The Way We Heard - Dog Days are Over

I arrived in 2008, on the sunniest of days, which if you knew my disposition, was ironic. 

    The times they were a’changing, again. America had voted in a black president. Humans in their millions were buying something absurdly expensive called a smartphone and as far as I could make out, using it to find pictures of naked people, or contact old schoolfriends they hadn't even liked when they were at school with them. Well at least it was free. This was just as well as nobody had any money. Apparently, some greedy bankers had gambled it all away on rundown houses. A few actually lost their shirts, though they soon replaced them with even more expensive ones. One or two went to jail, but not for long.

    These things didn’t worry me. My kind were here thousands of years before money was invented, and we’d still be here thousands of years after it was gone. 

    My new home was pleasant enough I suppose. Woven rugs over stripped and varnished floorboards. Unimaginative but comfy. The front room curtains were dark green velvet and descended from the ceiling right to the floor, leaving a satisfying crumple of material at their base. As a nipper I would have scaled them at lightening speed. The furniture was what I believe is described as ‘Campaign Style’ and incorporated a lot of pale woods and linen which are both unsatisfying materials to get your claws into. I don’t know why people suddenly want to look as if they immigrated from Sweden, but there we are. It was a house typical at that time of those North London boroughs that were being reclaimed by the newly well off.

    The kitchen, a place where I would no doubt be expected to spend a great deal of my day, was large, expensive and patently little used. This family could afford to eat out every night. Luckily they were in the business of bed and breakfast in the air, whatever that is, so they were doing ok.

    It is an ignominy I would not wish on my worst enemy, being gifted like some sort of toy. My ancestors who lived free and unfettered, in far-off much hotter parts of the world, escaped this shame, most of the time; due in no small part to their superior ability to bite the heads off anyone who tried to tame them. My own fate alas, was not in my grasp. I was still young however, and optimistic up to a point. I had the confidence of the as-yet un-disillusioned, and I decided to try and make the best of my situation.

    I quickly discovered a special door installed for my personal use and availed myself of it without hesitation. At the back of the house an expansive lawn was flanked by colourful flowerbeds arranged in a serpentine pattern, provided a fitting estate for me to command. Nothing was going to get past me. At the rear of the garden stood a brick wall, I should say at least as high as a biggish horse. Although my experience of horses, as you can imagine, is very limited, them being notoriously skittish, prone to kick, and best avoided.

    Before long, the person to whom I had been gifted, made her presence known. I took an instant dislike to her. She was that particular type of spoilt child whose expression says ‘whatever you do to entertain me, I will not be entertained’. I made no attempt to entertain her, but despite this she seemed to be delighted by my very existence. She named me ‘Cybele’ (or as she said it ‘Thybele’) at once misgendering me, and presenting herself with a pronunciation challenge. It was a name I refused to respond to from the moment she exclaimed it with lisping delight. She was obsessed by someone called GaGa or GooGoo or something like that and constantly sang tunelessly about her ‘Poker Faith’. 

    In truth I have always been inexplicably drawn to people who clearly don’t like me; don’t ask me why. It’s the contrarian in me; that’s just the way I am.

    Within a week I had settled in quite nicely and had built up a regular round, with which to fill the day. After breakfast I would drop in on the next door neighbour, an elderly lady who smelled of camphor and could be trusted to offer treats with virtually no prompting. My mother had taught me that it is our lot to bring comfort to old and the vulnerable and that we should accept their offerings gracefully; preferably several times a day at several different homes.  Afterwards, I would lay on top of the garden wall digesting and keeping a lookout for vermin through one slitted yellow eye. Nasty, fur-less things they are,  darting this way and that like demented clockwork toys, trespassing on my domain. Whenever I spotted one I would give chase, hoping for an epic pursuit, but it never lasted long; I was too good at catching the little blighters. I rarely dispatched them immediately, preferring to let them think they had got away with it before stretching out a limb and batting them back to the ground. What fun.

    All in all I was relatively happy with my lot. 

    That is, until IT arrived.

The woman of the house had a bad habit of compensating for her maternal guilt about her long working hours, by bringing home inappropriately expensive gifts for her petulant offspring.  

    ‘It’th a puppy!’ Exclaimed the sibilantly challenged infant. In my book, this development was completely unacceptable and I made my disapproval known in no uncertain terms. The living room curtains received an extra fierce clawing that evening and I may have intentionally knocked over an expensive looking vase on the hall table.

    This was war. The Russians were pummelling Georgia and I was going to do the same to the canis familiaris that had dared to breach my walls.

    Of course a puppy was no match for me. Not physically or mentally. I could not however, drag the wretched thing out into the road and leave it for the traffic to deal with, as I would have a rat or a pigeon. That would have undoubtedly resulted in my expulsion and re-homing in the hell that is Battersea. To this day the smell of bleached concrete gives me the shivers. No, I had to be clever about this.

    My first salvo across the bows of the canine usurper was to purloin the car keys from the counter top where they regularly lay, and drop them in the wiry-haired creature’s bed.

    After the woman of the house had spent an hour looking for them, making herself late for work as a result, it was all she could do not to kick the mutt’s butt from here to the dog pound. I thought I’d cracked it, but then watched with sickening disbelief as Bozo lowered his head and looked up with those puppy-dog-eyes, turning his owners heart from stone to mush in an instant. Curses!

    Bozo is my name for the mutt by the way. The child called him Sparky. At least there was no S in Bozo.

    I decided the situation called for stronger measures. I had to make sure dog boy got his marching orders before he bonded with the family and all hope was lost. 

    I know what you’re thinking, how could I do this to a little puppy dog? Please! Spare me. Dogs are the fur-ball in my throat, the chewing-gum in my pristine coat, the maddening, tinkling bell on my collar. I knew I could show no mercy.

