itshouldnthappentoadogwalker

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

Boo pretending to be guarding the back garden!!

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

WE’RE BACK!!!!  BIGGER (that’s probably due to my chocolate addiction!) AND BETTER (hopefully!).

It’s great to be back at work, after the Government lifted the restrictions in England regarding “professional” dog care, including dog walking and dog grooming.  It’s been over 2 months and I’ve cleaned my house from top to bottom and bottom to top, I’ve even been working in the garden!  However, I must admit I’ve been putting off tackling the attic and the garage, mostly because of the spiders!!  In particular, the attic looks like a set from “Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom!”.  Not only that, there are some big Ninja spiders up there, not the normal small house spiders, the type that don’t back off when you approach them, in fact they start coming towards you!!  I even considered rigging up a small hoist so I could get Boo up in the attic as back up but even I didn’t think that was fair on Boo but it was a close call. 

On my very first walk back at work with Ben and Kali last week I was stopped by my friend Eddie who asked where I’d been over the last couple of months?  I replied, “nowhere”.  He looked puzzled and asked me how I’d managed to get out of the country?  I was puzzled his remark,  “Eddie, did you hear what I said?  I’ve been nowhere!”.  Then the penny dropped and a dim light bulb went off in my brain!!  Eddie was obviously trying to be funny!!  “Okay buddy, what are you getting at?”. I could see by his expression he was pleased with himself!  Eddie  replied, “Well, if you’d tried harder at school and paid attention in the geography lessons you’d know, like I do, that there is in fact a place called Nowhere and it’s located in Oklahoma in the good old US of A”.  Had to be in the States, I thought!  “Okay Eddie, I’ll give you that one!!”.  But not wanting to be outdone, I asked Eddie (who happens to be Scottish) “If he’d heard of the Scotsman who’d been giving away £50 notes to the English, Welsh and Irish?”  Eddie replied, “No”, I simply looked at him and said, “Me neither!” and walked off.  I reckon that was a one all draw!!

This installment is really to let all my followers (by that, I mean my youngest daughter Tor) know that I’m back working with Caroline and that we’re both looking forward to walking and looking all the dogs that are put into our cares.  Whilst I’ve been cleaning the house, working in the garden and fighting spiders Caroline has been really busy and productive, not only has she completed and passed a number of “dog care” courses, including one on dog psychology.  Caroline believes this particular course may prove very useful when owners actually go back to work and their dogs are left on their own, after almost 3 months were the dogs have become used to their owners being in the house 24/7.  She also took delivery of a grooming pod last week.  This is a purposes built pod for dog grooming, it even has a built in bath and hairdryer and is big enough to live in!!  It had to be put in situ by crane.  This entailed the pod being lifted over Caroline’s house and dropped (not literally) into the back garden.  

Caroline has already used the new pod, as there are a lot of dogs in Northleach who desperately need their coats grooming, almost as many as ladies who need to go to the hairdressers and gentlemen too!!! 

As you’d expect a lot of people have been walking their own dogs during the lockdown, as a result of the restrictions placed on dog walkers and the spare time they found themselves with.  It was great to see so many dogs out with their owners.  Dogs are like children in a number of ways!  Like children, the most valuable things you can give your pet are your love and your time.  However, you can see from this photo that some dog owners haven’t quite mastered the “art” of dog walking.  Let’s just call the guy Pete, for namesake and his dog, Rolo.  Obviously, Pete went out with Rolo with the intention of having an enjoyable walk for both of them but look carefully at the photo, the head collar is around Pete’s head and the lead dangling aimlessly in front of him!  It just cries out, “Help!”, like an unfolding nightmare or as I like to describe it, “Dog Owner in Distress!” or DOD for short.  

But don’t worry Pete, help in always close at hand and you can call us to get help for yourself and Rolo anytime.  So if you feel you or your dog need help, you know where we are.  Actually, I think I might have been a DOD myself on one of my walks with Boo but you’ll have to be the judge of that!  Boo and I were out on a walk over the weekend when we stopped on a bridge to take in the scenery, have a rest and a drink and for Boo to have the odd biscuit or 2.  I poured Boo’s water into his bowl and gave him a biscuit.  I really should have seen this coming but Boo was caught in 2 minds, he was very thirsty but he also wanted the biscuit!  He decided to try and have both!  But all he succeeded in doing was drop the biscuit into the water.  Boo was not to be beaten and before I could offer assistance he tried to get the biscuit out of the bowl using his paw but in doing so, he not only turned the bowl over but he knocked my walking stick into the river.  A small group of people were watching us with some interest.  Fortunately, I managed to scramble down the bank and retrieve my stick without getting wet.  Now back on the bridge, I topped up Boo’s bowl with water but after a couple slurps Boo’s interest turned to the remaining biscuits in the rucksack.  Boo was so determined to get to them that he got his head and front paws stuck in the bag and because he couldn’t see where he was going he almost fell off the bridge and into the river!!  I was shouting at Boo “down”, “down Boo!!”  There was panic in my voice and just when I thought he was going to fall off the bridge he went down but he was still stuck in rucksack.  The group of people were now laughing at his antics, so I decided to beat a hasty retreat!  I pulled Boo out of the rucksack and picked up his bowl of water to throw it into the river.  However, not being a sea fairing man (otherwise I would have joined the Royal Navy) I forget to take note which way the wind was blowing!!  I throw the water into the air and watched as it blew straight back over me, cold water with a hint of dog saliva and soggy biscuit crumbs.  Having typed this story I think this was a DOD!! 

