Parting Gift

Who can remember the story of the Commando Raid through a rainy Dublin, where Mr Silverwood went on a secret assignation to covertly capture an unloved westie pup of unknown name and bring it home to their house? Well, that pup became known as Maxwell as "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" was the song Mr Silverwood was singing as he came in the front door with the pup in a bundle. Well. that pup has lived in interesting times since then, having been at one stage returned to the 'unloving' owner who thought they might like him back but then thought twice.

From there was moved to Steak Lady where it didn't work out because SL's own male pup (a Yorkie) was also growing up big and strong and full of male hormones and the two were starting to fight. Maxwell (by then reverted to the name Charlie as per unloving owner) being rather bigger was starting to bully the Yorkie (sorry, none of us can recall name of same - perhaps Mr S will enlighten us?), so Charlie is now back at Silverwoods and is once again known as Maxwell. We all hope this is now permanent or the poor little mite won't know whether he's coming or going. Anyway, with Boris-Pup returning to his real home tonight as 2CV Llew comes back from his week in France, we'll all miss* him and it'll be good to know that the Silverwoods have a young westie pup for us to beat up as we did with Boris, whenever we chance to meet..... Project Erroll; Bring it On!

* We will all miss Boris except perhaps for Mum whose slipper is depicted here from 10 minutes ago on the landing after Boris got bored waiting for Dad to come back out of the shower. My other picture is, of course, Barge-Dog Kess smiling as she looks over the rather tall port bow rail of SB Cambria. Also the neighbours now we have all just been out for a good shout at long haired Goldie, Alfie who was visiting next door. The Nerve!

Look after yourself

Deefs

Take Three

Three strong contestants for the role of 'Cute Barge Dog' here. You may recognise Alfie, a yorkie who is part of the furniture on the SB Greta and visible on any visit to the Greta website. Alfie has been around ages and was there to welcome Megan and Haggis aboard when they chartered her for a day's sailing.

Alfie's new young companion is Ludo, tricolour short haired JR, here challenging the cameraman from the deck of Greta, which was moored alongside SB Cambria. Finally another old chum, Kess, faithful chum of one of Dad's fellow volunteers on Cambria, Mark.

Meanwhile, in Project Erroll land, it's all gone a bit quiet. Our most recent viewer was perhaps the most hopeful-sounding, a single middle aged lady with no small child-shaped encumbrances, who seemed delighted with the garden and was talking about bringing her grown-up son back to see the place a 2nd time. Despite themselves, Mum and Dad allowed a glimmer of hope to start to glow, but it was not to be - word came back that she'd decided it was too small.

I love the pictures in the brochure taken by the professional lensman with a very wide angle lens (certainly wider than Dad's widest lens, which is 18mm focal length) as they show the rooms as if they were massive, but I guess when people then see the spaces in real life they might be forgiven for being disappointed. For "We could hold a party for 50 in there!" read "We might manage a small soirée for 6 or 8 guests". Ah well, it's early days yet - we've only been on the market a few weeks.

22 days to go, and counting

Deefs

Kess and a rescue

An eventful day. Dad is down at the Cambria where they are now back into real volunteer-work, after almost 12 months where "volunteer work" has meant manning the volunteer centre and explaining the project to the public. Today the boys are glad to get back into overalls and rigger boots, gloved up to paint really black sticky paint onto the rolled-steel "keelson" girder which will run the length of the barge along the midline, bolted to the floor. We dogs are not allowed anywhere near, although barge-dog Kess (we've mentioned her before in this blog) gets herself into a pic looking particularly demented, with a nice out-of-focus bargey background.

At one stage Dad has to rescue another Jack Russel (Fran) from the creek. It's high tide and Fran is playing with a ball a bit near the edge, when she puts the ball down on the slope and it rolls in. Plop! Fran is most concerned at this and slithers down the bank to rescue it, and falls in too. Splosh! She grabs the ball and turns back for the bank, but the sides are steep and muddy, and she can't get a grip. The owner starts to fret, so Dad clambers down the quay-side woodwork and hoiks her out by the harness. She is wet, cold and shaken but not harmed. Muppet. (Not clear if Dad's talking about the owner here, or the dog).

Also, for good measure, an nice pic of an orchid which the humans have TLC'd back into flower after we all thought it was a goner. And one of the three of us on the early morning bed, where we have romped and play-fought till it was no longer possible for the humans to relax and read the papers. This shows the H (left), the Megster (centre) and my good self (r).

Hope you had a good weekend

Deefski