Alfie in his 'Jack Sparrow' disguise.
I’ve quickly learnt that country mud is a breed of its own. It’s not just the light brown, ‘oh dear, but I can wipe it off on the grass,’ inconvenient mud of the town, but its close relative; the thick, squelchy, deceptive kind. It waits until I’ve placed my foot firmly in before grabbing hold with glue like properties until either I topple over as my momentum is snatched from me or my boot comes off with my stripey sock revealed. From the moment we moved to the country there doesn’t seem to have been a season when we didn’t have to battle with this new foe. Locals shrug it off with a stoical smile, having made my bed I’ve just got to lie on it and, like the waft of muck spreading, what else did I expect in the country?
I’m quickly down - grading my towels to establish the requisite pile for the dogs. In fact, if I could fashion a pair of stilts for Alfie, our Lhasa Apso, I would gladly hoick him onto them before ever letting him put one paw outside our back door to zoom over the fields as he chases the rabbits that I’m learning, not to coo at, but to curse.
There seems to me to be only two ways to conquer this stealthy invader; embrace it and start a laundry service endearing the whole village to the newcomers or stand firm and invest in a bulk order of fisherman’s waders for the whole family.
If, when out next time, you come across a happy troop of five, clothed from head to toe in rubber with no fishing tackle in sight plus a small dog on stilts, you will know which option I went for.
Teresa x
I’m quickly down - grading my towels to establish the requisite pile for the dogs. In fact, if I could fashion a pair of stilts for Alfie, our Lhasa Apso, I would gladly hoick him onto them before ever letting him put one paw outside our back door to zoom over the fields as he chases the rabbits that I’m learning, not to coo at, but to curse.
There seems to me to be only two ways to conquer this stealthy invader; embrace it and start a laundry service endearing the whole village to the newcomers or stand firm and invest in a bulk order of fisherman’s waders for the whole family.
If, when out next time, you come across a happy troop of five, clothed from head to toe in rubber with no fishing tackle in sight plus a small dog on stilts, you will know which option I went for.
Teresa x
