful Bonio-shaped food bowl with a special section for Safe Snack Storage to prevent ones Bonio falling into the water bowl and becoming soggy before one is ready for it!

26/5/11

Hello again all!

This time of year all dogs with any sense, and quite a lot with none, who live near the sea love to go to the beach.

There is something so satisfying about stretching out on the hot sand, having a snooze, getting too hot, having a paddle or a swim, getting too cold, and then having a snooze in the sun to warm up again.

Helen does this a lot whilst I prefer to dig sand all over people covered in sun-cream!

Dogs also like doing these things and especially as I’ve become a more mature dog I’ve really started to appreciate the finer points of living near the beach;

Lolling in my deckchair, sipping cool lemonade through a straw with my sunglasses on, or maybe even enjoying having an ice-cream if Helen will go oblige and fetch one,  breathing in the salty sea air and distant smells of  someone’s-food-not-too-far-away-to be-investigated-when-Helen-is not-looking.

At times like these even my blasted muzzle can be imagined to be a designer fashion accessory worn by a discerning fellow to prevent a Dog About Town getting his nose sunburnt.

Of course there are drawbacks; the angry shouting about Which Dog Stole The Small Child’s Ball, the inevitable holiday snaps featuring one in a compromising position with someone else’s sandwiches, the lack of privacy when one is caught short unless one goes in the sea, the sand going up your muzzle when you try and pick up things you’ve been told to leave well alone and amongst these I count my companion Spike and his incessant barking, here captured on cctv footage whilst I was just trying to chill out and be sociable to The World At Large as usual.

I can’t work out why he is always so noisy whenever we go to the beach. You’ll see that I have a devil of a time trying to shut him up…

Starring:

Mutley

as

The Hero ( lead role although he’s not got his lead on)

Co-starring:

Spike

as

The Villain

none speaking parts:

Smeagol Jackson

as

Jackson Smeagol The Seaweed Hoarder

and introducing:

Bramble

as

The Well-Behaved One

A boniosaremyobsession Production

not featuring :

Mark

as

The One Who Is Going To Get Grief From Helen For Writing Out The Above Credits You Can Be Sure Of That Oh Yes Especially For What He’s Put About Spike and Smeagol Jackson!

14/6/11

Well, well well!

Who’d have thought it, I now have my own online diary!

This has come about because Mark is In Big Trouble with Helen.
He’s in trouble because I wanted to do an update which mentioned the bane of my life my good friend Spike.

Spike is the other permanent resident of the Rescue who has reached the hallowed status of becoming one of Helen’s own dogs and having a star collar.
At the time I was thinking of this, Spike was enjoying playing with one of his favourite toys – a large red rubber ring, which he constantly worries at and savages for being All-Kinds-Of-Imaginary-Snake-like-Creatures.

So anyway I suggested to Mark about writing a ‘Lord Of The Rings’ themed update, with me being Lord Of The Bonios because I’m obsessed by Bonios and like to order people around by demanding they feed me whenever I’m a bit peckish, Spike having the ring, and hence being Frodo ( because he is also much smaller than me and so to me is of hobbit-sized proportions and also because he has hairy feet ).

All was going well with this idea until Mark suggested with much mirth that Jackson could be Smeagol, on account of him looking rather like him.
Helen took great affront at this on Smeagols Jacksons behalf and my latest update was banned, censored, removed, evicted and generally forcibly done away with pronto.

Helen would also have liked to have confiscated Mark’s dinner like she often does with mine for good measure but since we live in Poole and he lives in the Far North somewhere up near the Arctic Circle Birmingham this wasn’t possible.

So instead my ‘updates’ are being removed from Smeagols Jacksons page and placed in my own Diary and Mark is forbidden from ever referring to Smeagol Jackson as Smeagol Jackson ever again no matter how funny he thinks it is to do so to wind Helen up.

Which it does.

Very much indeed.

5/6/11

Hello again. In the interests of giving you all more information about Jackson so that I can get the end of my bed back that he can find a good home, I’ll let you all know ( since it isn’t on here already as Helen was trying to keep it a secret so that she could keep him herself “didn’t think it was important to mention it” ) that Jackson is a shar pei cross.
I must admit I didn’t realise this at first and thought that he’d just stayed in the bath too long and gone a bit wrinkly.
I’m sure I’d go all wrinkly if I stayed in the bath for too long, so I always make sure to run off and pretend to be deaf whenever it looks like Helen is thinking it might soon be bath-time to not over-stay my welcome during bath-time visits.

I thought that maybe we could cure Jackson’s wrinkly shar pei bits with a foot-pump as he reminds me of a balloon which is becoming deflated.
Perhaps instead of growing up, he’s getting smaller, like my mid-day meal always seems to.
Perhaps when he was younger there was a sale on and he bought a larger coat than was necessary, hoping to grow into it. He ought to go and ask them for a refund if you ask me, it is hardly Stay-Pressed.
I suppose he’s lost the receipt though else would have done that ages ago.
Young ‘uns don’t always realise the wisdom of always keeping their receipts.
I’ve kept all my old-Bonio receipts of course. I even buy old Bonio receipts off ebay and at car-boot sales when Helen is not looking. They are all filed chronologically in two-hundred and thirty-seven box-files in the back of Helen’s attic.
Helen doesn’t actually realise that is why she sometimes complains about having far less space than she thought that she used to have.
I think I’m safe for the moment though, she is On The Phone.
Helen is On The Phone so much talking to everyone about Dogs that I can quite understand why it is colloquially known as The-Dog-And-Bone.
I’d like to be known to the world as The-Dog-And-Bonios..

