Further Misadventures of Oscar the Wonder Dog

“Dogs are great. Bad dogs, if you can really call them that, are perhaps the greatest of them all.”

John Grogan, author of Marley and Me.


I knew Oscar had put on a bit of weight.  We both did. We’re not completely stupid, and we’re sort of in the habit of carrying him around when he refuses to go where he’s told, so we had some warning.

He’s become incredibly lazy over this winter.  He won’t even go upstairs to try to sleep on our bed anymore. He’s happy on his sofa. 
Of course it could be because he’s fed up being woken by His Nibs’ snoring, like I am, and like Marley is.  But if we have to suffer he does. 
So sometimes we carry him up to his bed.  I can’t bear the thought of him downstairs by himself in the dark all night. 

He’s put on the weight over the winter.  I think that often happens to dogs.  At least I hope it does.  We go to work  in the dark and get home in the dark and the only decent exercise he gets is when His Nibs takes him to the forest at the weekends.  Other than that it’s just a quick run around.  Sadly, even this doesn’t really happen if there’s heavy rain or snow. 

This doesn’t affect Marley at all.  Because he’s more or less deranged with giddiness.  I don’t know what he does all day, but I imagine there’s a lot of running around in circles in the garden, barking and generally making a nuisance of himself to the neighbours.  Also, as often as not we find the rug from their kennel in the middle of the back garden when we get home.  I assume he drags it out of the kennel, with Oscar still lying on it, in a futile attempt to get his lazy companion to move about a bit and have a play.

The other day,  His Nibs took the pair of them to the vets for their annual check-up.  They had their medicals, and their pedicures, and their weigh in.

No good news for Oscar.  He has to lose three kilos.  They say dogs and their owners grow more alike as they get older, and it would appear that in the case of Oscar and I, that’s completely true.  Except that if I lost three kilos nobody would even notice.  Three stones might make a difference.

Oscar is the three legged one.  Being overweight is particularly bad news for him because carrying around the extra weight puts pressure on his remaining front leg, and may lead to problems in the shoulder later.

I’ve been overweight my entire adult life, and have done nothing about it.  When it comes to the dog, though, it’s a different story.  Something would have to be done.

I hitched him up to a short leash, and took him out for a walk up the main road.
He was furious.  It appears that he no longer likes walking.  He prefers to lie on the sofa and be left alone.

I thought at first that he just didn’t realise that we were going out for a fun walk, that he was going to enjoy himself, and sniff the hedge, and pee at his leisure on his way up and down the road.  

Usually he only wears a short leash to go out in the car.  I assumed he knows this and wasn’t keen to be brought to the vets, or the kennels, or similar places.  I give that dog far too much credit.

He wouldn’t walk.  I swear it, he just sat on his bottom and forced me to drag him along.  This dog is at least seven years old.  He’s been in the habit of being on his leash since he came to live with us, at ten months old.  There’s no question of his not being used to the leash.

Until now there’s been nothing he likes more than a nice walk.  I usually bring him down through the little village we live in and to the tiny park.  This year, though, they’ve gone all posh and filled what used to be a grassy field with fancy wooden adventure structures, for the benefit of our younger residents.  They’ve banned dogs. 

I think that’s a bit unfriendly, actually, but then maybe not everyone brings poo bags on their walks, so you can’t have the children and the dogs in the same place.

We'd taken the main road out of the village.  For some reason, giving the dog a lot more credit than he deserves again, I thought that maybe if we turned back and went through the village he might be more co-operative.  At least the route would be familiar to him.  So we turned, and he suddenly sprung to life, and trotted merrily down the street with me.  Until we got to the entrance of our estate, which we needed to pass.

Once more he sat firmly on the ground.  I’d been through all this yesterday, and had ended up bricking myself that all my dragging would pop his collar over his head again, like it did before. He can’t afford to lose another leg.  So yesterday I brought him home early.  Today, though, I had his harness on him.  Because he has no front leg, the harness doesn’t go around him as it should, and doesn’t really act as a harness at all.  It ended up almost twisted around his neck.

Anyway, I insisted that we carry on.  I found myself talking to him on the road, in a fairly mental fashion.

“Come on, Oscar,  you have to walk.  You need to lose  weight.  This is ridiculous. What kind of dog doesn’t like going for a walk?  Will you come on?  You’re making a show of me”.

The leash was under pressure, him sitting on his bottom, me leaning back on my heels, trying to drag him to movement.

I was right about making a show of me.  The local teenagers were hysterical. 

The sight of this large woman begging a disabled and clearly ridiculously stubborn dog to walk must have been quite a sight, in our small village.

I had to drag him every step of the way.  The little brat. I’m afraid to look at his arse, it must be red raw from being dragged along the road.

I was still giving out stink to him as we walked in the garden gate. His Nibs was gardening, as always. He immediately started pitying the dog, and saying I’d pushed him too far, and it was too much exercise all of a sudden.

I tried to explain that he’d been carrying on since we left the house, well before there was any question of over exercise.  That in fact, he’d done feck all exercise, having been on his arse the whole time we were out.

But when Oscar threw himself on the hall floor, panting and carrying on as if he’d been put to work in a coalmine, His Nibs immediately rushed to his aid, carrying him to the sofa, and bringing him a bowl of water to sip from.

We’ve stopped all treats, but to be fair, he never had human food, he’s only ever had high protein dog food and a Bonio a day.  We can’t cut his food down by much. 

