=COUGHS=

Dear cannabis users;

I get it, OK? You like cannabis. You have the right to like it and - in my personal opinion - to use it if you so wish. As drugs go, it is (mostly) harmless; the equivalent (again, to most people) of enjoying a glass or two of wine with your meal or of an evening, and the government is beginning to show signs of agreeing with that thought by reassigning its use in criminal law from a high 'class' to a lower one (and then re-classifying it again to a still lower one).

However, with that in mind, I would be terribly grateful, cannabis users, if you would do me and those like me a favour, and STOP SMOKING IT IN THE STREETS.
     Really. Please.
     Not everybody likes it. Not everybody finds it harmless. For a small faction of the public it is in fact incredibly harmful indeed. And for a larger faction, like me, while it may not be 'harmful', as such, it is bad smelling and nausea inducing.
     So seriously, just STOP. I'm not telling you that you shouldn't/can't use it. I don't - nor do I feel the government should - have the right to tell you that. All I am asking for is a little consideration for the other people you share public spaces with. You can take it all you want; until it comes out of your ears. We just don't want to breathe it in at the same time. For those of us with lung problems, cigarettes are bad enough, but at least cigarettes don't have the added effect of making us want to vomit every time the scent hits our nostrils (or at least it doesn't for me).

So really, seriously, pretty please with a cherry on top: if you have to smoke it?
     SMOKE IT AT HOME.

Thank you kindly.

Yours,
     The girl that wishes to be able to breathe unhindered when she steps outside.

You Can't Learn Genius Like This...

I am so smart.
     People have no idea how smart I am; just precisely how much smartness is going on underneath my prettily kinked golden-brown locks and sweet, innocently dim yet infectious smile. But there is lots, peops; lots of smartness going on in there.

Do you want to hear an example of just how smart I am?
     Well, here it is...

I am so smart that I just trudged 30 minutes in the rain - 15 minutes each way - to rescue a dog that possibly-but-incredibly-unlikely might have been abandoned sometime earlier today, which turned out to - surprise! - not actually have been abandoned after all.
    See? Smart.

The dog in question was first spotted at around 12:45 this afternoon as I hobbled home from work.
     It was of indeterminate breed with an attractive, intelligent looking face, a long bushy tail and sandy coloured fur; and the reason that I took extra notice of it than my usual "aw! cute!" was that it was barking quite determinedly and walking in circles around the post its lead had been tethered to.
     Slowing to a stop, I looked at it and then around the general area. Nobody else seemed to be taking any notice of it. Seeing dogs tethered to posts and bench legs etc. is far from unusual in Kidderminster; people do it all the time, tying the lead around something solid while they pop into a shop so that the dog is safe while they are gone. All well and good. But...there have been adverts recently on television, posted by animal charities calling for donations, in which abandoned dogs feature heavily. And this dog seemed to be so...agitated.
     I hovered for a moment or so, Then my brain stepped in. It reminded me of the commonness of dogs temporarily tethered to posts in the proximity of shops, and pointed out that the dog appeared to be healthy and well cared for.
     I started to walk away, then looked back. The dog was still circling and barking. Nobody appeared to be coming to claim it.
     The paranoid 'what if...' side of my nature started to prod at me again, but my brain was quick to shout it out, reminding me again of the tethering practice and the obvious well treatment of the dog, and pulling out the big guns, it also pointed out the facts of my aching feet and tired and muzzy head, and that the sausage baguette I had just purchased would only stay warm for a finite amount of time,

So, with that in mind, I walked away.

'It's probably just fed up waiting for its owner to emerge from a nearby shop,' I told myself, as I walked, convincing myself that I wasn't being selfish; 'and in any case, my own dog will be bursting for the toilet by now...'

All well and good. Until 7:03-PM this evening, when I opened the door to take Bingo for a walk to find it pouring with rain and as I ushered his - very reluctant - highness outside and started trudging the image of that barking, circling dog flashed into my mind, and stayed there.
     What if my paranoid 'what if...' side had been right all along?
     What it it was still there?
     In the cold.
     And the dark.
     And the rain.
     All alone...

