Watching paint dry

Welcome, dear reader, to the fiftieth entry in my now legendary and universally adored blog. Thanks to you all for your support.

And now that the platitudes are out of the way I'll crack on with my inane ramblings.

Firstly, as much as it sticks in my craw to have to admit it, I may have understimated the long man. Either that or, as is more likely, I have very much overestimated the quite obviously tin pot organisation to whom he'd applied when looking for his new job. He's only gone and got the position, leaving me wondering just how many backsides he has had to sniff to swing that one. Oh, and get this, a man's best friend is, supposedly, his dog. Ergo, I am the long man's best friend, but did he bother to tell me about his little bit of good luck? Did he buggery. I only found out about it via Facebook. Bloody typical.

For a change, and a very pleasant change indeed, the news that he has wrangled himself a half decent job has kept a smile on his face. The clippy cloppy woman took a couple of days off work as the weekend approached and continued her love affair with the noisy, sucky thing and the tins of smelly stuff. I wouldn't mind quite so much if not for the fact that I heard her mention she wants to move house. If that is to be the case, then why the hell does she have to keep cleaning this one? Pointless in the extreme if you ask me. Shame she never asks me, I could make her life so much easier if she did.

The little people have gone to stay with their father for a couple of weeks. Apparently this time of year is called "Easter" and is some kind of religious festival where, as far as I can ascertain, people celebrate a magic rabbit that lays chocolate eggs. Religion is something of a mystery to me, I just can't get my head around it.

On Friday I was sent to stay with Audrey et al in Salford so that the long man and the clippy cloppy woman could (surprise surprise) go off gallavanting around North Yorkshire to a place called "Whitby" on that damned Vespa of theirs. As far as I can figure they planned to drink lots of that stuff that makes you wee a lot and wobble, eat burgers and then sleep in a field. They really know how to have a good time eh?

My weekend was possibly marginally more fun than theirs. Also marginally more fun than having your tail nailed to a plank. In case you've missed the sarcasm here let me be frank, it was crap. It was as boring as a boring thing, and then some. Audrey stayed out of the way for the most part, she's not daft. The shouty woman spent most of the first day smearing that coloured stuff all over the walls in the kitchen and left me to my own devices. I just lay in the doorway and watched.

The clicky ankled lady spent most of her time making "tut" noises and getting in the shouty woman's way. Getting in the shouty woman's way is not to be advised. Unless you like her being more shouty than usual. I personally am not even keen on the level of shoutiness she already seems to have attained. My nerves were in tatters.

Once all the colouring in, tutting and shouting ended I retired to my favourite spot in front of the hot, flickery, burny thing in the clicky ankled lady's living room, anticipating an evening of quality time and biscuits. I do like quality time. And biscuits. Next thing I know, the clicky ankled lady gets her coat on and buggers off out for the evening without so much as a by your leave. And there was I thinking the whole point of my having to stay the night in Salford was so that I would have a little company. I might as well have just stayed at home.

The following day wasn't as bad though. Obviously riddled by guilt the long man and the clippy cloppy woman decided to treat me to a lovely, long walk around Worden park for the first time in ages. Not before time too. Free of the lead at last I made it my mission to get as dirty and stinky as I possibly could before getting back in the metal box thingy, and let me tell you - Worden park in April was designed for getting a puppy filthy. I was chest deep in mud at several points during the walk. The river at this time of year is much deeper too, more than deep enough for swimming in. I was having a fine old time bounding through the undergrowth, squelching through the marshy bits and diving in and out of the stinking water when the long man decided he wanted to play with that bloody tennis ball of his. He took it out of his pocket and proceeded to throw it around with gay abandon. I have now, however, put an end to that particular annoyance. I accidentally on purpose managed to lose it in the river. It took me two attempts, the first time it bobbed to the surface for the long man to retrieve. But the second time, being the clever puppy I am, I ensured that I put a hole in the damned thing first so that it sank like a brick. I did feel a pang of guilt when I saw the look on his face as he realised it was gone forever, but I soon got over that. Life, dear reader, is too short for regrets. And it is too bloody short for chasing tennis balls around.

