Another day in the Glen

Don't get me wrong, I really do love coming to visit Ann and Dan, but it can be a bit of a strange experience.

For starters, Ann just wants to cuddle me all the time.  I'm quite happy, sitting on the rug in front of the sofa, but she insists on getting me on the couch so I can be meticulously tickled, stroked, brushed and tickled some more.  Some dogs like this, but Jeeez - give it a rest woman.

There I was curled up last night, in between the pair of them, getting warmer by the minute, and Dan decides to have a wee snooze strechting himself out and blocking me in - sweating my paws off I was, and Ann couldn't work out why I retired to the coolness of the hallway.

And then there's Dan.  He has this mad fixation with wood at the moment.  And I'm not talking about the fact that Ann has been working away a lot and he's more then excited when she comes home. 

No - the man is obsessed with collecting firewood for his logburner.  Last nights walk saw the pair of them take me out for a cracking walk up around the lochan, and then follow the more adventurous yellow trail.  I thought it wierd that they both went out carrying their 80 litre rucksacks, both empty, until I realised what they were up to.  They had found a stash of rather chunky pine trunks, about 3ft in length, and stashed them in thier rucksack.  I mean, there was enough wood there to keep Windsor castle warm for a week.  And off they both stumbled, fully laden back to the house.  And if that's not enough, Dan did the same again this morning with me.

It's like being out with Ray Mears all the time - all I'm waiting for now it to be dressed up in a lumberjack shirt, have a bow saw stuffed in my mouth and be sent out in the woods to do my own chopping - in time, in time.

But to be fair, this mornings walk was another cracker.  Dan took a route completely off the trail and through the forest, neatly following the contour around and emerging in exactly the place he wanted to - not sure if it was more luck than judgement, but it was cracking all the same.  The rutting deer were out in force this morning - not sure what all the fuss is about - they just sound like cows to me.  Mooooooooo