Now I’d like to finish off my reminding all dog walkers of the need to take responsibility for their dog and its’ actions, particularly at this time of year when there are a lot of sheep and cows in the field with their young.  It is very important that you keep your dog on a lead when you’re waling through a field with these animals.  A farmer is quite within his legal rights to shoot a dog that is worrying or actually chasing his stock.  There are plenty of signs on gates reminding owners to keep their dog under control and on a lead, so there’s no defence saying to the farmer, “this is the first time it’s happened!” or “I didn’t know I had to keep my dog on a lead!”.  I’m afraid that if you’re actually talking to a farmer it’s probably too late for his animals or your dog!.  Not only that, please respect the farmer’s land, keep to the footpaths, bridleways and rights of way.  Please lock all the gates after you have gone through them, even if there are no animals in the field.  I always take a plastic shopping bag with me, to pick up any bottles or cans I find along the way.  The vast majority of people do take their rubbish home but a small mindless minority leave it scattered over the fields, which is dangerous to animals and humans alike.  A cow can easily smash a bottle in the grass and injure itself, in the same way that a child running across the field can fall on the broken glass.  It’s just common sense really, take your rubbish home.  Right, that’s my “soap box” address over.

Now, have you heard the one about the 3 legged dog that walked into a Wild West bar and said, “I’m looking for the man who shot my paw!”.

I hope you enjoyed this installment.  The next is entitled, “I Counted Them Out And I Counted Them All Back”.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

Boo making sure he gets to watch his programmes tonight!

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

As you can see, this waterfall certainly isn't in the same league as Victoria Falls or even Niagara Falls!!

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

“With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility” or in my case “With Dog Walking Comes Great Responsibility”

As it’s the 1st April, April Fools Day, I was prepared for some practical jokes being played on me but clearly with the current restrictions and self isolation I thought I’d be pretty safe this year but Boo had other ideas!!  Yesterday I worked on this installment for almost 4 hours and whilst it needed some minor tweaking, it was almost the finished article.  So you can imagine by surprise when I turned on the computer and the whole chapter, with accompanying photos had vanished, disappeared, been lost in the ether!  As the Welsh would say, “There was my chapter, gone!”  I must admit I did suspect that Boo was playing an April Fools Day joke on me but he hasn’t got that sort of sense of humour.  I thinks it’s a case of, “to err is human but to screw it up you need a computer and you forget to use the save icon before you close down your computer!!

Okay, here we go again!  Where is that bloody “save icon?”

Hands up if you know who is accredited with saying the following phrase “With Great Power Comes Great Responsibilty” first?  If you thought it was Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben in the film “Spiderman”, you’d be wrong!  I thought it was him but it turns out to be Voltaire, so 10 points if you knew the answer.  I should have tried harder at school!!  Our own Winston Churchill was famous for his quotes and he nearly had it when he said, “The price of greatness is responsibilty”  but my favourite quote by the “Great” man is, “I may be drunk Miss but in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly!”  God, don’t you wish you’d said to someone?

Right, I decided it would be useful if we all understood the definitions of “responsibilty” as described in The Mini Oxford School Dictionary.  This dictionary was actually used by my eldest daughter Emily at Dauntsey’s School.  She has decorated the dictionary with stars, the Moon, a funny face (think this was her first attempt of a self portrait, needs more work Em!) and has written her name in several places in the dictionary but what is worrying is that she also wrote, “Keep Out” and I’m not sure why?  Anyway, there are 2 definitions of the word;

1.  The state or fact of having a duty to deal with something or having control over someone or something (In my case, the “something” refers to the dogs but I’m pretty sure no one has told them that I’m supposed to have control of them!!).

2.  The state or fact of being accountable and having to take the blame if something goes wrong, in other words “The buck stops with you!”.

So there you have it, as a dog walker you have a duty of care for the dogs, you have sole control of the dogs, you and you alone are accountable for their actions and if something goes wrong you are to blame!  Given all this, why do I like dog walking so much?  It’s simple, I enjoy the challenge of trying to impose my “will” over the dogs and bring order to a potentially disfunctional group!  That’s complete bollocks and you all know it!!  I do it because I like being out in the fresh, walking some nice dogs in the lovely countryside in and around Northleach.

I quickly realised when I started walking dogs that to many owners their dog is much more than just a pet!  The dog or dogs are an intrinsic part of the family.  This status of a dog can change dramatically if the children leave home.  In some extreme cases the dog might be catapulted into the status of “child substitute”.  This means that when you take a dog out, you might as well be taking out a new born baby and “God Help You” if something happens to that dog!!  