I’d also personally like to thank Pat who popped round the other day and brought us all presents after reading about us on the website.

She brought me some Bonios for my Pension Plan!!!!

She also brought toys for Jackson and the others
Thank you very much indeed, Pat, that was very kind of you, I’m much obliged!

30/5/11

Good news, my last report seems not to have incurred the wrath of the censor and she let me have my dinner (eventually).
Well I don’t know how but Dogs-About-Town seem to have got the impression that I’m often rather sleepy.
I don’t know how this has happened and I’m determined to put this right.
Lots of photos are A photo is circulating t’interweb pupporting to show me and Jackson snoring.
#Mark:please put that bally awfully embarrassing pic of me Helen took at this point in me narrative, if you would, Ta#

Now I’d like for everyone to notice the flash relecting off my eye, dazzling me mightily,
and causing me to see blobs and blotches of afterimage for ages afterwards. Thanks Helen.
The point I’m making is that if my eye is open, I’m awake,
and if I’m awake then I’m not asleep
and if I’m not asleep then I can’t possibly be snoring , can I?
Exactly.

So even if Jackson does sometimes snore enough for the both of us then that’s no reason not to offer him a home.
The fact that as you can clearly see he snores on my bed is a perfect reason that you must offer him a home immediately.
By my bed in the photo you can see my stuff: books, photos, momentos and the like.
Things Dogs Acquire Over Time.
My favorite books are on the bottom shelf for easy bedtime reading.
They are a present Helen got me many years ago for biting someone who defending her.
They are a full 21 volume set of first edition leatherbound copies of that most coveted work:

The Fully Illustrated Encyclopedia Of Bonios,

signed to frontispiece by Lord Bonio himself.

Well the thing is, I always used to love looking at this before going off to sleep of an evening, as it helps me have wonderful Bonio-filled dreams.
And when Jackson first came to stay with us he wasn’t feeling very well, so it seemed the right thing to let him sleep on the end of my bed and I’d read him Bedtime Bonio stories.
The Trouble IS, youngsters these days haven’t the stamina for some reason.
Whenever I start reading, he’s always nodded off and is snoring away before I’ve even got to the end of reading him the Foreword, Preface, Introduction by Lord Bonio and the first 100 pages of Volume One.
And once he’s asleep I can’t reach the other volumes and can hardly wake him up can I?
So over the past few weeks I’m getting desperate to read the other volumes again.
I find myself worrying in the middle of the night about whether I might have forgotten some of the Bonios in volumes 19 and 20 , and whether the one I dreamt of last night was from page 433 of Volume XII or from page 253 from Volume XV?
It is starting the bother me, because perhaps my memory is not as sharp as it once was.

So please someone hurry up and get Jackson off my bed!!!!!!!!! consider giving lovely Jackson a home and think of his snores as endearing and not the sort that rattle your photos off your shelves so that they bounce off your head in the middle of the night and you think that there’s been a blooming earthquake!!!!!!!!!

24/5/11

Helen found out about our earlier reports and both me and Mark who does the website were in Quite A Lot Of Trouble.
So I’ve got to tone it down a bit and Mark is going to help edit it so we don’t get sued. he doesn’t get an irate phone call and I don’t get my dinner confiscated.
I’m quite getting to like this ‘blogging’ malarkey and might have to ask Mark if I can have my own ‘Mutley’s Diary’ section like Dooley.
Then again I’m rather an old dog and this is rather a new trick…
However, I’m not old enough to be pensioned off yet so huge thanks to everyone who gave me all those yummy bonios last month, they were very tasty! had the wisdom and foresight to invest their bonios in my Pension Plan for their future.
Anyway, moving quickly on…. about Jackson…
A new spy photo of him has been taken whilst he, Spike and I were all hard at work helping Helen at her allotment on Saturday.
I say ‘spy photo’ because I’m in it and I certainly don’t remember it being taken!
It shows us hard at work waiting for the water to be added to what obviously must be our new padding pool. It will be great to have one as such hot days inevitably cause one to become rather dozy dusty after luncheon.
As you can see in the photo, Helen had placed lots of things onto the lovely warm black bed black plastic sheeting to weight it down to stop the wind blowing it away until it was filled up with water. We volunteered to have a kip on it helpfully helped weight it down too.
We waited all afternoon in fact but Helen never did fill it up.
Later ( some time seems to have elasped here and I can’t remember how ) I woke up I was going to ask Helen to hurry up and fill up the pool but she seemed busy with the plants and muttering why we didn’t help her with the digging, so I didn’t mention it.
Best not too I thought, after all, I was up ( in principle at any rate ) to helping with the digging but Spike and Jackson seemed quite sleepy for some reason.
Let sleeping dogs lie, I always tell people say.
Anyway the whole point of this ramble report is to say that in the photo you can see that Jackson is now sporting a very natty matching-jacket-and-trouser-ensemble like all the other youngsters these days.

Now when I were a lad…..

*zzzz*