I'm getting a bit of peace and quiet today since the long man and the clippy cloppy woman have gone over to Salford to arrange with their ne'er do well friends an open day for the scooter club next Sunday. Whatever keeps them out of my fur is all good so far as I am concerned, just so long as they don't expect me to be going to the open day with them.

Who cares?

The long man has embarked on what I consider to be a futile attempt to better himself by changing career. He has thus far done what I can only decribe as a plethora of crappy jobs, and in my opinion that suits him down to the ground. I cannot for the life of me imagine him in any position of responsibility or any position that requires a degree of common sense. Sense of any description, where the long man is concerned, isn't very common at all. Bloody rare in his case. For instance, he loves playing with his tennis ball and always brings it with us when we go to the park. Then he'll proceed to throw the bloody thing away and immediately want it back again. And does he go and get it himself? Does he balls. Muggins here has to go and fetch it for him. So, off I plod, find the damned thing, take it back to him and drop it at his feet, and what does he do? He only goes and throws it away again. Moron. Anyway, as I was saying, he wants a change of career so guess what he's applied to be, a CARER. Him. Caring. Looking after others. Ha. How in the world is that going to work? I'll tell you this, he had better not be expecting me to go to work with him and spend all my time pulling him out of the sticky stuff. I like my mornings listening to the radio and my afternoons watching loose women on the telly thingy whilst licking my lady bits and snoozing. Following the long man around and reminding him to breathe is very low down on my list of priorities I can tell you.

In between his pointlessly completing application forms for jobs he has little or no chance of getting the long man has also been spending a lot of time piddling about with his Vespa. Taking bits off, swearing, putting new bits on, swearing when the new bits fall off, phoning his friends to find out where he's going wrong, putting the fallen off bits back on and then swearing before taking them off again because he forgot to do something else. I'm beginning to have something of an attention deficit where he is concerned. After finally getting the scooter looking and sounding exactly like it looked and sounded immediately before his meddling, at daft-o-clock on Sunday morning, he destroyed the peace and tranquility of another lovely Leyland Sabbath by popp-popp-popping away up the street in a cloud of thick, blue smoke. His mission, along with his friends, was to deliver a seventy nine pence Easter egg to the childrens hospital in Carlisle. I've checked, that is a round trip of one hundred and eighty four miles, and all to drop off a piece of cheap confectionary. Very noble I'm sure, but how much did the fuel for this mammoth journey cost, and more to the point how many poor little asthmatic kiddies were caused to suffer because of the scooterists selfishly pumping god knows how many cubic metres of noxious gasses into the atmosphere?

Meanwhile, free of the long man's sycophantic simpering, the clippy cloppy woman and I took the little people to visit the cat lady and the black furry coat woman. I do enjoy going out with them, and they get a big kick out of it for which I love them all the more, but the journey to the cat lady's house is not the most pleasant. Especially with Wing Commander clippy cloppy at the wheel. It's best described as a roller coaster ride of terror. She seems to use the accelerator like an on/off switch. At least in the new metal box thingy I am situated at the very rear, keeping me a far as is possible from the front which will be the point of impact when the inevitable catastrophic collision, for which we are long overdue, occurs.

The long man returned late in the evening and was walking rather gingerly, like a rider who'd had his horse stolen, and wincing whenever he sat down. Serves the damn fool right, riding all over the place at his age. He proceeded to regale us with the most mundane tales about, well, quite frankly I don't know what they were about. I tend to switch off whenever he starts banging on about most things. I really couldn't be bothered paying attention.

Tomorrow the long man has to go to Manchester for an interview with one of the companies he wants to work for. They must be mad to even consider him. Perhaps they're just toying with him, letting him down gently or are really, REALLY desperate. He's got more chance of seeing a rocking horse take a poo than getting a job with even the tiniest bit of responsibilty. Let us hope that, when the inevitable rejection letter lands on the mat, he will learn his lesson and apply for a more suitable position. Ideally part time and in a biscuit factory, giving him plenty of free time to shower me with gifts of heavily staff-discounted biscuits to which he would have access. Since I don't have fingers, puppy fans, I beg of you to cross yours on my, I mean his, behalf. Thank you, and ta-ta for now.