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We adopted Rosie in December 2013. She was a stray from a pound, and she went through several homes and bounced back to her foster home a couple times while she was in rescue. I offered to foster her, but she fitted in so well with Az and Brythen and the cats that I quickly decided to adopt her.

She has been gradually slowing down for years, but this weekend, her legs began to go and she was starting to have difficulty breathing. It was clearly time to say goodbye. She was always terrified by trips to the vet, so I asked for a home visit, which I think was the right call: it was easier on her, and all of us.

She was always Pp's favorite of all the dogs we've ever owned or fostered. We called her the weird alien cat, because she never behaved much like a dog, and went through life wide-eyed and baffled by so many things. Not squirrels though. She definitely knew about squirrels.

She was always a bit baffled if we met Pp out in his car when we were walking. She didn't recognise him at all if she could only see the top of him: clearly the vital thing for recognition were his legs and feet.

I'll always remember the holiday we had with Rosie on the Caledonian Canal. She found the boat so very scary at first, but adapted to it wonderfully, and soon was enjoying sitting up on top in her dog bed, being admired and snapped by tourists passing by. She went to Essex to see Maldon, and for a lovely sunny holiday on the Fal, to Helford where she found the otters fascinating, but was scared of the sealions, and on many many Tamar Valley explorations.

I have lost track of how many times I swore I would own no more salukis due to Rosie Roo, but right now I would adopt her and do it all over again if I could.

When she was young and lovely running through the woods in spring.

She was terribly thin at the end, but she still managed to wobble down to the beach on Saturday and almost all the way back.

- Rosie had been doing really well for such an old dog - in fact, so well, that I began to wonder if I should get her teeth cleaned at the vet and booked an appointment to discuss it.

Rather ambitiously, I suggested that we do a short flat mile-long walk at Tafarn Sinc, which looks like this, and is named for the Wonder of Zinc:

( Read more... )-

Theo developed some worrying pimples on his face, so I decided that he ought to have a test to check if he was having a leishmaniosis flare. This is a Mediterranean disease which is transmitted by a specific kind of Mediterranean sand-fly, and can lie dormant for up to 7 years.

We had originally thought that Theo's litter was unlikely to have been infected since they arrived at the rescue at the age of only one week old, but both of his littermates have had leishmaniosis problems since they came to the UK, so they may have got it from their mother.

Unfortunately, this requires a blood sample taken from the jugular vein, and Theo was Not OK with this. We did try various options such as seeing if he would be OK with giving blood in the car if he'd had a chance to get to know the vet first, but the answer was a definite NO.

So I held his head (wearing Rosie's old muzzle, which we have practiced with) and the vet jabbed him with a sedative in his backside. Poor Theo! It took him ages to go to sleep (like, about 40 minutes), and in the end he sort of flomped on top of me and the vet was able to take a sample.

Thankfully the biochemistry results were good,and the leishmaniosis results came back negative on Saturday. And the pimples have now vanished again, so who knows what caused those.

I need to go into the vet again to pay for the extra biochemistry test I requested, as per the rescue's advice and demand the full results. I had asked these to be emailled to me, but vets never seem to do that unless you pester them relentlessly.

Theo sadly snoozing before the vet came to take his bloods.

Yesterday, we were packing orders and Rosie would not shut up. She went upstairs and yodelled, she came downstairs and yodelled.

I gave her a sausage.

I moved a bed into the packing room so she could sit there: no.

More yodelling.

Eventually when we had tried everything with considerable interruption to the packing and were wondering if she was getting really senile and didn't know what she wanted....

One of us said 'where is Theo?'

And THEO HAD ESCAPED THE GARDEN. She was trying to tell us!

Anyway we then ran around madly trying to find where Theo had gone, and found him on the doorstep looking apologetic.

I keep vaguely thinking 'I should do a post about that' and not doing it. So to get back in the swing I shall just do a bulleted list of Things in no order.

Today we went to Lawrenny Quay, which is a lovely place some distance up the Cleddau river, looking out onto the resoundingly named Black Mixen Pool. There's a nice cafe, but rather a lot of signs of all kinds — some of them helpful signs about crab sandwiches and toilets, but also so very many 'don't do this!' signs. We watched a man very determinedly attempting to make a verge flatter using a road roller. It was a fair battle, but I think the verge won.

