Don’t take your eye off the ball!

It was another fairly early night and I was asleep until I heard heavy drops of rain on the upper roof. I remembered that my metal detector was on the decking and that the dogs in the crates were not covered up. I ‘jumped’ out of bed at 04:00 to do the necessary. Going back to sleep was not an option so I made the most of the warmth and comfort of my bed for a further twenty-minutes.

I was thinking about further integration of Other Dog since it’s less than a week before Ursula gets lumbered with looking after them whilst I’m away. Other Dog pined when he was confined to the storeroom so integration seems like the other choice. There have not been any new additions to the Pack since Princess and Pea back in March 2017, only subtractions: Heidi and Millie, Minnie, Dave and then Boris. Additions are much harder to achieve once the Pack is firmly established.

I decided I’d take Other Dog out with the others and put him with Obi and Princess since they are more amenable. Luis and Fido are a powerful combination as is Oskar and Charlie. Separately they are not a threat. Once we met up with Ursula at the end of the Promontory, we proceeded to release the dogs one at a time, keeping Other Dog on the lead with me. Everything appeared to be going swimmingly until I asked Ursula to release Fido and Oskar, the last two. Charlie had been fine and so had Luis. I was fooling with Heidi having been lulled into a false sense of security. One of the dogs started on Other Dog so, naturally, all the others joined in. I waded in to the rescue and tried to pick Other Dog up out of the reach of the others. He was being attacked from all sides so was lashing out in every direction. One of his feet caught me on the face and I got a few cuts on my right hand. I finally re-established order and then walked the dogs over the rocks. I knew I had some cuts but was unaware of the marks on my face until I wiped my hand across my cheek. Only when I got back and looked in the mirror did I see the marks. I sloshed on loads of medicinal alcohol before going out for my run.

After the run and a hot(!) shower, Ursula, Eleanor and I had tea and I went to Paleochora to the chemist, bakery and supermarket. I bought some vaccines for the dogs. Georgia had talked getting the vet to come to the camping back in the Spring, however…

After breakfast, I returned to get on with some important matters and then Eleanor came to help with the dogs. Between us, we managed to give them their annual jabs as well as a good brushing. I did the jabs and Eleanor did the brushing. The final candidate for brushing was Princess so the two of us mounted a two-pronged attack, me with the clippers and Eleanor with the scissors. Princess didn’t really know which way to turn so gave in to let us have our wicked ways. She is still not as tidy as she might be but improving nonetheless.

We adjourned to Ursula and Tony for tea and cake then off for a walk around the Promontory before supper. Ursula produced her very excellent mushroom stew (stifado) which I helpfully managed to finish off. I even washed up the pot!

22:00 was fast approaching so the wild evening broke up to see who could be the first in bed.