Is Cats and Critters a private diary of your dog, your patch, your life?

Jovial Monk wrote on Jul 31^st, 2023 at 9:46pm:

You are talking to yourself, with the occasional drop-in like me saying you are talking to yourself.
Almost all the threads in Cats are started by you and end with your opening post because nobody cares. Or if not, they have a few more posts by you and end with a post by you. It's your sad little sandpit. You are constantly throwing parties and nobody ever turns up - or if they do stumble in, it's  only to shuffle their feet awkwardly, mutter something inane to fit the tenor of the OP and then, realising the banality, quickly leave.

Sad.

Yup, way too many forums, several do not have a Mod tho they are supposed to be Member Run Boards.

The Barnacle who was the Mod for Atheism has left, disgusted by the crap in Environment and Coronavirus boards, and no new Mod has been selected or the Atheism board merged with Philosophy. Ditto Sad Kangaroo and the Fringe board he modded.

Environment is a waste of space modded by a gullible numpty—this board could easily be renamed Environment, Critters and Gardens and the existing Environment board hidden.

Health and Womens’ Issues could be merged with Kat as Mod of the combined boards.

Etc—merge the Party boards with Politics.

Well, a Lure Coursing meet today.

As always, Socks bloody tiresome—excited so barking, whining, jumping up, pulling on the lead etc—pretty much all dogs are like that, excited because they can see/smell/hear all the other dogs there and after a meet or two they know they are going to run like blazes!

First run—I thought average but was enthusiastically praised “as fast as any whippet!” Not bad but I was thinking “whippet snippet, she can do better!” So after lunch—well, I went to see what number they were up to, we were number 24 and I wanted to see what number the current dog was doing. I had left Socks in the car. It was a lovely day with full sunshine—how Antarctic like, NOT —so I had all the windows open incl right front window open, ohh 20cm? 25?

Suddenly I hear “Escaped!” Yup, despite her really deep chest the bloody dog had managed to squeeze through the narrow space. Back in the car, looked at the number, ah we are up after 1 or two other dogs.

So, get the mutt, walk her to warm her body up, head to the queue and soon enough we were in the ring—a huge showgrounds oval. Lead off, firm hand on her collar, walk her up to the start position. “Tallyho!” and I let her go.

Well, her speed and concentration caused jaws to drop. Far out she was fast! So glorious to see! Any whippets running at the same time would have been eating Sock’s dust!

As I mentioned in “What a transformation” thread I had a honking big Saxon woodburning heater installed. A real beauty!

Suddenly I noticed Socks wanted to go for a lot more walks than usual.

Socks doesn’t like the heater, is afraid of it. Possibly something happened to her in the 19 or so weeks before I adopted her from the RSPCA. Being wet weather I have 3 wooden chairs lined up in front of the fire with clothing on them to dry. This means she doesn’t actually see the fire and is a bit more relaxed. Good!

I have some old sheets (I got so many sheets I could set up a sheety shop  ) and will keep the chairs there after their use as substitute Hills Hoist with a sheet across their backs, do that for a week or two and Socks should be reconciled.

Tomorrow to the local big smoke and a walk along the river while the car gets new tyres and brakepads. I was told 90 minutes  so a two hour walk it will be, 2.5 hours if the weather is nice and brisk. Will do some shopping once I have the car back (so I can park Socks) for food incl some rib racks for the smoker and a flea and tick treatment for Socks.

Ticks were not something I worried about in Adelaide but there are some nastys on the east coast so I rigorously apply the flea and tick treatment.

Ahahaha poor Socks.

Loud sounds of chainsaws—HEAP of trees along the fence being cut down. One of the wielders living just down the street, has two border collies. Left Socks inside mostly—over the west fence is a field belonging to a Booby type who shoots dogs on his field to be the BIG MAN—hence I am careful not to let Socks run around too much off lead.

But did take her outside to interact with these dogs. Socks not really utilising this being HER territory and bossing the border collies, did let the lead go—with two blokes and two dogs here Socks was NOT going to stray—and we saw an exhibition of VERY FAST RUNNING!

LOL! Socks DOES so love being able to run fast and far. Did get away a bit and charged along and over the connecting road leading to the highway, luckily no cars. I do so LOVE to see my beautiful dog running at incredible speed, faster than any whippet, faster than almost any dog other than a race-trained greyhound.

Doesn’t just run, in running she really POUNDS the ground with her paws, man, the SOUND of her running when she does that running just past me BANG BANG HAMMER!

Reason for all the chainsawing—so a 1.8m high fence can go up around the back part of the backyard. Finish that tomorrow. Sunday, when I am running Socks in a Fun Run, some earthmoving is done.

Orchard getting closer to reality!