Mark has gone.
He will not be there yet. He left a couple of hours ago, and probably will hardly even have reached Glasgow by now.
We had a bit of a flap to get him out, indeed, we have had a bit of a flappy day. It has been completely unlike a normal day, and by the time I had reached the taxi rank I felt as though my head was going round and around just with the peculiarity of it.
He has finished doing things to my car, which is a relief. It is warm again. I am very pleased about this. Autumn is beginning to slide into the Lake District, everywhere is beginning to fade into hues of brown and gold, and there is a cool bite in the air.
It was not just cold this morning. It rained, hard.
We would not normally notice this on a Sunday morning, because of working for most of Saturday night, and hence not sticking our noses out from underneath the duvet until everybody else is starting to think about lunch.
This morning we had got to get up.
This was difficult, I can tell you. We had finished late, and by the time we had rushed through the whole rigmarole of dog-emptying and showers, it was five in the morning.
This made the nine o’clock alarm an unwelcome klaxon.
We staggered about, swearing and looking for things that were under our noses, and dashed out.
We were going to Preston.
The adventure of the day was not ours, but Rosie’s.
She has been irritatingly and robustly in season for several days, driving everybody up the wall with her enthusiastic yearnings.
Most especially she has been driving poor ill-equipped Roger Poopy up the wall. He has coupled with her, hopefully, several times, resulting in everybody yelling at him, and him finding himself stuck there. I know you are supposed to wait patiently when dogs do this, but if I am on a walk over the fells in the pouring rain when the Misfortune happens, I have almost no sympathy whatsoever, and have just bellowed at them to shut up and come along, usually resulting in agonised yelping shortly afterwards as they frantically try to release themselves.
In consequence of this, Roger Poopy has finally learned from his mistakes and begun to decline all of her attempts at seduction, leaving her love-lorn and despondent.
We have long thought that Rosie ought to be a mother. She is an excessively maternal little dog, washing and generally looking after an indifferent Roger Poopy until he becomes impatient and growls at her.
Yesterday we decided that this was as good a time as any, and called the chap whose dogs will Do The Deed in return for a small handful of cash, and this morning at eleven we were in Kirkham whilst she reluctantly succumbed to the blandishments of a rather dashing ginger poodle.
We left poor old Roger in the car.
Fortunately he is ginger as well, so he will never know that the resulting poopies will not be his, except you obviously, so please do not tell him.
Rosie did not much like the ginger poodle, and had to be restrained. Her heart belongs to Roger Poopy and she was most upset to find herself propelled into the paws of Another, enthusiastic and excited as he evidently was at the prospect.
Undaunted by her growls, he Did The Deed, and the chap in charge assured us that it would probably take. He guessed at five poopies and suggested that we pop by for a scan in a few weeks time.
We trundled home through the torrential Lake District rain whilst the dogs were noisily reunited in the boot, and felt quite pleased with ourselves, not least because even though we will probably keep one, the others will be saleable, and we will be selling them in January when Oliver’s car insurance needs to be paid for.
We considered what breed we might call them. When you breed a cocker spaniel with a poodle the resultant offspring is described as a Cockerpoo, but Rosie is supposed to be a Shih-tzu, and I do not think that naming combination would exactly be a marketing man’s dream.
I had not been for a walk or anything, but we did not care. When we got home we went back to bed.
We were just emerging again, groggily, when Mark’s mother arrived. She is around for a couple of days for a funeral, at which I will be representing Mark tomorrow. It is some Ibbetson relative whom I have never met, and so I will not feel the need to repress paroxysms of grief, but it will give my funeral dress a second airing before I take it to the dry cleaner.
We caught up on family gossip over a cup of tea, and then Mark had to go.
We dragged his bags out to the car and said our farewells, after which I took the dogs for their evening sojourn and wondered what I could eat for dinner.
I could not be bothered to go shopping, and so I have had the most peculiar picnic of all of the things Mark usually eats but had left in the fridge, which was nice but left me feeling distinctly queasy.
Back to normal tomorrow.
