Well, goodness gracious me - Cathar curries!

Earlier this week saw a large increase in activity around the kitchen with some lovely smells arising from whatever was going on there. The action levels reached a peak on Thursday morning, just before the unexpected arrival of some 13 of my favourite people, all of whom, for some reason, were dressed very strangely.

Soon all was revealed. I turned out that mum and dad were holding a Curry Tiffin lunch for a load of friends and that dressing up in true Indian style was requested. Some people excelled themselves at this challenge whilst others were a little more modest.

Another feature was the application of a large red dot between the eyes - apparently some Indian mark of one's status in society. Even yours truly was not excluded from this but then I suppose that is only right in view of my position in the social hierarchy of this family.

With dad in the role of head chef, some four large vats of curry together with a large assortment side dishes, nibbles, and other delicacies were served up followed by a scrumptious Indian dessert made by Auntie Jo.

Not unexpectedly, bottle stuff was, as usual, in good supply, but strangely there was also a pot of stuff which had various bottlestuffs emptied into it together with all sorts of spices and fruits and then heated up. Apparently this is called mulled wine - a new one on me - and it proved exceedingly popular. I did not get offered any to try so I cannot comment. However, the end result of all this imbibing was that a good time was being had by all.

I didn't manage to sample any of the curries either, but I did manage to snaffle a samosa, a bit of naan bead, and a bit of poppadum when no one was looking and they were yummy.

And now I also have a new best friend - Uncle Stuart and Auntie Jo's son Tom who was over here for Xmas. He is a lovely person and I spent quite a bit of time on his lap and even managed a bit of a snooze whilst I was there.

As I had been up all day organising and then socialising, and as Uncle Tim and Auntie Mary stayed over that night, it was very late by the time I actually hit the sack. Consequently I had a bit of catching up on my sleep to do the next day as well. Come to think of it, I might just need a bit more.

Oh, and by the way, it is three years to the day today that I came to live here in lovely Montazels. Where did those three years go?

Happy New Year everyone.

Frightening objects and an industrial injury

Now as you all know I am a big, brave hunt dog and not much scares me...... but I must admit that occasionally something rather silly does. The other day mum bought a new pair of kitchen tongs - and they frighten the life out of me. Maybe it's because they are purple.

And I have always been a bit worried by the big ceiling fan in the lounge but recently this star thing has appeared dangling below it and that is really scary. I have to sit and stare at it for hours....just in case!

Yesterday my nursing skills were called upon. Basically, dad fell off a ladder in the garage, landed on his head on the concrete floor, and was rapidly leaking blood everywhere. Mum tended to the practical aspects of stopping the blood flow, dressing the wound, and administering brandy whilst I stepped in to administer TLC and maintain a "concussion watch" just in case he had done any real damage.

Glad to say that thanks to our combined efforts he is fine today apart from a small lump on his head and some quite sore bits of body. I think I might need to slip back into an 'elf and safety advisor role to ensure there is no repeat.

Other than that, all is well on the run up to Xmas. Dad has still to buy some more bottle stuff but mum is pretty much on top  of the food situation. I understand we are having "eggs benedict royale" (smoked salmon instead of ham) for Xmas day brekkie so I will look forward to that!


Oh, and by the way, my ringworm has nearly all cleared up and I stop getting the daily daubes soon, thank goodness. And it has been raining for three days now!!!!!!

Being a care assistant turns out to be quite a tiring occupation, so the sofa beckons.

Out of sorts and isolated!

Hello again everyone. Yes, I know that once again it has been over a month since I posted but this time I do have an excuse.

You see, I have been a little out of sorts having come out in a rash in a few places including one that I would rather not go into. Turns out that I have contracted ringworm and it seems that I have caught it from one of my best mates. Now I am not going to name any names as I do not want to be dragged up in front of the Leverson enquiry or anything similar - but you know who you are.  Although the rash is now largely sorted I am banished from contacting any other dogs for a few weeks yet and still get daubed twice daily with this evil smelling (and tasting) liquid. I don't mind that except my mum really should not be asked to handle that part of my anatomy with such frequency (I now have a new name "Willy the Worm").  This is a clue as to where the original rash started!

Other that that things have been pretty quiet as I am not allowed doggy visitors. Mum popped over to see her dad in England for a week so dad and I had a bachelor week together. Then dad popped back to see his dear friend Clive who is very ill, so mum and I had a few days of "cuddle time" together - lovely! Thing is, when one of them is away I have to be even better behaved than normal as I cannot then play one of them off against the other - something I am very adept at.

