Today, dear listener, we’re all about dog stuff again. Blimey, a puppy!

As later this week we’ll be talking a bit about African vampires, Black vampires, vampire hunters, and related fun, here’s an update on the pack. Which is now back up to three for the first time since we lost the mighty (if obstinate) Twiglet a couple of years ago, at the age of sixteen.

We’ve always liked having a succession of canine companions, all rescues, and with both longdogs getting older, we felt we’d like an additional companion, maybe for those longer walks and more difficult landscapes. Aha, we thought – we’ll go scour the rescue centres, especially fine places like Lurcher Link in West Yorkshire (through which Django and Chill found us). Perhaps a one or two year old lurcher, eager for a bit of affection and exertion in equal measure…

Oho! said the World. Tough luck. One of your relatives has a friend whose bull terrier came into heat, and unexpectedly got into heavy kissing with a naughty boy doggy. And one of her pups has been returned from its first placement because they couldn’t handle it. It is small, and no one wants it. It needs a home now.

So it was that the family became divided in an instant, with Chilli and I feeling extremely dubious about this move, the two other pink people being rather keen, and Django just wondering how to get into the fridge, as usual. But some of us lost the battle. First it was an overnight stay, and then it was a week’s trial, and then…

We now have a highly annoying 10 week old bull terrier x something pup in permanent residence. He is called Biscuit, and his main characteristics are:

• He runs upstairs constantly, and then shrieks to come down again.
• He steals and seeks to destroy shoes, socks, jumpers and Useful Tools.
• He bites my earlobes (drawing blood), and rips at my beard and ponytail.
• He is obsessed with carrots and cries if he can’t have one.
• He baits the other dogs until they lose their tempers.

In short, he is a Bloody Nuisance. He is also extremely unhelpful to my writing career, especially when he plays ‘sleevies’ whilst I am trying to type, and when he starts shrieking for something just when I’m on a crucial passage.

After two weeks, he is still weeing rather randomly, but pooing almost always on his training pads. He knows his name, when to come, and how to sit for treats. So that’s something.

As for Django and Chilli…

Django is getting on, and has a touch of arthritis and possibly early Cushing’s Disease, which means he’s not quite as mobile as he was. But he’s a relaxed dog, and still fairly active in his pursuit of a comfortable blanket, a modest walk, and as many treats as possible. His main interest in life beyond those is to steal food, so he has a hobby which keeps him busy (this has recently come to include ripping the bottom out of the recycling bag so he can lick out meat trays, tin cans and hummus pots).

He determined with a few hours that Biscuit did not fall into the ‘easy snack’ category, and thus paid the pup little attention, even allowing the tiny bugger to curl up next to him.

Chilli on the other hand, older but fitter, was deeply unimpressed, and avoided this small brown horror completely for the first few days. Dominant and territorial, she then made it clear that Biscuit was not getting on the bed with her. Not getting on the sofa with her. Not coming into her corner. No way. And given Chilli’s bite, we were a bit worried about this (she once gave Django a veterinary-level wound for jumping on her by surprise).

However, in the last few days she has apparently softened, and has condescended to play-fight now and then, including ‘bitey face’ (which given the size of her teeth and the size of the pup is an alarming situation – we supervise in terror). He can come on the sofa sometimes, but only when there is a human barrier firmly in place. It’s progress.

Anyway, today I had the first full pack line up whilst eating my lunch. Three dogs standing quietly in a row by my desk, each waiting for sliced ham, with Biscuit sitting patiently between the other two until he got his tiny token scrap. No fighting or snarling, for once. And so I felt it might just be safe to make this post.

Tomorrow – now that I have committed myself in print – lots of things will probably go wrong. I shall try to be patient, knowing at least that next time we fancy another dog, I will be able to insist on that lurcher I wanted in the first place…

greydogtales.com has had fine experiences with Lurcher Link. You can learn more about them and their dogs below:

https://www.lurcher-link.org/