Thursday, May 21, 2009

The great escape

The other night, Master and I went for a nice late walk.

We had all cruised off to our beds nice and early, deciding that we would go out for a later walk when it was quiet.

Misery, as usual, was lying in her bed (ie on the floor), and suddenly she heard a loud bang. And then another one.

Fireworks! she thought. And wondered if there were going to be lots of them.

Meanwhile, I heard the first nasty loud bang and started. The next time, I decided it was time for action. I pulled in the opposite direction to Master – and as luck would have it – my chain snapped.

Off I skipped. First I ran onto the road, but then remembered there are nasty vehicles on there so I quickly jumped back onto the pavement.

I ran up the street in the opposite direction to Master so he could chase me. But he didn't. He called 'Pippa' and when I waited for him to chase me he just turned and walked in the other direction. I was so disappointed. And I didn't want to be left either, so I quickly ran after him, and he clipped my lead to my collar. Not much of an escape really.

The next day Misery went to the shop to look for a Strong Harness. Hmmmm. She spoke to the man in the shop and agreed to go back with Master and I.

The shop man brought out a very strong looking harness and put it over my head. Then he wanted me to lift my left paw through. But I always lift my right paw first. Perhaps I am right pawed? So Master put my left paw through.

But I think it is rather nice, and it is blue so it matches my blue collar. I wonder if my husky blood is showing through here as a harness-wearing dog?

Here is a top view of my new harness


Down the monkey steps we go


I think there were monkeys here.....


.......Or maybe they were here?


In the swing of it here with Master - walking jauntily


A quick pee-mail


WHO added that silly flower?

Friday, May 15, 2009

Geocatzing

I said in my last post that I would write about our geocatzing adventures so here they are.

Some of you may remember that many months ago Misery Mistress went geocatzing on her own - unsuccessfully. You can read about it here where I pointed out it was clear that she was unsuccessful because she did not take ME.

She has decided that we need to get out exploring and walking more, so came to the conclusion that geocatzing would be just the right thing for that. Master is always happy to buy new toys, so on Saturday they went to buy the GPS unit needed to find the little pots of hidden treasure.

Off we went in my Landy, and we were stopped at the frontier by the Spanish customs police. They are usually nice and friendly and smiley with me, but these two seemed very dour. I was disappointed.

After they had peered and poked all over my Landy, we set off to the location of the cache. It was in a very pretty park on a headland, with lots of spring flowers. And, there were lots of new dog friends to meet and greet and sniff.

We wandered round the nice paths and master and I posed for photos. There are more photos on Misery's other blogs (you can see on the sidebar), including a very good one of my ears.









Then I stood around patiently waiting for Master and Misery to find the cache but they didn't. Makes no difference to me whether they find it or not. I am sure if they had let me off the lead I would have found it. Well, I would have found something, although maybe not treasure - maybe a few nice female dogs would have been interesting. There were no catz to be seen anywhere so I am beginning to think this geocatzing is not about catz at all.

After that we drove to a nice place called Tarifa and Master and I sat in my Landy while Misery took photos of the beautiful beach.



And that's it. So the Pippa verdict on geocatzing is that it is ok from the perspective of going for a drive and a nice walk, but it was rather short on the catz.

Master and Misery went out again in the evening to look for the one up the Rock that Misery could never find, but they didn't take me so I can't report on that.

I have forgotten to thank everyone who voted for me in the GSD Adventures competition April Showers, May Flowers. I didn't win, but I was very pleased with the votes I received, and as Misery only voted for me twice, lots of you must have gone over there - so thank you very much.

Next up - The Great Escape.

Monday, May 11, 2009

History and monkeys

Well, Misery seems to have a problem with her computer. Hal, the Apple.

Anyway, I am not interested as she has bought herself another one called HP, the Sauce.

So long as my blog is updated and there are Pippapix, that is all I care about.

If you are interested in Misery's computer woes (and I tell you – there are plenty of them) you need to look at her blogs. I think the Land Rover blog is free of them.

Now. More interestingly, I was on Monkey Duty the other day.

Sniffing, looking


We had a nice walk up our back streets and came around the top of Trafalgar Cemetery. People think lots of British sailors are buried here from the battle of Trafalgar in 1805, but actually there are only two. Most of those who died at Trafalgar were buried at sea, and Lord Nelson was taken back to the UK for a state funeral. Many of the graves are for people who died from yellow fever in the early 19th century.

Cemetery entrance


Sign about the history of the cemetery


A peaceful spot


Anyway the history lesson is over. As we all know, next to the cemetery are fig trees, where my friends the monkeys come to sit and eat. So yesterday, when I walked past the cemetery I could sniff the monkeys had been there. But I couldn't see them. Only smell them. No monkeys in sight.

Poking head through wall to look for monkeys


I know you are there - or you have been there


Come on monkeys - talk to Pippa


Update -
She has also been too busy GeoCatzing to post this before now, so I will write about my geocatz adventures next.