It was August bank holiday weekend 2023, and we were expecting some guests for a stayover.
Stella arrived on Saturday night, and she was made most welcome and it appeared that she was delighted with the céad mÃle fáilte afforded her on her arrival.
We noticed that she was very spirited and energized after the drive down from Dublin, so we went out to the back garden for a play which was enjoyed by all and then we adjourned to the sitting room for some down time followed by a bedtime snack and a wee drink.
Next, we set up the bed and made sure that the night cover was in place so that she would not wake up too early. Then we sat down to imbibe a relaxing glass of chilled Grand Vin De Bourgogne from Andre Goichot 2020 Chablis collection before retiring for the night.
Morning dawned and we were delighted to see the early sun beaming through the window.
Then we heard a strange sound. It was a dog barking. Suddenly we realised that our weekend house guest was awake and needed to perform some early morning relieving duties.
And so, we went down to be greeted by Stella, our two-year-old energetic French bulldog guest who, having performed her morning duties of nature, wanted me to play tug of war with herself and her tug of war puppy toy. Naturally I obliged. There was much joyous yelping from the canine side and lots of puffing and panting from yours truly. We both needed a break, after ten minutes of such activity, for breakfast of fruit and nuts which was much enjoyed by both parties.
Post breakfast we headed for the garden and some further ball throwing and exercise.
Well, you never saw such liveliness as Stella galloped around the garden, jumped up steps, galloped around trees and back down to base again in frenzied excitement investigating her new surroundings.
Suddenly a neighbour’s dog barked, a cat appeared on the wall and the excitement and stress levels went stratospheric and she took off at a hectic pace speeding around the garden in circles going nowhere fast, but she started barking laying down her territorial boundaries. They were warned. We had a visitor.
Now she was getting hot under the collar and needed a drink. She looked a bit bothered, so we brought her indoors, having washed her muddy paws. She needed a lie down and somewhere to scratch her sweaty itchy back.
Being quite a resourceful canine, she found that she could crawl under the two-seater couch in the sitting room and scratch her back while afterwards having a nice, relaxed stretch on the carpet, purring contentedly.
Suddenly the younger members of the family arrived unannounced disturbing her peace, and Stella had to readjust herself again to the enthusiasm of the newly arrived energetic junior members of the family. She ran, she frolicked and got very excited at the company and her excitement knew no bounds. A junior 5-year-old shared a biscuit with her, and she was all agog and delighted with herself. She wanted more play and the juniors duly obliged while poor Stella was parched and urgently needed another drink from her personalised drinking vessel. She slurped and drank till her thirst was sated and then the poor dog was exhausted, and she just flopped down on her own personal rug for a well needed rest and relaxation.
When the Juniors were going home she barely managed to open an eye as if to wink a canine farewell to them.
She had a good time during her stay with us and I must admit that I enjoyed her company too,if a little exhausted after the added exercise and the early morning alarm clock call.
It’s a dog’s life.