Things that go 'Woof' in the night......

We were at a fabulous Caribbean party last weekend, setting off, in the ‘mandatory’ beach wear attire, we worried that it would be dampened by the horrendous wet weather that had shrouded the island in mist and drizzly rain for the whole day. Not so. We all had an amazing time, with Caribbean cocktails, limbo dancing, hula hoops, palm tree canopies, spit roast pork and a huge BBQ, not to mention the good company, and the promise of more smoked mackerel from the skipper off the Jura ferry boat, a bag of frozen sloes from his wife, and with a bit more cajoling, the happy farmer thinks he may just be able to persuade him to spill the beans on the secret location, somewhere deep in the island’s woods, that he visits in September for a plentiful supply of sloes. The happy farmer will be washing out more flagons in preparation for his sloe gin making at this rate!

Arriving home much later, tired children sleeping in the back of the jeep, the happy farmer went over to welcome our holiday guests who had just arrived off a delayed evening ferry. He sloshed through the puddles and rain, in the darkness, still clad in his ‘beach wear’ attire, to give them a good island welcome…and those shorts did the trick, he managed to convince them that the weather here had been spectacular for the whole day. As the morning arrived, so did the sun, and it hasn’t stopped shining since.

Sunday greeted us with Mist the sheep dog coming into her first season though. We could recognise the signs, Roy, her male counterpart, was following her around the garden, nose firmly glued to her, sniffing away. We separated them, and Mist had to be confined to barracks for the day. Night time came and the happy farmer took Mist from her kennel and placed her on a long chain in the shed, with her bed and water bowl. Roy reluctantly went to the kennel alone.

At some unearthly hour we were woken by Mist barking outside the bedroom window. ‘Houdini’ had managed to escape from the chain, escape out of the locked shed, and had decided to take herself off to play with the pigs, in the middle of the night. Of course the pigs were not for waking up and joining in with her shenanigans at such a late hour, hence all the barking, as they lay lifeless, sound asleep, refusing to budge.

One weary happy farmer, dragged himself out of bed, got dressed and collected his dog and took her back to the shed, securely shutting her in this time, and returning with legs covered in flea bites, to a robin, flying around son’s bedroom. Much later, ‘de flea ed’ and robin rescued, he returned to his slumbers.

Next night, 2.00am we were woken by one howling, barking sheep dog. We couldn’t sleep for the noise, and despite the happy farmer’s quips that we could charge our lovely guests extra for the authentic farm yard sounds in the middle of the night, one weary happy farmer had to get up and go and rescue his dog from the shed. A lady needs her bed, so Roy, the sheep dog got ousted from the kennel, and Mist duly went to her own familiar bed and fell fast asleep. She hasn’t bothered us since. Roy now has a ‘camp’ bed in the garden, so far so good….and hopefully no puppies!!

Until next time…