She did get totally confused one day in the local park when a lady practising Tai Chi appeared to be giving Mila the ‘come here!’ signal . . .
Mila is an Old English sheepdog, and we named her after the Casa Mila, a famous building in Barcelona, but we often joke, ‘You can call her what you like – she can’t hear you!’ She is cute and cuddly and has the most gorgeous blue eyes – unusual in a pet, but a sure sign of deafness, we now realize.
People always want to stroke her, and often comment that it is a shame she can’t hear, but in reality it is a challenge for us, not for Mila. Fireworks, loud traffic and machinery do not worry her, and of course she sleeps very soundly.
She can totally disarm the most loud and aggressive dogs (or people) with a wag of her tail and a nuzzle of her big black nose.
She doesn’t have an ounce of malice in her. Mila, our lovable deaf dog, is the most wonderful, friendly companion – we are so glad she chose us.
LIKES people, dogs, cats
DISLIKES rain, grooming
FINEST HOUR when she wandered onto a nudist beach and discovered a taste for suncream
Sandra Stansfield, Shrewsbury
Teddy, Labradoodle
WE TALKED of having a dog for some time, but there were a few obstacles to overcome. The husband was reluctant, the son had allergies and could I fit the walks in on a busy day with three children to get to school on time? Finally the husband caved in, and so I set about searching for the ‘right’ dog for us.
Early in 2012 I visited Broadreach Dogs near Cambridge and met Teddy, the F2 miniature Labradoodle. Medium-sized, she assured me, and not likely to shed hair at all, so ideal for my son. Of the puppies, Teddy seemed incredibly laid-back, not bothered if he was chosen or not. Maybe a good sign, I thought.
We brought him home at nine weeks old and he simply fitted in like an old slipper. No crying through the night, just a few little accidents on the floor (only to be expected) and a slight change of lifestyle to accommodate another little person that needed care and attention. But the rewards? Almost too many to mention. A sweet-natured softie that greets us all with a waggy tail every single morning.
From the beginning, I took him with me in his cage in the car, so he’s happy to sit and wait during the school pick-up or while I shop. He’s not too big when we holiday in our caravan, and is completely relaxed as we head out on our boat for a trip along the coast near East Head.
Teddy was one year old yesterday. The children sang him ‘Happy Birthday’. But for me, the best bit is the walking. I never used to walk anywhere – always too busy – so I just took the car. Now I love it. Rain or shine, he’s happiest when jumping through long grass looking like a little lamb, trying to catch a hare – and that makes me smile. He’s the best decision we made in 2012.
LIKES devouring pigs’ ears
DISLIKES a wash in the utility sink
FINEST HOUR being dressed in a Build-a-Bear tutu and revelling in the attention
The Wilson Family, Northamptonshire
Barclay, best friend
BARCLAY, THE best golden retriever that ever lived, did not have a good start to life. I found him at a puppy farm, which I tried in vain to have closed down. He and his siblings were taken away from their mother far too early and were sickly and undernourished.
The vet was not optimistic when he inspected this unhealthy little dog, and gave him a year at most. But with lots of care and monthly hormone injections that I became an expert at administering, he lived until he was thirteen.
When my son Adrian was born, Barclay took it upon himself to be his guardian at all times, parking himself beside the pram or cot and keeping a sharp lookout for any interlopers. He entered into all games with a grandfatherly indulgence, and saw off our other golden retriever, Diggetty, whose favourite diet seemed to be small motor cars, Transformers and pieces of Lego.
Diggetty’s dietary requirements also ran to children’s food: at Adrian’s fourth birthday party, he was caught red-handed, or rather, red-muzzled, paws up on the table, helping himself to all the strawberry jellies and sweets. A howl from the birthday boy and Barclay was in like a flash, dragging the culprit off the table and giving him a headmasterly ticking-off, which resulted in some sulking and skulking on the naughty step while Barclay graciously welcomed the small visitors.
