Spirits not dampened...

I'm telling you I was totally spark out when we arrived in Mainz in Germany yesterday  evening after two days of non stop train and ferry. I would have been happy to rest in the hotel room (especially since it was raining the proverbial) but the man at reception had gone to the trouble of finding a nice "hundefreundlich" local restaurant for Gail and she insisted it would be rude if I didn't join her.

So the day before we had had a soggy walk across London from St Pancras station to Liverpool Street.

Then  the overnight ferry across the wet (obvs) North Sea,

Followed by a damp interlude between trains in Utrecht,

And a scenic but rain splattered view of the Rhine Gorge from the train window.

Let's hope the sun puts in an appearance when we reach our final destination at Michael and Renate's home in Bavaria later today...

Bertie is unimpressed by Frida...

Can you see me here in the window anxiously waiting* for Gail to return from a weekend in London?

Foolishly (given bitter past experience), I was expecting a present.

I mean normal people come home from jaunts to the Big Smoke clutching a colourful array of shopping bags, and if they are dog owners they will surely have been tempted into buying some special and exclusive 'not available in Scotland' treats and toys for their Best Beloved. Am I right?

I think you can tell where this is heading...

The sum total of Gail's putative credit card extravaganza was this:

One postcard. Yes, ONE POSTCARD! And it's not even a picture of London. Or a dog.

So it seems Gail had met up with a friend on Saturday and visited the very popular 'Frida Kahlo: Making Herself Up' exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum, along with a surprisingly large number of Frida fans who were expressing their devotion by dressing up as their heroine.

You know, I myself have done a little research in Ms Kahlo (can I remind you, Boffins don't always have to stick to science) and I have discovered that dogs feature in several of her paintings. No mind that they were those funny little hairless Itxcuintlis - a breed rarely seen in Scotland - I feel rather offended that Gail did not scour the V&A gift shop for a one of these pictures.

My google-based research also turned up a tutorial on how to make your very own Frida Kahlo dog costume. Oh how grateful I am that Gail's needlework skills are limited to sewing on buttons.....

After the exhibition, I gather Gail went to a schoolfriend's 60th birthday party and wore, as requested on the invitation, a sparkly dress. I CANNOT BELIEVE I HAVE NOT BEEN PROVIDED WITH PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE OF THIS UNHEARD OF EVENT!!!

So, I'm sorry my friends, but no treats and no sparkly frocks today. In fact all Gail had to show me was a nostalgic photo she took of the institution, hard by the Victoria and Albert, where in 1982-3 she spent many hours attempting to digest blackboard after blackboard crammed with differential equations expressing the fundamentals of geophysics. Happy days!

*Gail says: Please rest assured Bertie spent most of the weekend with neighbours Neil and Yvonne, being introduced to new foodstuffs and generally spoilt rotten.

(I do want to go to) Chelsea*

Bertie's future as a fashion accessory?

Is five and a half too old to have a tantrum?

Now we established last week, didn’t we, that if a Chihuahua can undertake a ten hour flight from Seattle to Frankfurt, then there is absolutely no reason for an only slightly oversized wire-haired fox terrier not to travel around the globe with his doting human?

So imagine my horror when Gail announced that she is flying to London for a business meeting next week, and taking the opportunity while ‘Down South’ to visit Human Granny in  Nottingham for a few days, and as a result I am being left behind AGAIN.

I feel it is a failure of imagination on Gail’s part, that she can’t figure out how I could accompany her on this trip. But I am a creative kind of a pup, with a terrier’s tenacity, and I have been gnawing away at the problem.

You know, to me it seems simple. One just need to take things one step at a time.