Isn’t it funny how we react to looking after other people’s children or animals, as opposed to our own children and pets.  I can remember dropping Tor on her head when she was a small baby (sorry Tor, this probably explains why you like watching F1 motor racing!).  As for my other daughter Emily, she had an unfortunate accident when she was 18 months old and we were living in Cyprus.  We’d been out for a walk and because of the strength of the sun the pushchair was fiited with a large white sun parasol.  We’d enjoyed a lovely walk and as we came down the side of the house towards the back garden I repostioned the parasol to keep the sun off Em’s head, as it directly behind us.  If you can imagine in your mind’s eye, the parasol was now in an upright position, resembling the sail of a yacht but obviously not the same size!.  I carefully parked the pushchair at the top of the stairs that went down into the garden.  I wanted to make sure it was safe for us to go into the garden, as that morning a large swarm of hornets had decided to set up home in a hedge in our back garden but fortunately they’d gone.  I turned round to go and get Em.  From that moment everything seemed to happen in slow motion.  A gust of wind came from nowhere and hit the parasol with sufficient strength to start the pushchair rolling towards the stairs, some idiot had forgotten to put the brakes on and I was that idiot!!  I could see what was about to happen and despite a heroic dive (my discription of the dive, definitely not Em’s) I failed to stop the pushchair bouncing down the stairs.  It finished up on the concrete footpath with Em face down!  All you could see were her little legs and arms sticking out from under the pushchair, like a little starfish.  What struck me immediately was that Em hadn’t made a sound as the pushchair crashed down the stairs or even when she hit the ground.  Oh My God, I’ve killed my daughter!!  As I picked up the pushchair and took her out of the harness I noticed that the colour of her face was going from pink to red and then from red to crimson!  What could this mean?  I tell you what it meant, Em was taking air into her lungs, enough to let out a scream so loud our next door neighbours thought someone had been attacked, so they called the police!  Fortunately, Em was unhurt but everytime I took her out, she would say, “Naughty Daddy forgot to put the brakes on!”  There you go again, responsibility for one’s daughter’s safety, accountability and blame!  But interestingly, as these incidents related to my own daughters they were soon forgotten, by me away!  Even looking after other people’s children doesn’t have the same responsiblity or worry as looking after someones beloved “pet”.  Let’s face it, if your friends have several children and something happens to one of them you’re looking after, it’s not the end of the world, as they still have a few others but if you let something happen to that one dog, it’s worse than the end of the world!!  That’s why a dog walker will risk almost everything to safeguard the dogs in his charge, as these 2 stories will show you.

I was taking 2 dogs for a walk one morning in Northleach.  I’d already collected Sapphire, a lovely black Cockerpoo and we were on our way to pick up Polly, a Springer Spanial and another lovely dog but bigger and much stronger than Sapphire.  Polly is a lively dog and she has a tendancy to pull at the start of her walk, simply because she is so excited and happy about being out for a walk.  Anyway, as we left the house and were walking down the driveway, Polly took off and started to pull me down the driveway, she’s done this before so it wasn’t a surprise but I didn’t count on Sapphire joining in and I was taken offguard!!  The 2 dogs were pulling me down the slopping driveway towards the road!  Now I weigh just over 15 stone but with Polly and Sapphire pulling hard, downward slope of the driveway and the wind behind my back (okay the wind wasn’t behind my back!) we were heading towards the road and there were cars going in both directions.  I had to think fast, thinking is fairly difficult for me, thinking fast might be too much to ask!  It was just then I saw in the corner of my eye something green, it was a bush and without thinking of my own safety I threw myself into it!  It worked, the dogs came to an abrupt halt, yards away from the road.  However, we weren’t out of danger yet, as the driver of an oncoming car  must have witnessed the whole thing and he was laughing so much that he almost lost control of the vehicle and only just avoided mounting the kerb and running his car into the bush, where yours trully was still stuck!  There you have it, control, responsibilty and ultimately blame.  That’s dog walking for you!