But Barclay’s greatest gift was that he could talk. He was a huge hit with my parents. My mother, in between visits, would phone for a chat. She would say, ‘Put Barclay on the line.’ I would hold the receiver to his ear while she inquired about his health and well-being, and he would answer with a series of snorts and grunts. On arriving home from excursions, we would be greeted with a curled lip and grunted rumblings.
This picture of Adrian and Barclay’s tea party is one of my most treasured. I have neither of them any more, but I have wonderful memories.
LIKES biltong (South African dried meat)
DISLIKES loud bangs (not really a retriever, more a human being)
FINEST HOUR emerging from the trees after disappearing for hours at the shock of some clay-pigeon shooting in the area, and being greeted by frantic, tearful owners
Jackie Pilkington, Salisbury
PART SEVEN
PAMPERED CHARMERS
Lupin, the best cat in the world
‘CALL ME Lupin.’ Actually, he started off as Lulu until he showed us all otherwise. Exchanged for a bottle of champagne, we got him for my son’s sixth birthday, and he’s remained Joe’s cat for twelve years now. He’s endured being laughed at openly by a cleaner, who thought his black moustache hilarious, and he’s suffered being slung out regularly for hours on end by a visiting American sister-in-law with ‘asthma issues’ (‘He’s in the damn house – I just know it’). He used to follow the family into church, but then came the schism: the vicar was happy to have him, but the churchwarden objected, so Lupin got slung out of another joint.
He’s very well loved – somehow a touchstone to keep anxiety a little bit further away. Joe has one of his whiskers in an ornate gilt frame in his room at college, a relic. Some months ago, he snapped a tendon in his right front paw and now sits around with one foot off the ground. The vet declared it inoperable. I’m positive they were in it together. There are five flights of stairs in the house, and he gets picked up and taken to various sinks because he refuses to drink still water.
So there are shades of mortality for him, and I get concerned about where we’re going to bury him. The garden’s not deep enough to ensure he stays under – the previous cat had to be given a showbiz interment in a Zippos Circus skip on Blackheath (there was a council strike on and the dump was closed). It’ll be sad to see him go, but it’ll be a welcome break for me from being the human palanquin. His headstone will say: Lupin, the Best Cat in the World. Reader, I carried him.
LIKES watching snooker
DISLIKES police horses
FINEST HOUR uncanny and intense glaring at sister-in-law from garden bench
Dave Ashmore, Blackheath
Marmaduke, surf dude
WITHIN TWO weeks of moving into our cottage, Colin was off to the cat rescue centre. I arrived home from the hairdresser to find that Marmaduke had been installed. He claimed Marmaduke ‘had chosen him’.
The next two or three weeks were absolute hell. Not only was Marmaduke a confident adult cat with a high opinion of himself, he also thought he was in charge. It took a lot of persuasion (and some physical injuries) on our part, but eventually he got the message that he was one of the family, not the team leader. He still lets us know his opinion on most things, but at least not via the medium of teeth and claws.
Marmaduke is a very sociable cat, and loves nothing better than joining in. Three months after he moved in we held a housewarming party. How would he cope? When we tracked him down in the middle of the party he was on the lawn, between two of our friends, wearing my sunhat.
We have since discovered that he has a thing about dressing up, and he
now has his own wardrobe. His favourite item of clothing is his Puchi ‘Talk to the Paw’ diamanté-encrusted T-shirt.
He is so well and truly one of the family that we also take him on holiday, though finding cat-friendly accommodation can be a challenge. He’s been to Pembrokeshire and the Peak District, the Cotswolds and the West Country. He’s walked on Dartmoor and explored the New Forest; he’s even visited some English Heritage properties. We have to watch out for dogs, but the only incident to date is an unprovoked attack on a golden retriever.
Cornwall is his favourite destination as we stay by the sea, so he can go rock-pooling, eat fish and chips and indulge his passion for surfing. You think we’re joking.
LIKES sleeping, fish suppers, grooming
DISLIKES our rabbits, rising before four p.m.
