It was nearly five years ago that we first brought the Princess home with us. We had just lost a dog to kidney cancer and her companion, my beloved James, was pining, so we went to the RGT kennel and asked to see the older hounds, because we didn’t want our arthritic oldie knocked about by some young hooligan. Anyway, among those brought out for our inspection was a long-legged red brindle with a black snout and pretty white chest and toes. James took to her, she took to him, her trainer assured us that she was as calm as any dog she’d seen and unlikely to bounce at James, so we signed the adoption papers, and took her home.

The Princess turned out to be a most affectionate and easy dog, content to sleep and go for walks and follow me around in the approved greyhound way. She and James got along beautifully, and she provided reassurance and comfort for him until his death from heart failure. She chewed a few things in those early days - if we’d known what signs to look for we’d have been forewarned, because she has brown marks on her front teeth from chewing the wire in her kennel - but we provided her with alternatives and eventually she learned not to eat drawer knobs and walls.

But she has never been that big on stuffies - unlike the Pirate who adores them - or stealing things like socks or slippers or TV remotes and mobile phones, as so many dogs do. So why is it that today, five years after being brought home with us, she has seen fit to steal one of my shirts, and take it to bed with her? I didn’t see her do it, but I know it was her.

I wonder. Did she think it would add something to the colour scheme? You have to admit it does look rather fetching there, on the royal purple bed. Or is it - as OH would have it - that she simply wanted to take my smell and snuggle up with it?

I suppose I should be flattered, huh?

Except … I’m sure that the curve you can see impressed in it was made by her bottom, and the Princess does killer farts.

After a bit of a downer in the form of the previous post, I thought I’d search Google for some good news to bring you.

News item No. 1

A man who wrongfully received a tax rebate from HM Revenue & Customs in the form of a cheque for £2o,ooo was today told that he could keep the money. A spokesperson from the office concerned (who asked not to be named) apparently told reporters ‘We made the mistake, and it’s not fair that Mr. Higgins should have to suffer for it. He tells us he spent half the money last week on a huge party for his friends and relatives and gave the rest to charity. How can we ask him to give it back now?’

He added that Mr Higgins’ tax records would not now be investigated in a ‘routine check’, neither would HMRC be making any attempt to get the sum back by re-coding him on the basis of his windfall.

News Item No. 2

Scientists from all over the world are descending on a small village in Worcestershire where a woman claims to have a self-regenerating cucumber plant.

‘It’s amazing’, she told reporters. ‘I was in the greenhouse harvesting the cucumbers, when I broke one off instead of cutting it properly. Imagine my surprise when it started to regrow itself into a perfectly formed new cucumber from the broken end! By evening I had a whole new one on the same stalk, ready to cut! If I slice through the stalk, it doesn’t work, but if the cucumber itself is broken, it just starts to regrow’.

John Smith of the Institute for Biological Studies in Tollesbury, Kent, said that if the plant breeds true, it could herald a new solution to global hunger and food shortages.

He later added ‘It’s a shame it’s a cucumber’.

News Item No. 3

A local council in Devon has announced that as part of the bicentennial celebrations for the birthday of the burgh of Mount-Witchett on the Moor, they will be suspending council tax payments for everyone living within the boundaries of the town this year. Stunned citizens are delighted with the news and local travel agents report record sales with many package deals selling out within hours.

Mrs Scott, a widow of 36 with five small children and a disabled mother to support, said ‘This will make a lot of difference to me. I’ll be able to afford to buy groceries next week, instead of sending the kids to McDonalds and leaving Mum outside Asda with her violin and a flask of cocoa’.

So, OK, none of those have the remotest basis in actual fact. They are a fabrication. A bundle of lies. This is a work of complete fiction and no-one named here bears any resemblance to a real person, living or dead. There is no Institute for Biological Studies in Tollesbury, which is not in Kent, nor - as far as I know - is there a Mount-Witchett on the Moor in Devon, although Devon does, in fact, exist. Nor is there any intent to impugn the good name of either McDonald’s or Asda.

But Google didn’t have one item of good news today, so I made it up, and I bet you smiled at least once, even if only in sorrow for the loss of my blogging integrity.

Please. Tell me you did?

Once upon a time there was a very nice man. He had a fairly uneventful childhood and grew up to be kind to children and animals - you know the sort of thing. And then, lo! The Nice Man married a Nice Girl and they had two children and took out a mortgage on a Nice House in the country and got a kitten and it all looked very idyllic.

And then the drinking started.

For a long time, nobody knew about the drinking. The Nice Girl always looked pretty and happy and bright and normal, but the Nice Man started to refuse social engagements to the point where his family would invite him to weddings and parties but they knew that he wouldn’t turn up, and neither would the Nice Girl.

So time went on, and still nobody but their very closest friends knew about the problem. Actually, I doubt that even they - no, not even his family - knew the true extent of the problem, because things had got very bad indeed. We are not talking about ordinary social drinking, let me make that clear. We are talking about wheelie bins full of White Lightning empties from a single evening because nothing else was available. We are talking about people having things thrown at their head, punched, kicked and slandered in public because of the ravings of an alcoholic. We are talking about someone dancing barefoot on broken glass and not feeling a thing because they were so, so out-of their-head drunk. We are talking about a real, honest-to-goodness alcoholic. Who wouldn’t admit that there was anything wrong with her behaviour at all.

Oh, yes, dear readers. It may come as a surprise to you, but it was the Nice Girl who had the problem.

For years, the Nice Man did what he could. He smiled and gritted his teeth and cooked and cleaned and shopped and took the children to the doctor and made sure they did their homework and attended school concerts when work allowed. In short, he did a damn fine job of being a single parent, within his dysfunctional marriage. And he had quiet words with the Nice Girl’s friends and asked them to please watch out for her when she went out without him, and he made sure not to keep any alcohol in the house, which of course did absolutely no good at all, because alcoholics are very good at finding supplies.

So why am I telling you this now? Because last week, she - the alcoholic, but still possibly nice-underneath-it-all, girl, moved out. She upped and left home.

The children chose to stay with their father, who breathed a sigh of relief and changed the locks. He would never have left her, but now he can have his life back, and the children can come home without wondering what they’re going to find when they open the door.

It is a very sad fact that no-one can help an alcoholic until they face the fact that they have a problem.

So far, this woman, once so pretty and bright, has not done that.

The robin paid us a visit again today. Here he is perched on one of the empty rings of the dogs’ feeding stand. Does he look a little disappointed to you? I think he does. See, we used to feed the dogs outside because of the Pirate being practically toothless and the Princess being … um .. not perhaps as dainty an eater as a Princess ought to be. So when the dogs had finished eating and come back indoors the robin, and occasionally a blackbird, would fly down to see what they’d left, and dine on scraps of dog food - which isn’t actually that bad for them, as I understand it.

Sadly, since the mice have discovered that same buffet option, we’ve had to stop letting the dogs eat out there - or if we do, we clean up pretty quickly and pretty thoroughly when they’re done. It leaves nothing to attract the mice, but sadly nothing for the birds either.

Still, I did clean out and refill the bird feeder with seed mix today. They’ll have to make do with that.

And my little robin friend will have to refine his acrobatic skills.