    One night whilst watching something called ‘The Inbetweeners’ (young humans really are stupid) and ruminating on an idea involving a microwave and a half-chewed power cable, opportunity struck. The family had gone out to see a chap called Nelson speaking at Hyde Park ( I thought he was a statue but what do I know? ) and left their precious puppy in his cage in the kitchen. I, of course, was trusted to come and go as I pleased. Bozo, none too bright at the best of times, was wearing his teeth down to the gums by gnawing at the metal bolt that secured the door to the cage and had succeeded in dislodging it enough that, with a little assistance from yours truly, it swung open and he was free. For a good two minutes he sat there like the dumb animal he was and stared at the open door.  I had to literally put my rear end on his nose to stir him into action but eventually he gave in to atavistic instinct and chased me around the kitchen island, scrabbling at every turn as if he were trying to bury one of his disgusting bones in the solid floor.

    He had no chance of catching me of course, I was far too agile and canny for that. But I could see that, with a little encouragement, he would be one very unpopular puppy when the family returned.

    Firstly, I made sure he followed me through my personal door. He was a little big even at his tender age, but once he’d smashed the plastic door frame and torn the flap off it’s hinges, he was out in the garden where I led him a merry old chase through the flower beds, accumulating mud and dirt on his big fat paws whilst destroying the man of the house’s precious (and as I’d heard him say on more than one occasion ‘irreplaceable’ ) plants. When he was good and filthy, I led him back inside the house and upstairs to the main bedroom where a game of,  ‘who can get on and off the bed the most times’ ensued. By the time we’d finished in there it looked like the Battle of the Somme where ninety years ago my great, great, great, great, great-grandfather, Klaus (yes of course we pronounce it ‘Claws’) was awarded a medal for carrying messages to the enemy during the Christmas truce.

    Next, I led the gullible hound into the bathroom where he managed to crack the perspex shower screen and urinate on the bathmat. This was going very well indeed! We carried on our dance of  destruction through room after room, breaking ornaments, scratching floorboards, knocking pictures off the wall and generally leaving the normally tidy and clean house looking like a caravan in a hurricane.    

    Eventually, Bozo got tired and, as is the way with his species, flopped down in the middle of the living room floor and promptly fell asleep. This was so perfect I really couldn’t have arranged it better.

     I exited silently, as is the way with my species, and went to my favourite spot on top of the garden wall where I could see into the kitchen and observe the fun. I settled down to wait.

    Uncharacteristically I must have fallen asleep as when I next opened my eyes, it was dark and the kitchen lights were on. I could hear agitated voices and the squeaky voice of the girl child repeatedly saying ‘I’m thorry, I’m thorry!.

    What did she have to be sorry about? I slunk up to the back door to see and hear better. It was clear immediately that Bozo hadn’t been given the boot yet. He was sitting in the middle of a floor strewn with broken china looking as innocent as… well as innocent as a puppy I suppose. 

    ‘You obviously left his cage open.’ The woman of the house was saying.

    ‘I thaid I’m thorry’  The girl replied.

    Unbelievable! The girl was getting the blame and Bozo was in the clear. He had the luck of a jet-black Persian. I would have to rethink my strategy.

    In my family we are thinkers. We watch and we wait and we pounce when ready. We don’t rush. But this situation was urgent. It was Bozo or me, and it wasn’t going to be me if I had anything to say about it.

    The next opportunity came a few days later. She who ruled the household had left the refrigerator, which was stocked with party food for the child’s upcoming birthday, slightly ajar. Bozo was too dense in the thinking area to notice it, and his nose wasn’t yet developed enough to pick up the scent of cooked meat, but I had spotted the mistake and with a few deft pats I managed to swing the door wide. The family were in the garden enjoying some sunshine and out of earshot. I located a couple of juicy, cocktail sausages and placed them on the floor about a tail’s length from the tongue-lolling dope, leading a path to the open fridge, and waited for the fun to begin. Sure enough Bozo spotted the treats and wolfed them down without chewing. Catching on surprisingly quickly for a whelp still wet behind the ears, he was soon getting his nose cold and within a minute or two had snaffled enough sausage, bacon, cake and sandwiches to satisfy a gorilla with a tape worm. 

    I retreated to a suitable vantage point and waited for the inevitable explosion.

It wasn’t long before the show started. When Bozo trotted out to the garden and cheerfully chucked up the contents of his stomach on the patio, creating a pool of what looked like the innards of a rabbit I once disembowelled, his owners were, to say the least, disapproving. 

    ‘Bloody dog’, said he who tends the garden.

    ‘Thparky’, exclaimed the birthday child.

    ‘Oh poor thing’, said she who had brought the little tyke into my realm in the first place.

    Wait, that didn’t sound right. ‘Poor thing?’  Could it possibly be that this pugnacious pooch was going to get away with it again?

    And then…

    ‘Check the camera’, said someone.

This was not good news. How had I missed that?  They had a camera? Where? Clearly I was slipping. The old sixth sense had let me down.

    Sure enough there was a small blinking object on a high shelf, with a view of the kitchen including the fridge.

    The family gathered round the kitchen island and were obviously viewing the evidence. After a few seconds they turned as one and looked at me. I can tell you brother, that look sent a chill down my tail.

    It didn’t take them long to make their decision. 

    Just like the QE2, that grand symbol of British power and influence, on which my cousin spent fifteen years as chief rat catcher, I was cast aside, disposed of, thrown on to the scrap heap.

 

    And that my friends is where my story ends — for now.  As you may have surmised, I am reporting these events from incarceration where the smell of bleach is making me retch and If I could be bothered to look through the bars, I’d be able to see that famous power station.

    Nevertheless, onwards and upwards.         

As my mother used to say, there’s more than one way to skin a dog.