Suddenly there is a flurry of decorating activity going on with lots of lights being put up, a tree being decorated, and baubles everywhere. I guess it must be that time of year again called Christmass, although judging by the antics of the last few years it ought be be called "Super bottle stuff time" as so much of it gets consumed. Still, another couple of weeks and it will all be over and we can get back to normal.

Will report back soon with a progress report. In the meantime I had better get a bit of rest before the social rigors of the festive season descend upon us.

Frog dog goes to Spain

I know - it has been nearly a month since I last spoke to you all. SORRY! But, I have just been on hols to Spain for the very first time so now I have got something to write about.

On Monday we all set off to Cadaqués which is a small, pretty, little town on the north east coast of Spain only about three hours drive from home.

Now I love traveling in the car and I also love staying in hotels as it means I get to sleep on the beds with my mum and dad.We did loads of walking during the days, interspersed with eating, and of course, for mum and dad, much of the bottle stuff.

We stopped at a few cafés for refreshments and in some the nice people brought me out my own bowl of water - very welcome. It was also a great opportunity to have a cuddle with my mum. Well, I was on holiday after all!

Cadaqués has its own lighthouse about an hour's walk from the town so we all marched out to see that. I saw no ships!

It is also  the place where Savador Dali spent many of his childhood summers and for this reason the local tourist information office has a lifesize cutout photo of him outside. Now Dali was a bit of a scary looking guy and the first time I came face to face with this I have to say I was a bit frightened. Not that I showed it, of course, so I put on a big show of bravado and loads of barking, much to the amusement of the locals.

Much as I like holidays, they can take it out of you so it was a good job there was a comfortable bed for me (and dad) to crash out on and recover.

It was a lovely holiday and I really enjoyed it, but I fear it will take a fair amount of relaxing to fully recover from it. I am off to do some now.

Found a new pub & vendage ends

Mum, dad and I went for a bit of a drive yesterday and, after a somewhat circuitous route, finished up in Chalabre. Now I have never been there before and dad was thirsty so we stopped to look around. To my delight we homed in a cheerful looking bar and ordered drinks all round. I have to say they certainly do a good bowl of draught water there, not that dad was interested in that of course.

Me outside the new pub

Sad day today as, at about seven o'clock this morning a very large and noisy grape picking machine went up the hill, woke up my mum,  and started harvesting Uncle Francois' merlot grapes. These are the last grapes to be picked in my neck of the woods so now my choice of early morning snack is limited to those grapes that either the pickers or the machines have missed. Mind you, there are a fair amount of those, and as the leaves fall off the vines it gets easier to find them! Probably enough to keep me going for a few weeks yet.

Still enjoying lots of nice sunny hot days here although apparently the pool has cooled to socially unacceptable temperatures, not that I would know. Suppose I had better go and bag a few more rays.

Scary dogs and creature comforts

The other day my best mate, Lilly, came round to lunch with her mum and dad. The humans, as per usual, gathered round the table and got stuck into loads of food and the bottle stuff.

I had not seen her for a while so there was a lot of catching up to do, a bit of lizard hunting, and then we decided to have a contest to see who could look the scariest dog. I won, of course!

Today mum and dad went shopping and came back with a lovely present for me. It is a super soft rug to go in the conservatory in front of my day bed. Those of you who know how much I like my home comforts will appreciate that I took to it straight away and have hardly been off it since.

In fact, it is so comfortable I might just have to try it out for a quick nap.

I've found my ideal job

I was browsing through the local paper the other day when I came across a very interesting article. It was talking about the methods used by wine growers in our region to tell when the time is right to harvest the grapes. Traditionally this has been done by measuring the sugar content of the grapes using a reflectometer or by doing a more detailed analysis in the lab looking at other features such as acidity levels.

However, it appears that increasingly some growers are abandoning the time honoured methods in favour of using taste buds. And here I don't just mean their taste buds, but more importantly those of their dogs. One grower reported that he decides when it is time to harvest when "his dog decides to start eating the grapes".

Those of you who follow this blog will be well aware of my penchant for the noble grape but I am fussy in ensuring their ripeness first. It would appear, therefore, that I have found my ideal role in life - that of Chief Taster of the Grapes. 

Me at work in my new role

On that basis they should have started harvesting here last week as I have been busy munching grapes for about 10 days now - but they are only just getting round to it in our locale. Don't say I didn't tell them, and don't blame me for a duff vintage!

Cooler now, mums first tomato, serpent identified

Bit of a mixed bag of news this time but as I have not been in touch for a while I thought I would just give you all a general update.