My other story involves 3 dogs, Roxy a lovely young Cocker Spanial, Shaun a mature Lab and Petal, a nice Collie. I’d picked up Roxy in Northleach and driven across to a nearby village to pick up the other dogs.  There are a lot of interesting walks in and around this particular village and I’d discovered this lovely walk, on a good pathway alongside a stream.  The walk would even take us through a small woooded area and all dogs like somewhere with a lot of trees!!.  Roxy, Shaun and Petal are all well behaved dogs and are allowed off their leads, when it is safe to do so.  We went through the gate and I let the dogs off their leads to run free.  They all get on really well and I thought this was going to be an enjoyable and uneventful walk, how wrong I was!  We’d been walking for about 15 minutes when Roxy decided it was time for a swim!  Springers love the water and Roxy is no exception, the problem was that she was probably used to the River Leach which runs through Northleach.  I call it a river and it is but it resembles a slow moving stream, it’s normally no more than about 2ft deep and spans about 4ft from bank to bank at its’widest point.  The stream that Roxy had decided to jump into was about 5ft deep, with a span on about 10ft and was running at over 10 knots!!  Roxy was swept downstream in front of my eyes and I powerless to do anything about it!  I could see you was struggling to get out of the water.  Bloody hell, now what do I do?  My mind was racing and I could feel myself starting to panic!  I had to pull myself together, no mean feat, when you’re on your own, you have one dog being swept downstream and 2 dogs running free in the wood!  I decided to go after Roxy and called Petal and Shaun to follow me and they did, Thank God!  Roxy was still in sight but she was gaining speed and being swept further downstream.  I could see she was trying to get out of the water but the current was fast and strong and the banks quite high.  Well, duty of care, control, responsibility and blame are all a part of a dog walker’s life!  I decided there was no alternative but to go in after Roxy!  It wasn’t an easy decision to make, as I can’t swim!  Actually, I can swim but don’t you think it was far more dramatic for you to think I couldn’t swim!  Just as I was about to jump into the stream Roxy managed to get out of the water and scrambled up the bank and we were all reunited.  I almost cried, it was such a relief to see Roxy safe and no worse for wear!  .

I hope you can see that whilst dog walking may look easy, particularly if you see a dog walker in a T shirt and shorts, on a lovely sunny day, walking a couple of well behaved dogs through the beautiful Cotswold countryside. It’s almost an Idyllic scene I hear you say but in reality dog walking isn’t an easy job and I can testify to that.  Since helping Caroline, I have a new respect for all dog walkers because, “With Dog Walking Comes Great Responsibility”.

I really hope you enjoyed reading this chapter.  The next installment is entitled, “I Counted Them Out And I Counted Them Back”.  I hope reading my Blog makes you laugh, we all need more laughter in our lives in these challenging times.  So, take care and stay safe, healthy and positive.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

“With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility” or in my case “With Dog Walking Comes Great Responsibility”

As it’s the 1st April, April Fools Day, I was prepared for some practical jokes being played on me but clearly with the current restrictions and self isolation I thought I’d be pretty safe this year but Boo had other ideas!!  Yesterday I worked on this installment for almost 4 hours and whilst it needed some minor tweaking, it was almost the finished article.  So you can imagine by surprise when I turned on the computer and the whole chapter, with accompanying photos had vanished, disappeared, been lost in the ether!  As the Welsh would say, “There was my chapter, gone!”  I must admit I did suspect that Boo was playing an April Fools Day joke on me but he hasn’t got that sort of sense of humour.  I thinks it’s a case of, “to err is human but to screw it up you need a computer and you forget to use the save icon before you close down your computer!!

Okay, here we go again!  Where is that bloody “save icon?”

Hands up if you know who is accredited with saying the following phrase “With Great Power Comes Great Responsibilty” first?  If you thought it was Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben in the film “Spiderman”, you’d be wrong!  I thought it was him but it turns out to be Voltaire, so 10 points if you knew the answer.  I should have tried harder at school!!  Our own Winston Churchill was famous for his quotes and he nearly had it when he said, “The price of greatness is responsibilty”  but my favourite quote by the “Great” man is, “I may be drunk Miss but in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly!”  God, don’t you wish you’d said to someone?

Right, I decided it would be useful if we all understood the definitions of “responsibilty” as described in The Mini Oxford School Dictionary.  This dictionary was actually used by my eldest daughter Emily at Dauntsey’s School.  She has decorated the dictionary with stars, the Moon, a funny face (think this was her first attempt of a self portrait, needs more work Em!) and has written her name in several places in the dictionary but what is worrying is that she also wrote, “Keep Out” and I’m not sure why?  Anyway, there are 2 definitions of the word;

1.  The state or fact of having a duty to deal with something or having control over someone or something (In my case, the “something” refers to the dogs but I’m pretty sure no one has told them that I’m supposed to have control of them!!).

2.  The state or fact of being accountable and having to take the blame if something goes wrong, in other words “The buck stops with you!”.

So there you have it, as a dog walker you have a duty of care for the dogs, you have sole control of the dogs, you and you alone are accountable for their actions and if something goes wrong you are to blame!  Given all this, why do I like dog walking so much?  It’s simple, I enjoy the challenge of trying to impose my “will” over the dogs and bring order to a potentially disfunctional group!  That’s complete bollocks and you all know it!!  I do it because I like being out in the fresh, walking some nice dogs in the lovely countryside in and around Northleach.

I quickly realised when I started walking dogs that to many owners their dog is much more than just a pet!  The dog or dogs are an intrinsic part of the family.  This status of a dog can change dramatically if the children leave home.  In some extreme cases the dog might be catapulted into the status of “child substitute”.  This means that when you take a dog out, you might as well be taking out a new born baby and “God Help You” if something happens to that dog!!  