Now, we all know exactly what I was going to be doing next, don't we?

Cutting Bingo's walk as short as possible - not that he complained; he was only too glad to get out of the rain and back into the warm, dry living room - I dried him off with a towel, gave him his dinner and then while he was still eating it, I set out for town with his lead still in my pocket.
     All the way down there, I told myself I was being stupid. That the dog wasn't going to be there.
     And of course it wasn't.
     Because it hadn't been abandoned. Something that I would have known had I not been in such an 'oh I'm so tired and need to sit down and eat my lunch before it gets cold' funk and had actually waited for what probably would have been just a few minutes for the dog's owner to return.

.....So! That is how smart I am.
     Yup. =nods=

Then on the way home I brought some chocolate.
     Because a super smart intelligent person like me deserves chocolate. Right?
     Right.
     Yup. =nods=

Alice x

A Dog's Dinner Of A Situation (Literally).

Bingo just ate his first normal (or at least normal-ish) meal for the first time in 6 days.
     He is so excited and happy, he doesn't know what to do with himself.

Oh, I could just cry...

Alice x

A Quick Update:

1) Bingo is seems recovered and is speedily reverting to his old self (thank you, God).

2) MJ has moved out of our house and into his own flat (yippee!).

3) We have a new second-hand sofa (one that isn't broken on one side).

4) I get to see Cousin 1 for a while later on, as she will be in Kidderminster (which is great. Plus, there will be ice cream).

5) There are chicken dippers warming in the oven (yum),

...=nods=...

Life is good.

Alice x

Good To Know.

~.START.~

A question one asks oneself whilst waiting for the vet to phone regarding your hospitalized pet: 
~ how many of the kitchen cupboards can I clean in the next hour?

Answer:
~ two thirds of them. 

~.END,~

Also for those interested; as you progress, you will end up finding not only various foodstuffs in packets and jars that have past their sell-by-date (by at least two years. ...Yeah. It's been that long...), but also a mass of things you didn't know were in there, don't remember purchasing and can't see yourself ever using,
     So there you go.
     I bet you feel better knowing that, don't you?

Alice x

Another Overheard Gem Of A Snippet.

~.START.~

LADY ONE TO LADY TWO (emphatically, as they walked past): you know, I swear all that spider spray does is make the damn things bigger...

~.END.~

=bows. walks off=

Alice x

Good Idea, Bad Idea.

~.START.~

Good Idea:
     Looking both ways before crossing the road.

Bad Idea:
     Upon seeing that there is a car maneuvering into a car-parking space, stepping boldly out in front of it and beginning to hobble your little old lady way across the road regardless.

Badder Idea:
     When said car screeches to a halt rather than mowing your dinky little old lady self down and stares at you with undisguised horror having nearly flattened you, shaking your fist angrily in his direction and performing a gesture known in popular modern circles as 'flipping the bird'.

And finally, the deliciously Bad Idea cherry on top of the Bad Idea cake:
     Said 'flipping the bird' completed, propping your little red and white checked shopping trolley up against the curb, leaning your walking stick against it and then rolling yourself a cigarette, which you take the time to light and begin smoking before at last starting to make your way, oh so slowly, across to the other side of the road, leaving a mass of stunned, blinking people - one of them still sat behind the wheel of a halted dark blue Volvo - in your wake.

~.END.~

It was one of those moments that one had to see to believe, and even then it had an air of unreality to it, as though we had suddenly stumbled into a comedy performance or a bad television soap opera.
     People stood around in incredulous silence for a few minutes before normality returned and everyday life started itself up again; shoppers began shopping, talkers began talking, walkers began walking, and the poor man in the blue Volvo finally plucked up the courage to finish what he had started and park his car.

As for the star of the spectacle herself, I have no idea where she went, having melted away into the crowds.
     I think it's fair to say, however, given the evidence, that farce and mayhem will have followed not far behind her...

Alice x