The beaver is a proud and noble animal
Notes from a bemused canuck
So grandad, after I peed on my usual tree, I went to the park to see Edgar Alan Crow, but I couldn’t catch him, cause mom wouldn’t let me run after him, and then I stole Nala’s ball, but I had to give it back, and then I was going to go into town to go see the lady at the meat library, and….
SQUIRREL!
MOM! MOM!! Did you see? There was a squirrel in the garden!!!
It’s ok, granddad, I protected you!
My dog thinks it’s a goat that was raised by cats.
MUST CLIMB EVERYTHING! I WANNA GO OUT, BUT NOT.
Also, have you seen that muscle definition???
So I will rest my pillowy bollocks and butt flap on your leg.
Christmas plans this year involve us – all of us, including Bubba – to go to England. The easiest and cost-effective way we found to do this was to drive from Morges to Calais, spend the night there, then take the Eurotunnel shuttle from Calais to Folkestone the following morning and drive to Leicester. In total, it’s a 1000km+ journey.
We left at 7:30 this morning for the 750km leg to Calais. Byron was not impressed at the early start but he was a super good boy along the way. We averaged a stop every hour or so to stretch legs and let him out to pee.
The rest of the time he was either sleeping with his head on my leg or alternating between sitting looking at me or sitting snuggled next to me. We made it to Calais at around 16:30. It was a long drive…..
I was really relieved to have made it, because I had a lot of anxiety about Bad Things Happening. None of which materialized.
Then I get a text from Gino, while we’re in the hotel parking lot, telling us he hopes we’re taking the ferry tomorrow because the French just went on a no-notice strike at 11 this morning and all tunnel activity is suspended until further notice and nobody knows how long it’ll take to get resolved.
Fuck.
Unions called the strike at 11:00 GMT. Under French union law they can run the strike for as long as they like, and there is no indication at the moment how long it will go on for.
The tunnel operator is not covered by a 2007 French law that makes a 48-hour strike notice compulsory for transport operators, which is why the walkout took everyone by surprise.
Staff were offered discretionary bonus of a €1,000 (£867) bonus, but the unions’ request is for three times that much.
Of all the things I was fretting about, this was not one of them. We only expected to be in Calais overnight so only had one night booked. This could turn ugly quickly. Thankfully, I could reserve a (different) room for tomorrow night and cancel it if we didn’t need it.
In the meantime, Byron, Katy and Ben were getting comfy in the room – which is quite nice. It’s a dog friendly hotel.
While we were waiting for our dinner booking, we weighed our options. Our shuttle tickets were refundable, so erring on the side of actually making it to the UK tomorrow, we cancelled the train and booked a ferry crossing. Hopefully that goes well tomorrow, but that is a worry for another day.
Being dog-friendly, Byron could come to the hotel restaurant with us. He was very well-behaved, especially considering that there were at least 4 other dogs there – two of which were uber barky.
While we had dinner, surrounded by other people and their dogs, we started chatting with a nice older couple from Strasbourg who were in the same predicament as we were, but they informed us that the strike had already been resolved. Murphy’s law says that this is because we cancelled our booking and made alternate plans, because has we not done so, the strike would have lasted forever. I firmly believe that the universe hates me.
So now Byron is snoring, Ben is watching Netflix on his laptop and Katy and I are going to try and get some sleep. It’s going to be another early start and another set of anxieties to deal with.
We’re not in Leicester yet, but hopefully by early afternoon we will be.
Pray for Omarion.
Byron is showing off his new (if a bit snug) Christmas jumper.
We took Byron outside to play in the snow yesterday. He got very excited, but he really wasn’t sure about the snowman some kids in the building made. It got woofed at last night, and peed on this morning.
ree is up. Now let’s see how long it stays up without being eaten.
It was Byron’s grand dog show début today.
We made it bright and early (!) to the Automnales and got setup. We met Frédérique, the breeder we got Byron from, and she was very happy to meet the boy.
She was supposed to show him for us, as we have no idea what we were doing, but Byron had other plans. He got a little bit nervous when he couldn’t see us and decided to splat and nope, so I had to be brave and show him.
In the end, the boy placed last, but with an “excellent” mention. The comments were generally positive, except that he’s possibly too tall and his babines a bit too floppy. His bones, ears, eyes, nose, teeth and gait are all good, but his knees are apparently still a bit wobbly.
I’m the end, he didn’t hump anyone and was super zen around all the other dogs. He didn’t seem fazed by all the noise and commotion, everyone loved him and heaped lots of praise on him and his behaviour. We always said we’d get him a miss congeniality ribbon, but Anna had the best idea when she declared him lord congeniality.
Have you tried barking at it?
The flip side of bed hog is cuddle bug. Several times a night, and every morning, the chonk will come on the bed and flomp on us – sometimes just to check in, most often he’ll stay for a while until we either push him off or he goes on his own. Morning cuddles are a bit different though. He knows we’re awake so he’ll come on the bed, flomp, and sigh contently. Big sighs. Then he’ll start snoring.