The dog is absolutely livid.  It’s obvious he’s not speaking to me. 

 

How in the name of God am I going to get nearly half a stone off a disabled and difficult dog?

Heels over Head

I've taken a notion.

I have decided, very suddenly, for no good reason, and showing no common sense at all, that I should embrace heels.

I was never a big fan of the heel.  I've only ever worn them going out, and if I can get away with it, I don't wear them then. 
I was lucky enough to be young in the grunge years, when you were considered dressed up if your Doc Martens were the genuine article, so I never really got acquainted with the stiletto.

They look like instruments of torture, and let's face it we all know that that's what they are. 

But my work summer shoes, a pair of red pumps, have become shockingly shabby looking during their holiday under the stairs, and last week I decided that if I'm to carry on with any dignity whatsoever, I had to get a new pair.

I hadn't the slightest intention of buying heels when I went into the shop.  I went straight to the pumps section.  Not a single shoe there even caught my eye, an unusual occurrence enough.

As I wandered around, I caught sight of a pair of nude court shoes, with a much higher heel than I'm used to.
I remember a couple of years ago, when everyone who was anyone was wearing nude coloured stilettoes.  I remember it, because I was so jealous of the glamour that the other girls were prancing around in, that I got a burning pain in my jealousy zone ( a spot between the heart and the stomach, just at the bottom of the rib cage, and in the middle, in case you're nicer than me, and aren't familiar with your jealousy zone).

I knew then that I'd never be able to wear those shoes.  The combination of a back injury about six years ago, and a husband who is the same height as me in our stocking feet, put paid to any notions of glamorous heels some time ago.
Now, for some reason, when I saw them in the shop my first thought was
"Life is so unfair.  I'm a good person.  I should be allowed, at last, to have a pair of nude court shoes."

It dawned on me eventually that the only person stopping me is myself.  If I'm willing to put up with them, I can wear what I like.
I started to tell myself that shoes are different now than they were years ago, they're all wide fit or soft sole or designed to take the pressure off the balls of your feet, and I'd probably be fine.  I put the shoes on, walked around the shop for a few minutes, skidded twice and wobbled once, told myself the result was better than I'd expected, and I put them under my arm while I continued looking around.

Then I saw a pair of black suede shoes with tiny kitten heels.  I stopped and had a good old stare at them.  If I couldn't manage the court shoes, I'd still need work shoes, wouldn't I?  Maybe I needed a back up plan?  Under my other arm with them.

The obvious thing to do would be to put the first pair back on the shelf once I'd chosen the second pair.  But I didn't do that.  Because the black ones have almost no heels at all.

Regular readers will know that I turned forty a few months ago (God knows I made enough fuss about it at the time).

Dylan Thomas once wrote

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light

I've developed a fear that I'm tending toward going gently into that good night.  It's too early.  I've a lot of fun to have yet.  And I feel that I should be having it in heels.
I'm worried that if I don't start wearing heels again now, I might be in orthopaedic shoes within a few years.

I was absolutely sure, by the time I got back to work that fateful lunchtime, that I'd never walk in the nude courts. 
I placed them under my desk, with all the other shoes, and began wearing the black ones.  I told myself that the whole project would have to be undertaken in stages.  I'd start off in kitten heels, and work my way up to the big girl shoes.
Obviously I should have gone back to the shop with them.  But I didn't.
And yesterday I decided that feck it, since it was Monday anyway, I might as well give the high shoes a try.  Better to break my ankle on a Monday than on a Friday, I told myself.  I don't know why.  I suppose things are so difficult on Mondays anyway that a broken ankle is all that you'd expect.

I warned my colleagues that I was taking a big step today, both literally and figuratively.  I suggested that if one or two of them wanted to walk beside me, ready to catch me when I fell, that might be a good idea.  They didn't seem keen.  I don't know why.

I wore the shoes anyway.  I'm as brave as a lion.  I got all the way to lunchtime without a stumble a trip or a fall.  Not even a blister to show for my efforts.

Did I celebrate this victory by smiling quietly and congratulating myself on still being able to keep up with the other girls?
I did not.
I put my pumps back on and insisted my good friend Ciara accompany me back to the same shop again.
I saw a lovely pair of shoes in there on Saturday. They were lovely, but even higher than the nude coloured pair I'd been wearing all morning.

For some reason I thought that if I could handle the court shoes, I should keep pushing myself.  Ciara, bewildered now, I'd imagine, by my utter lack of common sense, stood back and watched while I walked around in what I hoped would be my next victory.



I say I walked around.
I actually staggered around the shoe department, while the other shoppers jumped out of my way.  I caught a fleeting glance of myself in the mirror.  I would have run away too. 

I suppose Ciara thought she should be kind and try to talk me down, rather than just tell me what a twit I was being.  She suggested a more realistic pair for me.

 

But I wouldn't have it.  Sure they were only the same height as the nude courts.  What's the point in that?  Where's the challenge?
Then Ciara suggested that since I already have a new pair of black shoes, maybe I should just wear them.

Then she must have lost her head completely, because she suggested that I shouldn't buy any more shoes until I've worn out all the ones I already have.  I refused on the basis that I'll be dead by then.

I didn't buy anything yesterday.  I suppose I should calm down. One step at a time. 
And in my heart I know that within a week I'll be back in my flats.

After all, as a wise woman once said, if high heels were so great, wouldn't men be wearing them?