Some days Her Royal Highness The Beanster has no trouble jumping onto the sofas in our living room, but there are also times when a sofa jump goes disastrously wrong, leaving her half on, half off, with her little back legs desperately trying to get purchase in the air. It’s a distinctly unregal position, and one that requires  a solution. Unfortunately Princess Beanie is very picky about the surfaces she’s prepared to walk on. We bought a small, sturdy metal step with folding legs, but Beanie just couldn’t bring herself to trust it, in fact she would go out of her way to avoid it which actually led her to have more embarrassing sofa mishaps. We started looking at folding ramps – the kind that are common on eBay and Amazon – and despite some misgivings about their rigidity I twice tried to buy one, but each time the purchase fell through (all too common in these days of high inflation, with sellers regularly refunding items when they realise they could be charging more). It turns out those failed purchases were fortunate, because eventually Susan found this – a padded step and ramp set for children.

Beanie immediately took to them both, but the step was the perfect height for the sofa. The first time she used it she looked right at me and wagged furiously, obviously happy to be able to get up any time under her own steam. It felt great to give her back a bit of independence and stop the indignity of getting beached on the furniture in her own home.

While the step restored 24/7 sofa access for Beanie, Poppy made a virtual no-go zone by de positing a spectacular barf by our rear kitchen door. When I heard her rhythmic stomach pump starting up I hurried her through the door in the hope that she’d do her technicolor yawn on the grass, but Poppy’s never been one to walk any distance when there’s chunks to be blown. Nope, she just opened her mouth and let rip right there on the deck. It was, at least, outside the house, and the sheer quantity was impressive for a such a small Beaglet. I washed most of it away with a a few jugs of water and a squirt of washing up liquid, and figured that was the end of it. How wrong I was. For the next four days only Beanie was prepared to walk straight through the barf zone; everyone else needed verbal encouragement and even a toe up the bum to get across it. It was as though each little bit of spew residue was a miniature Gandalf proclaiming “Thou shalt not pass!”. This quickly became a source of irritation; handling the endless rounds of pee requests on an evening is bad enough, but now each outgoing and return loo trip involved the vomit avoidance ritual. It was particularly galling that Poppy was so keen to avoid stepping on it given that she had been its creator. I washed the area again but it made no difference – only tine eventually robbed the Gandalf-vomit of its remarkable power.

A few more recent moments:

A visit to the old pier at Portencross. That big hole is not really something you want to encounter when you’re holding on to four pulling Beagles, but happily no-one got an unscheduled swimming session that day.

The geese at Dean Castle Park are approaching! Notice how not a single one of our fearless Beagles is prepared to look them in the eye.

You just can’t beat frosty sniffs

But there are clear signs that Spring is on its way

The youngsters assist in clearing up last year’s dead growth. Unfortunately they’d be just as keen to assist in clearing up this year’s fresh growth too.

Poppy celebrates the final departure of her unnatural barf

This is the 15 year old girl that needs to be lifted onto our bed each morning for a snuggle.

This is the girl who often needs a bit of help getting onto the sofa.

And this is the girl who watched a plate of buttered bread being placed on the table at teatime, decided that infirmity is a choice, and jumped onto the table to speed-swallow a big mouthful of that bread.

Yes, The Beanster can still launch a successful shock-and-awe raid on the table when she wants to.

In other news, Monkey had a further brush with Monkeycide this week when I took him out for some early morning running practice.

He’s always got a ton of energy so recently I’ve been letting hum join me for a short but vigorous run up by our local farm, prior to going out with our other three furries for their main walk. All his previous outings passed without incident, but on this particular run lots of things were happening at the farm. On the outward leg it was mucking out time: a tractor was scooping up cow poop from one of the pens and piling it up in the yard to form an impressive poo mountain. I mistimed our approach and we had to dodge the tractor as it backed up. I was sure Monkey was well clear of the hazard but suddenly I felt his lead go very, very tight. Had he been hit? Was a limp and lifeless Monkey on the other end of the lead, having finally succumbed to Monkeycide?

