Hound mistress

2012-02-12T22:58:00.000Z

Firstly, my apologies for the hiatus in posting. Things have been busy and in particular I've been involved with Cariad, a partnership of twenty eight different animal welfare organisations in Wales, who are campaigning against puppy farming. WG published the second draft of their dog breeding regulations so it was essential we got together to do a detailed, authoritative response that

2012-01-08T00:45:00.001Z

A Happy New Year to all my readers. New Years Eve was quiet for us as fireworks are often let off which upset Booty, so we don't like going out and leaving her. There were lots around midnight but much of the night was fairly quiet as (thankfully) the bad weather kept most people indoors. New Years Day we took Boola over to Barry Beach for the Greyhound Welfare Walk. To our surprise the

2011-12-30T22:06:00.002Z

Firstly, a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all my readers. Since my last post, Christmas has simply flown by. Rita and Roger arrived on Christmas Eve - seems incredible that's a week ago now. We enjoyed our usual Christmas Eve seafood feast. Andrew prepared a ceviche of bream fillets, followed by scallops with samphire and some squid. After the meal we all watched Muppet

2011-12-20T14:59:00.002Z

Last week was incredibly busy, but the upside was that I completed most of the Christmas preparations. All the cards and parcels have been made and sent, all presents wrapped - this is surprisingly time consuming. On Tuesday afternoon I went over to Macarthur Glenn, near Bridgend, which is an out of town retail park which specialises in discount stock. On the way I got caught in the most

2011-12-11T22:33:00.001Z

A fortnight to go until Christmas. We're doing fairly well on the Christmas shopping. Yesterday, we went to Ikea to get our Christmas tree. It's a Nordmann fir, and it smells gorgeous. Andrew put it in its holder, watched by three very curious pointy noses. While I decorated it, Andrew put up the lights outside and in the windows so the house looks very festive now. The Advent candle is

2011-12-03T22:13:00.001Z

Drat. I did a huge, long post and Blogger and lost most of it. NOT HAPPY.

2011-12-03T17:23:00.001Z

Again, a busy time. Last Saturday night we went over to Llandaff Cathedral to hear Brahms' German Requiem, sung by the Cathedral Choral Society. It was absolutely beautiful and sung very well. The programme also included some Mozart and a short Schubert piece so a real treat all round, including a very beautiful prayer read by the Dean to open proceedings written by John Donne. Here it is.

2011-11-22T22:57:00.001Z

It's been a busy couple of weekends. On Saturday, we had a long planned family get together. We had bought Rita a ticket for Matthew Bourne's Nutcracker for her birthday (in early December) and both I and Claire (Andrew's sister) went along too. With all us being in Cardiff, we asked Claire to bring Basil and the boys, Rita to bring Roger and we had a big family lunch first which was great.

2011-11-03T23:12:00.000Z

There's an interesting new smell in the house - tack. On Tuesday I went over to Helen's and we had a fabulous day. Smudge, the fourth horsekitten of the apocalypse is doing brilliantly and has grown so much in just a week since I'd seen her previously. She's now bossing the other cats around and having a whale of a time - there's a huge personality inside a very tiny kitten. Helen has used

2011-10-15T18:49:00.000+01:00

I've written before about our broadband problems. It's painfully slow, intermittent and gets noticeably worse when it rains (yes, really). We've had some recent problems with it involving lots of phone calls to BT, and then on Tuesday night it went off completely. Andrew rang BT and after the usual faff, they arranged to send out an engineer on Friday (yesterday). He came around 10 and

2011-10-11T17:52:00.001+01:00

We were listening to PM on Radio 4 last week when they did an obituary piece on Steve Jobs. Not being an Apple-head I listened with interest, but was really impressed by an extract of a speech he did to Stamford students back in 2005. I found it very moving, very powerful and very impressive. Click here to see the text and a video. Rita and Roger came for the weekend and it was good

2011-09-28T10:44:00.000+01:00

Sloe gin puts hairs on your chest and a spring in your step, and we think it makes an important part of our winter. We also love giving bottles of it as Christmas gifts. So, on Sunday, Operation Sloe Gin commenced with Andrew and I setting out for a sloe berry picking session. We'd already identified a promising lane on a foray with the dogs, so took our carrier bags and set out. It was a

2011-09-24T18:28:00.000+01:00

Thursday was a back-to-school day. Trevithick Library had organised a mini awayday for all the staff to get us updated on what's happening in the Library service and to review the year. We had an excellent morning and it was great to see people after being off for the summer. Ruth, the library manager, decided to improve on perfection by bringing in a batch of home baked red velvet cupcakes

Opera gala, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

2011-09-20T13:21:00.000+01:00

The opera gala first. Held in the Hoddinott Hall, a complete sell out and the final event of Cardiff Music Festival, this was something we'd been anticipating for some time. It featured a range of up and coming younger singers as well as a special guest appearance from the much loved Dennis O'Neill. He has been working hard to set up the Wales Academy of Voice (see link here) to bring on

2011-09-18T16:07:00.001+01:00

The past ten days or so have been, perhaps understandably, a time of great emotional turmoil, but I've tried to keep going and stick to planned activities wherever possible. On Thursday afternoon, I attended a meeting of the new Cross Sectoral Companion Animal Welfare Group - chaired by WG, with attendance from local authorities, vets and various voluntary sector organisations. It was

2011-09-14T01:16:00.000+01:00

Michael John Evans 2nd October 1943 - 13th September 2011 RIP Dad

2011-09-11T22:25:00.003+01:00

Today was a big day for me - my first foray into judging at a dog show. Paula from Greyhound Welfare asked me back in the spring if I would like to judge at the annual late summer show at All Saints Church, Llandaff North. I agreed, with a certain amount of trepidation. Over the summer, we've taken Boola to plenty of local charity shows and I've been keeping a close eye on judging practice,

2011-09-09T22:31:00.002+01:00

Last Thursday, Boola was booked in for a GA at the vets - this was for a dental and for a hip X ray. We've noticed that his back leg "wobble" has got more noticeable recently and we wanted, if possible, to get to the bottom of it. The hip X ray confirmed there is no cancer or arthritis and it is what the vet suspected, a neurological problem. As such, we won't make any further attempts to

2011-08-29T11:57:00.004+01:00