First of all, thank goodness the really hot spell, where it touched 40 degrees on a couple of days and was really steamy for over a week, is finally over. The other night I had the best night's sleep in ages with the temperature indoors only 21 instead of the 28/29 it has been and a total absence of humming aircon or whirring fans. Bliss! Well, you know how much I like my kip.

Mum's first tomato

 Now as usual dad has been growing his cherry tomatoes this year and very nice they are too! (Don't ask) He buys the little plug plants from our local supermarket and always gets a really good crop. This year, however,  mum decided to set up in competition as she had been given some free seeds. Well, lovingly nurtured and carefully tended, they are now producing fruit and today she proudly picked her first, very own tomato and here is a photo to prove it.





Those of you Facebook friends will be aware that the other day I had a close encounter with a snake (or serpent as they call them here). Well, dad got a good look at it and scoured the internet in an effort to identify it. Turns out to be a young Montpellier snake which is a bit venomous but not of the death inducing variety. Mum was a bit relieved at that as she seems a bit worried that I might adopt it as a new playmate.

My best mate, Lily the teckel, is back from her hols in the mountains so I can't wait for her to pop over so we can have a good catchup.

Oh, and as you can see, I got a bit fed up with the change of design of my blog page so I have selected another one and will see how this appeals.

As today is a lovely, sunny, and moderately warm day I might now just go and do a bit of sunbathing on the deck to top up my brown bits. Speak to you all again soon.

I love Australians!

I've decided that I love people from Australia! Not that I have met that many, and those that I have met mostly originated in the UK so I suppose they are not real Australians. There is Uncle Paul who I have known since I was a pup, and there Is Uncle Steve (Slater) who pops over each year to visit his little house in Montazels. And then there are the totally psuedo Australians like Uncle Den and Auntie Jo who used to live here but now live in Oz.

Now there are two more lovely Aussies (again of UK origin) with whom I am deeply in love - Uncle Chris and Auntie Helen. They are over here on holiday and have been living in Montazels for the last three months. The other day they popped round to see us with arms full of the bottle stuff so I knew how the evening was going to turn out. Once everyone had a full glass and was settled down I decided to join them on the swing seat and play my role as host.

A jolly evening was had by all and much blanquette and beer was consumed - not by me I hasten to add. And what is even better, it did not tire me out at all so I was able to give mum and dad grief until well after bedtime!

Will this social whirl ever end?

A very special announcement.

This is my 100th blog. It seems only yesterday that I started blogging but it was actually back in December 2008. In those two and a half years I have had almost 2000 hits on my blog from over 60 countries around the world. It sends a shiver down my very long spine to think that all of these lovely people have taken the trouble to read about the antics of an insignificant little dog in the South of France.

 Last time I was telling you all about the hectic social time I had been having. Well, I have to report that it continues!  First of all Uncle Steve Brann turned up from England to check up on his recently burgled house.He came round several times and we had a good old catchup as I had not seen him for ages.

As I told you in the last blog, another Uncle Steve (Hall this time) arrived from Scotland and I had not seen him since I was a pup. He came round to watch the F1 race at Silverstone and then stayed for dinner. After the race they retreated to the pool deck where dad got out the bottle stuff (no surprise there then). I joined Uncle Steve on the balancelle (swing seat to you) and decided it was about time I partook of some of this apparent elixir of fun so I stuck my tongue into his glass of rosé. I was OK but I must say I prefer beer.

My dinner was served al fresco on the deck and I was called. Imagine my horror to then find Uncle Steve apparently tucking into my evening repas. Well, I was having none of that and soon saw him off and quickly scoffed the lot. I did hear someone comment that "that was the whole idea" but I have no idea what they meant.

I later returned to find mum and Uncle Steve snuggled up together on the swing. For some reason I don't fully understand, dad was not at all put out by this.

On Tuesday we went to Auntie Mary and Uncle Tims's for lunch. Their son Matt and his lovely lady Natalie were over from the UK, and once again I had not seen them since my puppyhood. She works for one of the county's leading vets and has two big dogs of her own so we got on like a house on fire.  And it is always nice to see Auntie Mary and Uncle Tim so I tried to behave really well for them all. Rumour has it that I succeeded!


No matter how much I do of this socialising, it does not get any less tiring so I am sure you will not be at all surprised to learn that it is time for some shuteye.

Best in show!

I went to my first fete today. It was at the local rugby club and as it had been organised in part by a Brit it had many of the things that I am told are typical for such a fete in the UK. These included tug-of-war, bobbing for apples, splat the rat, and skittles. However, instead of the usual burger stalls there were stalls selling gateau, snails, and cassoulet. Very French!