Isn’t it funny how we react to looking after other people’s children or animals, as opposed to our own children and pets.  I can remember dropping Tor on her head when she was a small baby (sorry Tor, this probably explains why you like watching F1 motor racing!).  As for my other daughter Emily, she had an unfortunate accident when she was 18 months old and we were living in Cyprus.  We’d been out for a walk and because of the strength of the sun the pushchair was fiited with a large white sun parasol.  We’d enjoyed a lovely walk and as we came down the side of the house towards the back garden I repostioned the parasol to keep the sun off Em’s head, as it directly behind us.  If you can imagine in your mind’s eye, the parasol was now in an upright position, resembling the sail of a yacht but obviously not the same size!.  I carefully parked the pushchair at the top of the stairs that went down into the garden.  I wanted to make sure it was safe for us to go into the garden, as that morning a large swarm of hornets had decided to set up home in a hedge in our back garden but fortunately they’d gone.  I turned round to go and get Em.  From that moment everything seemed to happen in slow motion.  A gust of wind came from nowhere and hit the parasol with sufficient strength to start the pushchair rolling towards the stairs, some idiot had forgotten to put the brakes on and I was that idiot!!  I could see what was about to happen and despite a heroic dive (my discription of the dive, definitely not Em’s) I failed to stop the pushchair bouncing down the stairs.  It finished up on the concrete footpath with Em face down!  All you could see were her little legs and arms sticking out from under the pushchair, like a little starfish.  What struck me immediately was that Em hadn’t made a sound as the pushchair crashed down the stairs or even when she hit the ground.  Oh My God, I’ve killed my daughter!!  As I picked up the pushchair and took her out of the harness I noticed that the colour of her face was going from pink to red and then from red to crimson!  What could this mean?  I tell you what it meant, Em was taking air into her lungs, enough to let out a scream so loud our next door neighbours thought someone had been attacked, so they called the police!  Fortunately, Em was unhurt but everytime I took her out, she would say, “Naughty Daddy forgot to put the brakes on!”  There you go again, responsibility for one’s daughter’s safety, accountability and blame!  But interestingly, as these incidents related to my own daughters they were soon forgotten, by me away!  Even looking after other people’s children doesn’t have the same responsiblity or worry as looking after someones beloved “pet”.  Let’s face it, if your friends have several children and something happens to one of them you’re looking after, it’s not the end of the world, as they still have a few others but if you let something happen to that one dog, it’s worse than the end of the world!!  That’s why a dog walker will risk almost everything to safeguard the dogs in his charge, as these 2 stories will show you.

I was taking 2 dogs for a walk one morning in Northleach.  I’d already collected Sapphire, a lovely black Cockerpoo and we were on our way to pick up Polly, a Springer Spanial and another lovely dog but bigger and much stronger than Sapphire.  Polly is a lively dog and she has a tendancy to pull at the start of her walk, simply because she is so excited and happy about being out for a walk.  Anyway, as we left the house and were walking down the driveway, Polly took off and started to pull me down the driveway, she’s done this before so it wasn’t a surprise but I didn’t count on Sapphire joining in and I was taken offguard!!  The 2 dogs were pulling me down the slopping driveway towards the road!  Now I weigh just over 15 stone but with Polly and Sapphire pulling hard, downward slope of the driveway and the wind behind my back (okay the wind wasn’t behind my back!) we were heading towards the road and there were cars going in both directions.  I had to think fast, thinking is fairly difficult for me, thinking fast might be too much to ask!  It was just then I saw in the corner of my eye something green, it was a bush and without thinking of my own safety I threw myself into it!  It worked, the dogs came to an abrupt halt, yards away from the road.  However, we weren’t out of danger yet, as the driver of an oncoming car  must have witnessed the whole thing and he was laughing so much that he almost lost control of the vehicle and only just avoided mounting the kerb and running his car into the bush, where yours trully was still stuck!  There you have it, control, responsibilty and ultimately blame.  That’s dog walking for you!

My other story involves 3 dogs, Roxy a lovely young Cocker Spanial, Shaun a mature Lab and Petal, a nice Collie. I’d picked up Roxy in Northleach and driven across to a nearby village to pick up the other dogs.  There are a lot of interesting walks in and around this particular village and I’d discovered this lovely walk, on a good pathway alongside a stream.  The walk would even take us through a small woooded area and all dogs like somewhere with a lot of trees!!.  Roxy, Shaun and Petal are all well behaved dogs and are allowed off their leads, when it is safe to do so.  We went through the gate and I let the dogs off their leads to run free.  They all get on really well and I thought this was going to be an enjoyable and uneventful walk, how wrong I was!  We’d been walking for about 15 minutes when Roxy decided it was time for a swim!  Springers love the water and Roxy is no exception, the problem was that she was probably used to the River Leach which runs through Northleach.  I call it a river and it is but it resembles a slow moving stream, it’s normally no more than about 2ft deep and spans about 4ft from bank to bank at its’widest point.  The stream that Roxy had decided to jump into was about 5ft deep, with a span on about 10ft and was running at over 10 knots!!  Roxy was swept downstream in front of my eyes and I powerless to do anything about it!  I could see you was struggling to get out of the water.  Bloody hell, now what do I do?  My mind was racing and I could feel myself starting to panic!  I had to pull myself together, no mean feat, when you’re on your own, you have one dog being swept downstream and 2 dogs running free in the wood!  I decided to go after Roxy and called Petal and Shaun to follow me and they did, Thank God!  Roxy was still in sight but she was gaining speed and being swept further downstream.  I could see she was trying to get out of the water but the current was fast and strong and the banks quite high.  Well, duty of care, control, responsibility and blame are all a part of a dog walker’s life!  I decided there was no alternative but to go in after Roxy!  It wasn’t an easy decision to make, as I can’t swim!  Actually, I can swim but don’t you think it was far more dramatic for you to think I couldn’t swim!  Just as I was about to jump into the stream Roxy managed to get out of the water and scrambled up the bank and we were all reunited.  I almost cried, it was such a relief to see Roxy safe and no worse for wear!  .