I looked round and was instantly relieved yet slightly disgusted to see a huge wedge of poo and straw in his mouth. It turns out that Monkeys can’t run and chew a poop gobstopper at the same time.

We had a second brush with danger on the return leg. Some of the cows were about to be moved from one holding area to another, with tractors used to create a funnel of sorts. “You’ll be OK” said the farmer, “Just keep going and be quick!”.  The “be quick” part proved to be problematic. There were various farmyard droppings on the road and Monkey wanted to sample them all. I got him through the faecal gauntlet and we were almost out of the danger zone when one more obstacle loomed into view: a final tractor was positioned to block the cows from escaping down the road, with its arms and scoop extended out horizontally just a few feet above the ground. I almost had to drop to a  crawl to pass under the tractor’s arms, and Monkey was not at all sure about following me. Fortunately for both of us, the sound of approaching hooves convinced him that running under a metal monstrosity was preferable to being trampled under several tonnes of cattle; it was the lesser of two Monkeycides, one might say. Monkey certainly had a lot to tell Poppy that morning when we got back home.

Some other random shots from that last couple of weeks:

A big delivery of timber heralds the start of a new round of garden projects, and Poppy is ready, willing and able to get under foot (though Beanie is still the master of being in just the wrong place at the wrong time).

This untidy metal gate has kept our polytunnel safe from nibbling Beagles, but it’s time it got upgraded to a full height wooden affair.

The afternoon marrobone roll routine is still very popular..

..but a second serving would be preferred.

It’s tree-planting time and the hired paws are ready to assist.

Despite that enthusiastic assistance..

..a useful amount of manure was still left to feed the trees

Just like humans, older dogs can lose their faculties. This is easy to spot in the case of well-trained, super-obedient dogs like the various shepherd breeds, but things become less clear when you’re dealing with aging Beagles. In recent years Susan and I have often discussed whether Beanie & Biggles are losing their hearing, or having senior moments.

For example, Susan might ask “What if Beanie is going deaf, and you call her when she’s off-lead on the beach and she doesn’t come?”

My response to that was typically “And how would that be any different to how she’s been most of her life?”

It’s true; Beanie & Biggles have been masters of the art of selective deafness for a long time. And on the subject of acting confused, well if you ask me Biggles has spent his whole life being confused. Now however even I have to admit to seeing concrete signs that our oldsters are starting to lose it proper. Last year Beanie was completely and mercifully untroubled by the whizzbangs of local firework displays, and for the last few months there’s been no reaction from either of them if I’m snacking on peanuts and one falls unobserved to clatter on our laminate floor. More recently, they’ve both become easily startled, even by each other. Just this morning Biggles was snoozing in our bed when Beanie decided she wanted to be in there too. Somehow she completely missed the fact that he was present, and she trampled over him. He woke up with a start and things suddenly got all growly and snarly. This sort of thing has happened a few times now; the first time was shocking but now I just pull them apart and tell them both to calm down and put their teeth back in.

Slightly more amusing is when Beanie or Biggles stride purposefully out of the lounge, then wander the hall for minutes at a time apparently unable to remember why they went out there in the first place. Actually I do that a lot too. Come to think of it I do that most days, but at least I always remember when I’ve set out on an urgent mission to the toilet. Unlike my oldest boy, I’ve never got so confused that I drop my trousers and take a dump on the floor.

On the subject of just doing things wherever you happen to be, Poppy has already submitted her entry for Laziest Vomit Of 2023. She was cosied up on the far end of our leather sofa, and when the stomach plunger started up it was Big Vom Dot Com all over the arm and seat; she couldn’t even be bothered to jump down onto the rug and trot over to the most light colored patch that would show off the vomit to best effect. By contrast, she does always jump off the sofa when she’s dealt a particularly vile fart, but then everybody gets off the sofa when Poppy drops one. She’s got me and both Beagle boys thoroughly beaten when it comes to air poop pungency.