1. The flight from Aberdeen to London: the fact that British Airways do not allow dogs in the cabin is no obstacle, I think. Either I could be smuggled in using a cabin bag with air holes (the flight is only 90 mins) or Gail could pretend she was fat or pregnant and hide me under her coat. If she removes my collar, I see no reason why I should be detected by the scanner…
2. The colleague accompanying Gail: I gather he is a friendly chap called Ishfaq and, although of Asian background, was born and bred in Scotland and so is culturally hard-wired to be dog tolerant and thus happy to co-operate with my escapade. Furthermore, his brown skin may act as an additional distraction at airport security (these folk are known to deal in the crudest of stereotypes) thus aiding my plan to slip through unnoticed. 
3. Heathrow to London SW3: I googled this one and am pleased to report that dogs are allowed the Heathrow Express, the London Underground and in black cabs. For sure an Uber driver would take me too?
4. While the meeting is taking place: two options here I think. 
1. The meeting is hosted by a French oil company with swanky offices just behind the Saatchi Gallery in Chelsea. In an ideal world I would be welcomed into the meeting room with open arms, immediately supplied with water and at lunch fed a choice selection from the buffet provided for the humans. The fact that the first time Gail ever visited this office, the new General Manager - just arrived from France - threw a big hissy fit at the poor standard of the lunchtime refreshments, bodes well, surely, for a quality offering this time around. 
2. However, I think it wise to have a contingency plan just in case anyone at the meeting kicks up a fuss and claims to be allergic to dogs. Mine is to be temporarily adopted by one of the international super-model type women whose natural habitat is the Sloane Square end of Kings Road. 
   
   Such ladies, I believe, regard cute fluffy pups as a fashionable accessory and, let’s face it, few are as cute as my good self.  So if I am expelled from the office building and onto the street, I aim to execute a perfectly timed bounce into the handbag of one such lady, who will exclaim ‘too cute’ and take me on a tour of designer boutiques, ply me with deliciously tooth-rotting treats and show me off to all her friends. Since such people have short attention spans, and their stick thin arms are not made for carrying  9 kg of WFT for long, I anticipate my adopter will tire of me after a few hours and will abandon me near to where I was picked up, just in time to reunite with Gail when her meeting ends. What could possibly go wrong? 
5. London to Nottingham: now we are on the home straight, as Nottingham is less than two hours away from London by train and once safely arrived, not even Gail can dream up further objections to my remaining with her for the duration.

How about it Gail?

*With apologies to Elvis Costello...

Gail's musings in St James's Park, London

Thank heavens I have a free hour before my meeting…a morning walk is so important for one's sanity…I do wish Bertie were here too….oh look what a cute Lhasa Apso…I wonder if Bertie misses me as much as I miss him…my what a lot of grey squirrels thrive in Central London….and ducks, geese, swans, gulls and, of course, pigeons…now I see a husky, poor creature, I don't think this is the right place for him…the London air smells sour this morning... not even the Queen over there in Buckingham Palace can escape it… now, we have a sparky wee terrier….and a rather sad looking golden lab…what a lot of leaves on the ground just now...I do hope Dad had a comfy night in hospital...and now this is exactly the place where I once nearly cycled into the then Foreign Secretary (Douglas Hurd) en route to work…can't spot any politicians I recognise this morning…but it's Bertie's happy, eager little face I really want to see…

Image from internet

Brian Cox: not cuter than me, surely?

Well it has been quite a week down here in England.

So in an intermission between visiting HGD in hospital, Gail disappeared off to London on business for two days. I went to stay with my cousins, standard poodles Percy and Cocoa in their beautiful Derbyshire farmhouse and I can't pretend it was all bad, even if Percy is a wee bit bossy and I was banned from chasing sheep in the fields nearby.

Really I could have stayed longer. In fact I nearly asked to go back there, when I heard what Gail had to say about her London trip.

I mean I thought she was going down for important meetings, but oh no, she came back babbling like a starstruck schoolgirl.

"Oh Bertie, we had such an exciting meal out on Wednesday night. I went with my colleagues, all geophysicists and engineers, to a Chinese restaurant near Victoria Station and can you believe who was at the table next to us? Brian Cox*, Eric Idle** and James Dyson***, all on the same table! Gosh we were so thrilled. I mean Brian Cox looked and acted exactly like on TV. Even the gestures. I like to think they were planning to write a comic song about quantum energy levels in vacuum cleaners or something. Oh Brian Cox is just so cute and adorable...."

It was a long time before she got around to saying that she'd missed me.

Explanation for readers based outside of the UK:
*Brian Cox: physics professor, presenter of brilliant science programmes on TV, ex-pop star, heart throb!
**Eric Idle: ex Monty Python, of course.
***James Dyson: inventor of the Dyson bagless vacuum cleaner and much else.


PS from Gail: against the odds HGD has rallied, still in hospital but he was sitting up and gave me a big smile when I visited yesterday.