I hope you can see that whilst dog walking may look easy, particularly if you see a dog walker in a T shirt and shorts, on a lovely sunny day, walking a couple of well behaved dogs through the beautiful Cotswold countryside. It’s almost an Idyllic scene I hear you say but in reality dog walking isn’t an easy job and I can testify to that.  Since helping Caroline, I have a new respect for all dog walkers because, “With Dog Walking Comes Great Responsibility”.

I really hope you enjoyed reading this chapter.  The next installment is entitled, “I Counted Them Out And I Counted Them Back”.  I hope reading my Blog makes you laugh, we all need more laughter in our lives in these challenging times.  So, take care and stay safe, healthy and positive.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

Battle of the Little Bighorn or more appropriately “Trotters Last Stand!”

Well, here we go again!  I’ve had 5 hits to date, given I’ve looked at my blog 4 times, I’m wondering who that 5th hit was by?  Hopefully, whoever looked at my blog did deliberately and not by mistake!  Before I relate “Trotters Last Stand” I have to admit that I’ve received some comments on my reference in my previous chapter to the game of golf.  I must admit I was surprised and somewhat saddened by some of the comments and if you are going to use foul language please check your spelling carefully or the meaning of the word is lost completely!  Many of my friends, sorry acquaintances (a person you know slightly), according to my mate Pete I don’t have any friends!!  Anyway, some of you will know that I started playing golf when I was 8 years old and I was lucky enough to represent the Royal Air Force on several occasions.  When I was stationed in Cyprus I was in the RAF Team that won the Inter-Services Golf Tournament 2 years running.  The Army team were so confident one year (cocky, I call it!!), their Captain asked if they could borrow the Cup, so they could and have a team photograph taken in front of the clubhouse whilst it was quiet!!  Now, I call that conceited, had to look that up in a dictionary!  Unfortunately, our team had other ideas and we beat the Army team by one point, the point being secured in the last game and on the last hole, right in front of the clubhouse!  It was like winning the Ryder Cup in America and if there’d been a lake on the course I would have jumped in it.  As it was, we just got ......!  Now, to set the records straight.  Golf is a great game to play and a great game to watch, if the paint has dried!  It’s full of fun and excitement, so if you have any heart problems or don’t like laughing out loud, golfs definitely not for you!

Okay, back to the blog.  Caroline is ex-Army and she believes in throwing you in at the deep end, which I think is more appropriate for personnel that have served in the Royal Navy, rather than an ex-RAF personnel!  Anyway, Caroline decided I could take out 4 dogs in the fields behind her house.  They were, Ben, Kali, Sapphire and Acorn.  I liked all the dogs but there was something about Acorn, that made him my favourite.  Acorn is a Springer Spaniel, I’ll say no more!! Fortunately, all the dogs were allowed off their leads and my job was to keep an eye on them whilst we walked across the fields.  It was a gloomy day but the rain had stopped and it looked as though we might stay dry.  Things were going reasonably well until I lost sight of Acorn!!  I didn’t panic, much!!  I called out his name.  After what seemed an eternity but was actually a few minutes Acorn’s head popped up from the long grass.  “Come here Acorn”, I shouted but he looked at me and then dropped to the ground.  However, he’d given away his position, so I walked over to where he was hiding, the other dogs were happily running around in the field.  When I found Acorn I could see he had something in his mouth.  It was the biggest pig’s trotter I’d ever seen!  “Drop it!!”, I yelled but Acorn looked up and I could tell there was no way he was going to surrender this “prize” that easily.  I managed to get him to sit up but he had a good grip on the trotter.  It was so big that the trotter stuck out on both sides of his jaw.  Several times I gave him the command to “drop” but it was like talking to one of my teenage daughters, a complete waste of time.  I decided I had to do something because the other 3 dogs had started to become very interested in what was going on and more worryingly what Acorn had in his mouth.  I grabbed the trotter on both sides of his jaw and pulled but there was no way Acorn was going to give up the trotter.  Anyway, I wasn’t going to give up either, so I kept pulling and Acorn held on as though his life depended on it.  Eventually, I had Acorn off the ground but not only did he not let go but I noticed his tail was wagging, this was becoming a game to him.  I started to lift him up and down but no way was he going to release the pigs trotter.  I then noticed a woman coming towards me with her dog.  “What are you doing?”  It was a simple question but I panicked and blurted back “Weight training!”  “What do you mean, weight training?”  “Well, I can’t afford a gym membership, so I come out with the dogs and use this pigs trotter and one of the dogs to work out” For good measure I lifted Acorn up and then down again.  The woman looked at me as though I’d come from Mars and walked off mumbling to herself but it sounded like “Shouldn’t be allowed out and those poor dogs!”  Poor dogs, what about me!!  I then remembered an RAF Police dog handler at RAF Bruggen giving a talk about getting things off dogs, particularly when they didn’t want to drop the object, food or dead animal!!  I remember he told us all you need to do is get a finger behind the object and gently touch the back of the dog’s throat.  This would make the dog wretch and drop the object.  He did emphasise you had to be quick or the dog might bite down on your fingers.  I do remember thinking, I wonder how he lost 2 fingers of his right hand!  Well, nothing to lose but the odd finger!!  I lightly tickled the back of Acorn’s throat and bloody hell, it worked and he dropped the trotter on the grass and I grabbed it.