FINEST HOUR attending a New Year’s Eve party at a neighbour’s house
Janette Dollamore and Colin Stenning, Cobham, Surrey
Daisy the chicken
EVERYONE SAYS it’s cruel to keep a hen all on its own. My other hens eventually died, and I was going to get her some companions until it quickly became obvious that she was positively thriving as a lone hen. In fact, she’s by far the happiest, healthiest hen I’ve ever had.
True, I’m around most of the time so she has company, and she has the freedom of the garden too. She squawks like mad if I dare to confine her to her palatial run (which is a massive twenty by twenty feet, complete with sand for dust-bathing), so I usually give in and let her wander freely.
She’s a real character, and loves trying to terrorize my cats, not to mention the two seagulls who have turned up daily for the past five years for their own tin of cat food, the pigeon collective and a family of pheasants that visit most days. As for the fox, I don’t think he’d dare!
She lays daily, and potters about in my office where I play her YouTube films of hens and chicks (she loves the one that plays a song called ‘Chicken Train’), and sits on the floor in silence until it’s finished.
She knows her name and comes if she’s called. She’s incredibly curious, and is always up for a new game with a ball or checking out what’s in the grocery bags when I arrive back from the supermarket.
The biggest problem is that she will try to eat the cats’ food (I put her back in her pen so she doesn’t wolf down their biscuits, which she’ll do at breakneck speed given half a chance).
I think she loves being a lone hen, and doesn’t miss being bullied and pecked by other hens at all, an inevitable and less appealing aspect of keeping hens.
LIKES any food – especially cheese and courgettes – except hen food
DISLIKES not being allowed to sleep on the cats’ cushions
FINEST HOUR getting into the car boot and pecking at all the grapes
Barbara Baker, Truro
Myrtle, lovable disgrace
THIS IS Myrtle, a one-year-old miniature wire-haired dachshund. She arrived at our home in Cambridgeshire last summer to join our family of four. She has tan eyebrows to match her paws and chops.
We were going to call her Bertha or Daphne, but my five-year-old son and eight-year-old daughter liked Myrtle, due to some Harry Potter character who hangs around in the loos (this should have been an omen, as you will see).
Our old cocker spaniel, Mabel, had just fitted in and caused no trouble. Myrtle, on the other hand, sussed out early on that an entire village was there to fawn over her and that it would be rude not to make the most of it by urinating on every surface in the house, fouling in every room, attempting to eat it and crying and yelping every time I went off to do something upstairs.
Things have improved considerably, and my love for Myrtle has reached a point I thought was only reserved for children. People stop in the street to admire her cuteness. At dinner parties, Myrtle is passed around the table along with the After Eights. Even the most hardy of middle-aged farmers have tickled her tummy while talking about the threat of wind farms.
My husband says that a third child would have needed less clearing up and attention. He has a point, but I can’t seem to get enough of her wet nose nudging my hand for tickles, and the joy I get from watching her wedge herself into any open cupboard or welly will never falter.
My husband was never a fan. However, not long ago Myrtle suddenly sat up and looked across the room at him. She then padded across in front of us. He gave her an ear scratch and looked at me with a smug smile. She’s no fool, my Myrtle.
LIKES running up to the biggest dog in the park, barking at them and then running away yelping when they turn around to sniff hello
DISLIKES our garden: she treads on it like it’s emitting poison
FINEST HOUR working out that she did actually fit in her bed if she moved around ninety degrees
Charlotte Andrews, Cambridgeshire
Cameron, tortoiseshell cat
CAMERON ARRIVED from the cat rescue centre as a tiny scrap of tortoiseshell fur with a snuffle. She had been hand-reared, and for the first few weeks I had to feed her from the tip of my finger. She slept deep in the fur of our other cat, the tolerant Wadworth.