Wally the Tenby Walrus has reportedly taken off to Cornwall, and was seen some distance off Padstow. I imagine the Tenby tourist industry is weeping, but at least the pubs are open again so they can weep into their beer.

In a desperate attempt to stifle some of the rather ugly concrete driveway here, I have covered it with a sedum carpet, the kind they sell for green roofs. So far this seems to be working pretty well.

This garden, or 'concrete and tarmac pad' as you might call it, is very much the opposite of my Cornwall garden. It has practically no soil, is very sunny and extremely windy!

( Read more... )

I don't seem to have posted for ages. A month ago, we had just put our house up for sale : this Friday, the painters finished painting it, and today we have (I hope!) sold it. It does look good with the sun shining and the paint all new!

So, with luck we will soon be on our way to Pembrokeshire. This is all very alarming but I'm sure we will get used to it. I had not expected to move again, not least because when we bought this house it was in a very unpopular area where houses took forever to sell. But I guess that's the Plague Year for you.

I've just been wandering around the garden, eating the figs and apples and strawberries for nearly-the-last time. I shall not be too sorry to say goodbye to the garden though. It is a source of good things, but it is also rather a strain, the size of it and the way it just GROWs with the least provocation.

I tried to take cuttings of the fig and the grape vine in the garden that I planted years ago, but the cuttings got mould. Have just taken some more cuttings and treated them with very-dilute bleach. We'll see if that helps at all! I'd quite like to plant a new clone of the fig tree, because it's very productive, and although *probably* it's just plain old Ficus Brown Turkey, I don't know for sure because I originally bought it for 50p after the label fell off.

It's been a stressful few weeks, and the stress isn't over yet, but things are happening and that's much better than NOT happening and feeling on edge because the owners of the house we are buying understandably would like us to buy it so they can get on with their lives. Bit worried that the cats won't like the move, but hey.

Rosie is currently barking loudly at Theo, because I gave them each a turkey leg and Theo ate his and then stole hers. Otherwise, all is well in the land of the hounds. I've just bought Rosie a new house collar, because her old purple velvet one is looking very tired. I went for red polkadot this time, after much agonising.

What else has happened? Oh yes, I finished the two Tolkien Reverse Summer Bang fics I was writing:
Lands, Lords and Ladies, lost beyond the Sea.
which is a crossover of Tolkien's Fall of Arthur with The Silmarillion, plus my idea of a world where the land of Elves and Valinor lies not very far away, and sometimes Elves wander through and have adventures. On this occasion, Fingon is the adventurer. Oh, and it also has the concept of Corrigans, from Breton legend via Tolkien's version of Aotrou and Itroun.

The other story I wrote was:
Sea Longing which is about the legend of the Took Fairy Wife. I'm convinced that a long way back, one of the Took family married a small and unimportant Elf, and this is how.

Arrrggh, Theo keeps getting out of the garden to visit the pair of little terrier ladies who are staying with their owner's Mum at the top of it. And he won't do it when I'm looking at him!

( Read more... )
In other news, walking back down into the village after my dog walk this morning, I saw a fluttering in the tree-shadows in the middle of the the road.

( Read more... )

A very small Theo, on arrival from Greece.

( Read more... )

I went out with the hounds for a wander, and a good time was had by all.

( Some more photos and a silly zooming video )

Theo the Small Gentleman is now a Moderately Sized Gentleman. He now weighs 16.3Kg.

For contrast, here he is with that walrus when we brought him home:( Read more... )

Oh, and here are a couple of cat pictures. I made the first one for Pp for Christmas, showing all three, and the second is just Nenya looking peeved, probably at Theo. :-D

( Read more... )

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Entries tagged with hounds

Rosie Roo

A Dogpost

Leishmaniosis test

Little Timmy is Down the Well

A post of many things

On the move with a fig (I hope)

Terrible Hound!

A Small Gentleman and his Walrus.

Just a sunny day

State of the Harehound, and cats

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June 2025

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