Now for the history lesson.  We’ve all heard of Custer’s Last Stand but do you know when and where it happened?  The battle itself took place on the 25th June 1876, it was fought near the Little Big Horn River in present day Montana (this is why the spelling of Bighorn takes on 2 variation but “Bighorn” should be used if referring to the actual battle).  On one side you had the 7th Cavalary Regiment of 210 men, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and on the other,thousands of Sioux and Cheyenne warriors.  The engagement was one of a series of battles between the Plains Indians and US Forces, collectively known as the Sioux Wars.  The battle lasted an hour (average time of one of my dog walks!)  The Indians (sorry Native Americans!) massacred Custer and every one of his men.  The battle has been ennobled as, “Custer’s Last Stand” but in truth Custer and his men never stood a fighting chance and I was about to find out how Custer and his men felt, now back to “Trotters Last Stand”.

Cast your mind back and you’ll remember that Acorn has surrendered the pigs trotter and I have it!!  However, my victory was short lived because all the dogs realised that I now had the pigs trotter!!  They started to circle me, just like the Indians had done with Custer and his men!!  Out numbered and out gunned, I only had one chance, surrender?  Never!  I saw in the distance a high fence so I made a break for it, the dogs were taken by surprise and I managed to get to the fence and without thinking I threw the pigs trotter over the fence, I’d snatched victory out of the jaws of defeat or more appropriately the “jaw of Acorn!”  Sapphire, Kali and Ben looked at the fence and wandered off but Acorn was made of stronger stuff and he literally flew over the fence!  OMG, 3 dogs on one side of the fence and Acorn on the other!!  I decided to mount a rescue mission and get Acorn back on the right sideof the fence but what to do with Ben, Kali and Sapphire?  I didn’t have time to take them back to Caroline’s, so I used Acorn’s lead and secured them to a tree.  I walked down the fence line and eventually found a gate which gave me access to the wooded area where Acorn was looking for that bloody trotter!!  It didn’t take me long to find Acorn but he hadn’t found the trotter.  He came to me straight away when I called him, perhaps he had enough of the trotter for the day!  But I didn’t have his lead, so I improvised and used the belt off my trousers.  As we were walking back to get the other dogs I could see someone walking towards us, it was the woman I’d seen about half an hour ago, when I was doing the “weight training” with Acorn.  As we appraoched each other, she stopped and simply asked me, “What are you doing this time with this dog?”  I could have told her the truth but for some reason I replied, “We’re playing hide and seek, the other 3 dogs are hiding in the next field and Acorn and I have to find them”.  The woman just looked at me and asked another question, “Why are you using your belt as a lead?”  I don’t know why I said this but I did, “That’s for another game later!”  She walked away but this time I could hear exactly what she was saying to herself, “Thank God I don’t live in Northleach!”  We were eventually reunited with Ben, Kali and Sapphire and returned safely to Caroline’s house.  Well, clearly I’d lost that engagement but at least I hadn’t been massacred like Custer and his men!  I still wonder how that pig’s trotter got onto the field and where it went after I threw it over the fence?  As you can see, that was “Trotters Last Stand”.

I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter, my next is entitled, “I Counted Them Out and I Counted Them Back”.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

Here Boo and I come across the Secret Lake, as the locals refer to it.  However, as everyone in Northleach knows about the lake I think it should be renamed the Hidden Lake because it is hidden away in a valley.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

After a long walk with Boo we set up camp in the church grounds to have a well earned drink and biscuit before heading home.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

Here's a photo of two of my charges and Boo. From left to right we have Penelope, Spotty, yours truly and my dog Boo. You quickly learn where to get good take away coffee and here you see us outside The Curious Wine Cellar in Northleach.  Below is another photo of The All Blacks taken inside The Curious Wine Cellar and yes, they do sell wine, as well as coffee.

