Mirinda is still under the influence of her cold so, although she spent the morning busy working on her DBA, it was pretty much a restful day. Our plans to visit a garden, take the dogs to Hankley and to pop into a garden centre were all put on the back burner for this week.
I took the poodles for a lovely long walk around the park in the afternoon while Mirinda had an afternoon nap. While the weather has become more spring-like (the temperatures reached 22 and the sun came out for a bit), we had a short sharp shower in case we’d forgotten what rain was like.
On our walk we met a somewhat manic Westie called MacKenzie. She wasn’t very old though not a puppy. And she could outrun the poodles. According to her owner, MacKenzie’s little legs have the advantage over bigger dogs because she can change direction easily and quickly. If the girls change too quickly, they go tumbling. This is always funny for us but a bit frustrating for them.
MacKenzie was so sure of herself that every time the poodles stopped chasing her, she’d come racing back for another run. Eventually, MacKenzie became far more interested in a father and small son kite flying team. The small boy was terribly frightened of the streak of white that was the Westie and kept hiding behind his dad’s legs.
Then, as the father tried to ‘protect’ his son, the kite, suddenly control-less, plunged to the ground, narrowly missing MacKenzie’s head. She was quite surprised by the sudden appearance of the kite though it didn’t stop her for long and she was quickly off again, her owner yelling for her to stop.
There was also a woman with a Jack Russell who, rather than say “hello” asked me, rather cryptically, “Are they Tibetan?” I figured she meant the dogs so I assured her they were pure poodle and had been since birth. She was ridiculously pleased, saying it’s been ages since she’s seen a pedigree anything, given they’re generally mixed breeds these days. Then she left us. Odd woman.
The poodles also caused great consternation when they tried to say hello to a boxer. He had a ball in his mouth and, according to his owners, he doesn’t take kindly to anyone trying to take it off him. I figured this meant any dog approaching would be perfectly safe because the moment the boxer opened his mouth, the ball would drop out and he’d be scrabbling to get it again, leaving any ‘attacker’ perfectly safe.
There was actually a lot of dogs in the park, enjoying the change in weather. Always good to see although I wasn’t very pleased with the man exiting the park with a bunch of freshly cut daffodils in his hand. That is just rude.
And that was about it for excitement today. Though Mirinda did have an early birthday present…The Hobbit on DVD.