There was also a dog show. At least there was supposed to be a dog show, but I was the only dog who entered. Therefore it was not much of a dog show but naturally I cleaned up and got best in show. Well, I would, wouldn't I, with my good looks! Here I am being presented with my rosette.

It was also a great chance to meet up with a few old friends and especially my mate, Steve Hall, who had just flown in from Edinburgh for a few days. Last time I saw him I was a mere pup.

All this competing and socialising is very enjoyable but in these temperatures in can be quite exhausting. I spent most of the evening stretched out on the cool tiled floor recovering, but still wearing my rosette of course!

Conned, surprised, delighted, exhausted!

So there we were, dad and I, last Thursday - two days before the Big Party - working away in the garage getting things ready. Mum had left earlier that morning to "go and have lunch with Auntie Jo in Mirepoix" (reason for the quote marks  will be obvious shortly). The front door bell rang. As we were not expecting anyone dad and I went down to investigate, only to find the godkids from England, Grant and Becky, coming in through the gate, shortly followed by their parents in the car with mum. Turned out that the whole Brigdale clan had arrived for dads party and we had been right royally conned by mum - something she planned back in December apparently. Naturally dad and I were both gobsmacked and delighted to see them all and I gave my usual extravagant welcome to each of them in turn.

Even better news was that they were staying for a whole week so I had loads of time to have fun with my mates.

Then came the day of the Big Party. Bar-Nez was fully stocked, the music was up and running, food fully prepared, and the pool freshly cleaned.  The initial trickle of party goers soon turned into a steady stream and things were off to their usual lively start. It was lovely to see loads of old friends again including by bestest mates Lily and Boudie. A few snaps of the event follow to which I will add no comments!

General concensus was that the party was up to normal standards and certainly, judging by how tired I was the next day, I sure did have a good time.

The rest of the week was really just a continuation of the party with just us and the Brigdales. As I am sure you can imagine, far too much of the bottle stuff was consumed (especially by dad and Uncle Clive) and a good time was had by all. Sadly they have just left to fly home. I shall miss them a lot as it is always so much fun when they are here. However, after all that partying I have some serious catching up to do on my kip so you may not hear from me for a while.

Hippie Birdie dear Dad

Today is my dad's 65th birthday and I have been giving a lot of thought to what I might get him as a present. I finally decided that I would have a T shirt made for him with one of the two logos shown below.

First one is a bit geeky as he loves his computers but at least my mate Jon Tack will appreciate it. The second is 'cause he can be a bit of a big kid at times. Problem is I could not decide which one to have made. In the end I ran out of time, but apparently it is the thought that counts.

I spent some of the morning helping him read his cards and unwrap his presents - just love the ripping paper bit!

Then Auntie Jane and Uncle Martin came round with my best mate Lily and we spent an hour tearing round the garden. Trouble is I'm not used to all this exercise during the morning and had to have a rather large kip on my dad's lap at lunchtime. Mind you, so did he!

Big party on Saturday with loads of friends coming round together with my mates Lily and Boudie. I had better start stockpiling some rest as it is going to be a tiring day, I feel. Full report later.

Early morning, vine pruning, loss of a mate, and a late night

What a day it was yesterday! It all started at 6:20 am - yes I know none of us normally see that part of the day - when I was rudely awakened from my slumbers by two cats fighting outside. Naturally I had to bark very loudly at this, in the process waking mum and dad, and then I demanded to go outside to investigate. Having satisfied my natural curiosity I then went straight back to bed to finish my kip but for some reason mum and dad seemed unable to do this!

That morning dad and I decided that our grape vine growing over the drinking patio needed a good prune to keep it in tip top condition and to allow the plentiful bunches of grapes now forming to develop. He chopped away and I tried to collect all the bits as they fell, but apparently distributing them around the garden and eating them was not what I was supposed to do. The the vine was sprayed to prevent mildew, at which point I had to retreat as we had not got a mask that fitted my muzzle.

Over the last few months I have been watching the growth of an albino baby bunny in the garden opposite and have grown quite fond of him. Imagine how distraught I was to look over the wall last night to find he had been run over right outside our house. I shall miss watching him gambol about.

Dad and I sat down to watch the Canadian Grand Prix at 6pm. Five and a half hours later (!) it finally finished, having been stopped for over two hours due to torrential rain. However, it was well worth staying up for as it was a stonker of a race and my dad's favourite, Jenson Button, won in the last lap.

So what with being woken up at 6:20 am and not getting to bed until 11:30 pm it was a very long day for me. I somehow feel that today will not involve a lot of activity on my part other than curling up on the sofa. so Shhhhhhhh! - don't wake me.