Blog,

Hello there and good afternoon.

I’ve just finished my online purchases of more tat for the house whilst the Husband isn’t looking. Do you know how quickly I can punch my bank card numbers into this computer without being caught? Do you also realise how my greed need for these purchases is only short term – i.e. 5 mins after throwing money down the toilet, I’ve forgotten all about it until

‘Zere ees a man at le door avec beaucoup de packages. What ‘ave you been buying?‘ –

it is a good question and my answer of ‘erm…..not much and maybe someone sent it to me as a present?’  is surely followed by

‘why do you keep buying so much merde?’ – the truth hurts? I’ll say but probably not as much as a depleting without being replenished bank account.

Anyway, let me tell you what happened one morning during our holiday in the Department of Somewhere with Lidl Supermarket Dog.

The beach was deserted. The clouds were low, full and very grey – I would go as far to say, moody (truly without trying to sound like a wally).  The grass of the dunes rippled by the gusts of winds changed from green to yellow to silver in colour.  The tide was in and the sea was choppy.

So,

Having learned the hard ( shameful, wet and cold) lesson of letting Lidl off the leash for a swim a few weeks before, I herded both dogs towards the dunes for some fun, SAFE, no danger of getting wet or drowning, play.

They scurried up the dune and were lost in the grasses.  I followed (however, I can’t apply my movement as a scurry – more along the lines of an elephant trying to climb up and out of a large……very large…..HUGE..bowl of blancmange).

We remained within the safety of the dunes, far enough away from the sea for Lidl to not be able to make a 2nd attempt at swimming the (English….how the French hate that) channel.

Just before we came to the end of our walk and just as I was about to put their leashes back on, that bastard adventurous dog made a break for it up and over the last high dune towards………horror of horrors, the place where the estuary meets the sea.

‘feckin’ feck feck feck FEEEEEEEEEECCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKK!’

Maisy gulped and managed to look ashamed on behalf of her hairy sister.

We ran up and over that last dune only to see Lidl supermarket dog begin to swim from the fairly calm estuary water towards the open sea.

It had started to rain.

The wind was now howling and gale force.

I took off my shoes and some clothes and went in screaming Lidl’s name.

The shock of the water temperature stopped me for a few seconds. I took in a breath and then it felt like my lungs reduced in capacity; it was ARCTIC in that water.

Lidl was having a ball. Swimming around and around. Looking at me quizzically (surely, dogs can do this….). I looked at her quizzically (how far around her thick neck will my hands reach whilst I throttle her).  My feet were slipping and sinking into some oozy mush.

She swam out further.

The cold of the water was punishing. The blood began to drain out from my fingertips. I was now in up to my shoulders.

The storm continued.

Im going to drown or die of hypothermia and then who will write my blog?

or

If I die, people will realise just what a dirty chaotic house I live in and how slack I am at paperwork

These thoughts gave me the push to survive.

So I made one last water-slow leap forward and grabbed her collar and dragged her very wet and soggy derriere out of that water.

What I didn’t call her as I started to take off my wet clothes and exposed parts of my very white body to some dog walker who must have been laughing at me from the dunes and who happened to walk past just as I started stripping, is of little import.

The storm worsened.

We had to walk at least a mile back along the beach without any respite from the sand blasting wind and rain.

When I got back home and by now I was so cold that I was dizzy and wanting to vomit, the Prof said to me:

‘I told you not to let her go back near the water.’

which was helpful…………

A few days later, we revisited the place of the second almost drowning and I saw, as the tide was out, exactly what I had been standing in:

I started to look up about dogs and drowning and found the piece which said:

Labradors are natural swimmers and have the ability to swim for hours. Only a total idiot of an owner would risk going in after them as even their tails act like a water propellor.

I’ll remember that next summer.

Right, now the bottle of bleach which I put on the workbench to begin burning and scraping the peepee and caca off the toilets is starting to shame me in the longevity of its position out of the cupboard that I’m off to put it back……..ok, I’m off to clean…..off to clean…..really…..

Until next time.

By the way, go crazy today, post me a comment.