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

Here's a photo of The All Blacks.  Let me introduce you to the Team, from left to right, Sapphire, Duncan (Captain, I don't think so!), Kali and Ben.  Boo aspires to be a member of the All Blacks but being a Black and Tan Cavalier King Charles, he's not made the Team yet.  Boo even tried to disguise himself by rolling in some mud but the All Blacks quickly realised it was Boo after they gave him the "sniff" test, poor Boo!

[itshouldnthappentoadogwalker]

How I got into dog walking, not to be confused with dogging!

Hi there,

My name is Duncan James Turner and I thought it might be interesting for readers of my Blog to know how I actually finished up being a dog walker in Northleach, after I  joined the Royal Air Force back in 1979 as a “young” pilot officer, leaving the RAF in 2007 as a wing commander.  To be honest, I’m interested to know how this happened too!!. 

I arrived at RAF College Cranwell on the 21st October 1979, never imagining that I would spend the next 28 years in uniform, not the same one I would stress!  Nor, that I would live in several countries, includng Wales (I’m half English, half Welsh.  My Mum and Granddad were both born in Tonypandy.  Very handy during the 6 Nations Ruby Internationals, as I have 2 teams to support and of course 2 chances of my team winning a Grand Slam!), Cyprus where my eldest daughter Emily was born (Victoria, on the other hand was born in Watford and I don’t think she’s ever forgiven me for that!), Germany and a few other countries, including the Falkland Islands, which as we all know isn’t a country in itself but a “Protectorate” of the United Kingdom (by the way, some of my friends in Blackpool, where I was born, wondered how the Argentinians had evaded detection getting their boats, planes and troops up to the Shetlands!!).  I had a wonderful time in the Service and met some amazing people and made some life long friends.  That’s not to say there weren’t times I questioned why I’d joined the Armed Forces and what was I doing in places like Senegal, Bosnia and Afghanistan.  I thought, like many people, if we were going to fight another war it would be in Europe, Germany to be precise and against conventional forces of the Soviet Union, how wrong I was!!  Anyway, after 28 years the RAF and I parted company, I had been diagnosed with Bipolar Affective Disorder, which meant I couldn’t be deployed to overseas theatres of operation and in addition I had to surrender my “green card” (a green card gives the holder the authority/permission to carry a weapon).  As you can imagine, a wing commander that is unable to defend himself or be deployed around the world is of little use to the RAF.  Not only that, in 1999 I’d been diagnosed with Malignant Melanoma (Skin Cancer) and underwent surgery at Mount Vernan Hospital to remove the cancer.  The operation was a success and my thanks go to the surgeons, doctors, nurses and all the hospital staff for saving my life.  Right, so there you have it, after 28 years in uniform I find myself in “civvy” street, now there’s a surprise, I wasn’t expecting that!!

I won’t bore you with describing all the jobs I did up to starting as a dog walker 2 months ago but I’ve been employed as a ground worker, a chef, I even worked in a marina in Port Adriano on the island of Mallorca selling power boats jet skies and SeaBobs (in all intensive purposes, a small electric powered torpedo designed as a toy for both children and adults, it cost in the region of £12,500 and could travel at 15mph above water, 10mph below water and dive to a depth of 120 ft, some toy!), The company I worked for was called Nautiparts and when I told my daughters the name of the company they thought I got myself a job in the sex industry in Palma!!  I even worked briefly (3 days) as a travel agent for TUI but that’s another story.  My last job before starting as a dog walker was as a driver for one of the top National Hunt jockeys.

I can already hear you saying, “For goodness sake, when are you going to tell us about the dog walking, well right now!!  My friend Caroline Hall recently set up a dog care, training and grooming business called Cotswold Top Dog Training and Grooming Services Limited.  Things were going really well for Caroline when she had an accident.  Caroline putting a bag of dog poo into a rubbish bin when she tripped and fell.  Unfortunately, the fall was so bad that Caroline broke her wrist so badly she needed an opeartion and was hospitalised for 4days.  If that wasn’t bad enough, when the poor girl tried to stop 2 dogs fighting she was bitten on her other hand by one of the dogs.  The bite not only fractured her thumb but it became infected and Caroline found herself back in hospital for a few days.  That was, as they say, “The straw that broke the camels back!”  I’d heard about her first accident and had already volunteered to help her with the dog walking but when Caroline had the second accident I found myself walking dogs on virtually a daily basis.  Caroline has been making good progress and was hoping to get back the normal this week  but everything has been put on hold because of the restrictions placed on dog walkers by the Government to combat this terrible Corna virus.  However, the events I am about to relate to you actually happened over the last 6 weeks!!  The names of most of the dogs have been changed to protected the innocent, with the exception of my dog Boo and Caroline’s dogs Ben and Kali.

I really hope you enjoy reading my Blog, in the most part it’s all the funny things that have happened to me out with the dogs, who are the stars of the Blog.  However, you will find that I describe other amusing events in my life, which I’ve thought about or been reminded of during one of my walks.  I really hope it makes you laugh because at the moment we could all do with something to take our minds off what’s going on around us and give us something to laugh at!!