Bertie and me

Next door are away for most of the day, so I’m walking Bertie.  It’s been 15 years years since I’ve had a similar responsibility (see extra).  I’m a bit out of practice.

They’ve left a goody bag on the kitchen table; a few treats, bottle of water and a couple of poo-bags.  There’s a similar bag for Bertie.

Bertie is a PAT (Pets as Therapy) dog and as a result is calm, patient and extremely well-behaved.  Unlike my old dog, bless him.

I take him to the Common, which is his usual morning walk.  He knows exactly where to go and when I let him off the lead, he runs on for a bit and then stops and waits.  I have his ball and ball-slinger.  This is new technology as far as I’m concerned and I send it a few yards sideways into some long grass.  It takes ages to find, Bertie being a small dog and the grass being extremely high just now.  

I eventually get the hang of it and off we go.  He cannot get enough of this and it’s not long before my arm is aching.  He takes pity on me, content just to carry it in his mouth.  

It’s mid-morning and the Common is empty.  A few birds rise up from the grass and I see a couple of Marbled White butterflies on the thistles.  Apart from that it’s just Bertie and me.  The rest of the world is somewhere else.