Oh dear

After lulling me into a false sense of security, Lazy Boy embarrassed me no end today.

He hasn't peed in so much as an unwanted place since he was last referred to as The Pee Monster and I left for a Sainsburys shop feeling quite the thing when he peed in his pee place at home just before we left. We made it all the way round the supermarket to the tills when imagine my horror to realise the sweet little pup that everyone had been cooing over a minute before was squatting on the floor for a poo!

The folk that work in Sainsburys were wonderful and whilst I got my poo bags out and cleared off the majority of the stinking mess, they ran for disinfectant and wipes to clear the rest with, which they did with minimal fuss and bother and just told me not to worry at all.

Meanwhile I was mortified and with great difficulty managed (just about) not to get cross with Vespa.

So now it's back to the 'no-supermarket-without-pee-and-poo-first' rule as I absolutely don't want to go through that again.

Whoever said Guide Dog puppy training was fun? Oh yes, that was me!

A (pretty much) non-working week

The lovely thing about being three-quarters retired is that, on some days, I can do all kinds of things that I certainly couldn't do when I was working.

On Tuesday I went into Edinburgh and was a 'lady-who-lunches' with my friend Shirley. We had a really nice meal at Jamie Oliver's in Rose Street and lots of time to catch up. She also bought me my birthday present, which is a bee house. Can't wait for the winter to disappear and then see what bees we can attract to our garden.

Yesterday was Old Lady Badminton. It was the first game back after my cartilage diagnosis and the news isn't that great. I played a good game and won both games I played, but my knee was very sore. I suppose the only good thing is that it didn't give way or lock. I was wearing a support, but next time I'll wear a stronger one and see if that makes a difference.

Today, on a cold and snow filled morning, while Mountain Man was off at a work thing, Lazy Boy and I snuggled down on the bean bag to watch Andy Murray win through to the finals at the Australian Open, before heading off to a meeting in Kelso, by which time the roads were pretty much clear of the white stuff.

And to cap it all, today I got a card with a fab photo of my lovely Odi with her trainer, Emma, from Forfar Guide Dog School.

Yup, all in all a pretty good week so far.

A sucker for a gadget

Last week when I was in Boots in Galashiels they had lots of fitness gadgets on sale and you know how I love my gadgets... so I ended up with a Fitbit Flex to put on my wrist and measure all kinds of things. That night, after having done my requisite 10,000 plus steps, I felt really ill. Nauseous and headachy. I did a bit of research on the great wide interweb and apparently I'm not the only one, so in the morning back it went to Boots who gave me my money back without a question.

I was thinking an ordinary pedometer would probably do, but then I kind of missed all that technology, so a bit more research and I became the proud owner of a Fitbit One. This one hooks on my pocket and I have no problems with it at all.

And best of all, since I got it I've managed to walk over 26 miles!

Do I really need something to tell me I've not walked enough in a day and to get off my arse and do so? In all honesty I have to say no, but I do find it motivating and at least it's getting me out there and (hopefully) getting myself fitter.

Yesterday, Mountain Man was on a Borders Search and Rescue exercise so Vespa and I were on our own. I decided, as part of my new walking regime, to get out there to Bowmont Forest, which was a favourite walk for Odi and me. We had a great time and he was wonderfully well behaved. He even came to my side when we spotted people and he just walked along quite the thing and didn't want to jump in any of the puddles... so different from our lovely Odi!

We did a great 35 minute walk, which knackered poor Vespa for the whole of the rest of the day, but it certainly added to my walking total and I felt quite energised. This morning Vespa was still in recovery and didn't want to do anything much at all.

I sadly didn't take my camera so no pics of our walk to show, but Lynne took some when we were in the garden centre in Kelso last week and she emailed them across, so here's one for you.

Vespa with pals Tweedy (10 months) and Quaver (7 months)

Hasn't my wee boy grown? He's now 5 months old and weighs in at just under 20 kilos, so no lightweight. I think this pic is great as it shows the complete difference between the more retrievery Tweedy (who looks rather like Odi) and the more labby Vespa and Quaver. I think Vespa is going to be a chunky boy, so hopefully all this walking is going to do him good too.

What's been happening... or not

You may have noticed that it's been over a week since I last wrote on this blog. I'm not going to bore you with the details, but briefly it's contained a bit of sickness, a bit of frustration and a change in Broadband provider (which hasn't actually happened yet but has been instigated) and a lovely (post) Christmas lunch with the Old Lady Badminton lot at the Kingsknowes Hotel in Galashiels. I'm hoping to get back to badminton next week as my knee has been feeling a bit better and I feel ready to give it a try out. 

