Good morning all, cooler and cloudier here and in fact we've just had a light shower. It's so much nicer for walking Billy though. Hot weather is fine if you have nothing to do but laze around with a book by a pool but it's not much fun when you want to get things done and go out and about.
Took Billy for his early walk today and would you believe he got set upon by yet another flippin' Staffie? We walked up a bank and I could see a man walking a little further away from his and when we got to the top of the bank I could see his dog standing stock still, staring over at us. I could tell from a distance that it was a Staffie. I decided we'd walk through the woods rather than across the top of the old quarry because that would've taken us marginally closer to the dog. All this time I was expecting his owner to call him. Before we could get to the wood path though, the dog suddenly started running at full pelt towards us, barking. The man was oblivious and just carried on walking. By that point he was probably 150 yards away from his dog and not once had he looked back and called him. As soon as he was over by us he jumped on Billy's back. It's bloody scary seeing a dog like that running fast towards you, snarling and baring it's teeth
I was shouting at it to go away and I hit it with my umbrella a few times. It wasn't until I started to scream that the owner turned around and started running towards us to get his dog
Thankfully Billy's fine, but he's stuck close to me ever since. He's never yet retaliated and I'm not sure how many times now that this has happened, I'm losing count, but each time it's been a Staffie. They jump on his back or go for his neck (he lost some fur and had a nasty bite on one occasion) to try to overpower him. The owner called the dog as he got closer and he actually went back to him and he put him on his lead and started to walk back in the direction he was going so after I'd checked Billy and given him a fuss I chased after him and gave him a mouthful. He said that he's usually the only one over there at that time (which is a load of rubbish) so his dog is okay off the lead - which said to me that he doesn't think it's safe to have it off the lead when people and other dogs are around?! All this time the dog was still barking, growling and baring it's teeth towards Bill.
We bump into lots of dogs and their owners while walking and it's always a matter of the dogs having a sniff and then have a run around together. Billy does this submissive thing when another (usually smaller) dog approaches where he lies down flat, letting the other dog know that he's not a threat.
So that was how my day started
Joe's still in bed and Tom's at M's as they were going to a dance class last night. No idea what kind of dance, he was vague about it and just said they were going out but she'd told Joe (who is the wrong person to give that kind of information to!!). I'll do some housework and walk Billy again this afternoon, and we need to pick up a desk for Joe's room from Argos this evening. Hopefully the rain won't amount to too much tonight and we can get a late walk in too.
Have a good day all! Enjoy the shops Di!