It’s been “all change” at Beagle HQ over the last week. We’ve finally retired some of our oldest office furniture and replaced it with new stuff, and that of course has meant some intensive flat-pack assembly sessions.

In the past Biggles has been my go-to companion for this kind of work; he rarely gets in the way, and even the most poorly designed assembly guide seems easier to handle when his furry head is studying it right next to mine. If things get a bit tense he diffuses the situation by rolling onto his back to display his bits, and if that doesn’t work, you can’t beat a well-timed sulphur-heavy fart. Unfortunately this time around it wasn’t Biggles that came to help me, but Beanie, and she isn’t a good assistant at all. You see it’s not the assembly of the kit that interests her; it’s the disposal of all the paper, cardboard and packing materials, and she’s hell bent on doing this before the item in question is built. Turn my back for a minute and all those little bags of screws, bolts and washers are shredded – their contents strewn all across the floor – and important chunks are missing from the instruction leaflet.

Biggles should have been my assistant on my recent flat-pack marathons

But instead I got this..

Eventually I just had to frogmarch my little “helper” out of the room and close the door. Yes, to my shame I actually had to exclude the Beagles from the room designated as “Beagle HQ”. The exclusion was temporary however, and they got to be the first to check things out once all the sweating and swearing was over. Only time will tell if the chinrests on the new chairs (incorrectly described as “armrests” in the documentation) will pass muster!