Here's some Odi news for you: her spay was very successful and she's now in her proper Guide Dog training with her personal trainer, Emma, who phoned me to tell me, and I quote, 'She's a very active dog'... erm, well yes, I could've told her that, in fact the person who looked after her when she was last at Forfar for her scan could also have told her that, but there you go. Now I'm to expect no news for at least 5-6 weeks, when I'll get an update as to how she's getting along.

And some Vespa news: Vespa is now known as either The Pee Monster or Lazy Boy, depending on the day. So why The Pee Monster? An example: last week he managed to pee in Lidl twice in one shop. Not sure it did much for my street cred to be followed around by a guy with a bucket, but they were very nice about it. And why Lazy Boy? An example: well sometimes he can't even be bothered to make it past the step and just pees where he is. We're working on it!

We had a disastrous training morning on Tuesday, when we met up with Alex and Quaver in Kelso to go for a walk. The dogs were awful and I found myself in despair at how bad Vespa was. It didn't help that Quaver (who's 7 months old) was barking away like mad and behaving just as badly. We ended up in the garden centre cafe where we were joined by Lynne and Tweedy (who's 10 months old). Vespa spent most of his time desperate to play.

Today I took Vespa over to Lynne's in Tweedbank and we went for a walk, swapping dogs. I loved taking Tweedy, he was so well behaved, but at least I could get to see what I'd been doing wrong with Vespa, so we're now on a new regime. I have hope!

And finally, because I haven't given you a pic for ages, here's one of the coffee plants in their usual winter state. A bit of growth, a bit of brown leaf and that's about it.

A lovely birthday

I had a great time at Gleneagles, only slightly marred by the hair in the bath (don't worry it was dealt with), a card addressed to Dr and Mrs F and a very over salted piece of turbot for dinner.

I had a beautiful room with a large and very comfortable bed and I even had my own fire, which was just lovely.

Lots of comfort to spread out on

Toasty warm

Which was just as well as outside it was snowing and bloody freezing.

The view from my window

I had massages, hot tubs, swims, steam rooms and just general lazing about reading time and then I had my golf lesson - which went very well considering I've never played golf before (apart from on the Wii, which frankly I don't think helped matters at all), but Kirsten the Instructor said I did brill as I only missed a few and by the end of the hour I was smacking that dratted little ball in generally the right direction.

Apart from the salty fish, the food was lovely and I even had a champagne cocktail on my actual birthday. I'd forgotten how much I like those!

All in all it was a lovely birthday even though it was marred by lack of attention to detail.  When I was leaving the Guest Relations Manager asked about my stay and when I told her about the bath and the card I got the full on 'you must come back and we'll do everything to make sure you're well looked after' treatment, however, I think I'd have been more impressed if they'd taken money off the bill, so on thinking about it I don't think I'll bother to make the effort to go back.

I got back on Monday afternoon with enough time to play with the dog and then get to bed as I had a very early start yesterday as I needed to get the train to Glasgow for an all day meeting. That went well, but the journey home was a nightmare. After getting into Edinburgh at about 5.30 I walked to get my car in the snow and then it took me an hour and a half to drive back to the Borders. There'd been snowfall on one bit of the A68 and the gritters had obviously not got out in time and so there was 5 miles of going at about 10 miles per hour... not the best.

Today I had another work meeting, but the rest of the week is going to be taken up with poetry and No. 2 Son coming for a visit, so that should be fun.

So that's my birthday for this year. 63 years old (how the hell did that happen?) and now we're almost half way through January. Yikes, scary or what?!

My 'real' New Year begins

Well after the disastrous start to the year, I'm now ensconced in the lap of luxury at Gleneagles for my birthday. It's just beautiful and I've got lots of massage, a bit of swimming and gym and a teeny bit of golf planned.

My personal New Year always starts on my birthday, so in spite of gale force winds, a lot of rain and a bit of snow there is now blue sky and sunshine. This all bodes well.

But right now I'm far too busy to be writing on here as I have a Balinese massage to go to, so that's me off for full-blown pampering.

See you when I get back!

Not a good start

So far my wishes for 2015 have spectacularly crashed and burned and the only thing I can find that's going well is having Vespa around, though to be honest the 5 am starts that we had for the first 3 days of the year haven't helped. Today we're back to 6 am, so that, at least, is in the right direction.

I also had some devastating news from a friend, which has added to the negativity surrounding the start of year. It's hard when there's absolutely nothing I can do but send her love and thoughts.

Anyway, I've planned good stuff for my birthday. My birthday present from me to me (a Dyson digital slim vacuum cleaner) arrived on Friday and is just brilliant - nothing like a bit of cleaning equipment to put a good spin on things - and I'm going away for the weekend to pamper myself and hopefully start my 'proper' New Year in a better way.