Eventually she lost the snuffle and began to grow, though she was never a large cat. From very early on she became the ‘property’ of our five-year-old daughter, Laura, an arrangement which seemed to suit them both. She slept on Laura’s pillow at night and when, several years later, she discovered how to purr, she would purr only for Laura. She also discovered where Laura went during the day and would make the 200-yard trip to the infant-school playground, searching until she found her. In the summer she would find Laura’s classroom and go in to find her, causing havoc.
She had a taste for adventure, and loved travelling in the car. If my husband or I spotted her wandering the streets, all we had to do was open the passenger door. She would jump in and spend the rest of the journey with her back legs on the seat and her front paws on the dashboard, watching the traffic. Everyone knew her in the village, and people we didn’t know would tell us where they had seen her.
Cameron had an ambivalent attitude towards dogs. Most she would see off with a cold stare, but once she went home with a family with a Labrador, with whom she spent the night.
LIKES Laura, Laura’s pillow, climbing the ladder to Laura’s cabin bed, exploring
DISLIKES people who were not Laura (at least during her early years)
FINEST HOUR always being aware of when Laura was in trouble (a not infrequent occurrence) and following her upstairs to her bedroom to offer lots of love and purrs
Rachel Leonard, Bucks
Murphy, Abyssinian cat
I INHERITED Murphy as a pet when I met and married his owner, Tony. It was clear from the start that I would have to share my new husband’s affections, but it was his unashamed devotion to the gorgeous pedigree Abyssinian that finally convinced me that this was the man for me.
As a tiny kitten, Murphy would climb onto Tony’s head, and as he got older he’d sit on his chest, put his front legs around his neck and nuzzle his face. Whether we were entertaining or eating alone, Murphy would join us, jumping onto a spare chair and peering inquisitively over the table. He would never climb on the table or try to take food from our plates, but he was delighted to lick plates and had a gourmet’s appreciation of spicy chillies and tagines, although crème fraîche was his favourite.
Typically for Abyssinians, Murphy loved people and wanted to be part of everything that was going on. Once, when we were having new flooring fitted, he got himself trapped under the floorboards. Another tradesman was almost startled into crashing his van when, halfway home from a job, Murphy jumped onto the front seat. He regularly got himself shut in the garage or one of our cars, not to mention his habit of climbing into the tumble dryer onto a heap of warm clothes.
Far from being a ‘one man’ cat, Murphy was promiscuous with his affections and we discovered that several neighbours, some with cats, were graced by visits (usually rewarded by titbits). The postman, the window cleaner and the de
liverers of local church leaflets were all devotees. Murphy strongly disapproved when we left him alone. If we were on foot he’d follow us to the limit of his territory, uttering distress calls to warn us to go no further, and on our return he’d be sitting on the doorstep if the sun was out or, in colder weather, inside on the windowsill watching for us.
He always had a healthy appetite so when, shortly after his thirteenth birthday, he began to go off his food and lose weight, we knew something was seriously wrong. Liver failure was diagnosed, and gradually he became weaker and as winter drew in, spent more and more time in his bed. What a hard decision it was to have him put to sleep, but we knew we had to let him go. I miss his little face looking through the glass panes in the kitchen door every morning. I miss seeing him in the window when I come home, and I miss his warm little body and stroking his silky coat – and those golden eyes looking deeply into mine. Murphy was a little person in a furry coat.
LIKES people, crème fraîche and duvets
DISLIKES power washers and vacuum cleaners
FINEST HOUR frightening off a fox in the garden
Linda Ames, Epping
Snowy, the drama queen
SNOWY, OUR wire-haired Jack Russell drama queen, liked laughter and applause as much as any actress.
She specialized in rubbing the very top of her head on the carpet, then showing us the resulting ‘style’. The more my husband and I laughed, the more the show went on.
At one time we lived in a house backing on to a park. Snowy was adept at squeezing through the hedge, racing across the park, collecting any stray tennis balls from around the courts and streaking back with her treasure. Over time we had several carrier bags full. She played ceaselessly with these balls, potting them with the very end of her nose in a style a snooker player would have envied. Any visitor who was foolish enough to join in would be the first to tire.
Charmers and Rogues Page 7