Okay, so I was feeling a bit smug. I’d braved the crowds (a lot of the schools are off already) been to the chemist and got mosquito repellent, anti-malarial tablets (another story) and sun cream, finished my Christmas shopping (I’m feeling a bit schizophrenic about this whole Christmas/holiday scenario) and opened the door to find…a grey gritty moonscape, littered with all sorts of rubbish, and one very sheepish-looking dog, trying to make herself look as invisible as possible, curled up on her bed surrounded by more crap.

A quick assessment showed that my first thought: that the dog had spontaneously combusted, exploding in a huge puff of smoke, then raining her charred remains down over the entire kitchen, turned out to be a tad over-dramatic. What she had actually done was to empty out the bin, very delicately and without toppling it over, therefore scattering the ashes of last night’s fire over the entire kitchen along with egg shells, yoghurt pots, tissues, potato peelings, and anything else that was in the bin whilst she took the tastiest morsels back to her bed for later investigation. She had also, I would surmise in a rather ‘CSI: Miami’ type fashion, sneezed several times during this process, which would explain the fine layer of ash that now covers all the work surfaces and cupboard doors in the kitchen, as well as most of her face and her entire nose.

She knew she was in deep sh*t because she didn’t move, just averted her head in that strange way she does when she thinks that if she can’t see you, then obviously you can’t see her either and aren’t going to give her the biggest bollocking ever for trashing your kitchen. Wrong. From the first ‘WHAT have you DONE?!’ she knew damned well she was in for it, and took her roasting like a man, whilst surreptitiously trying to shift her position to cover up the two crisp packets, the yoghurt pot and the cheese wrapping that were still in her bed.

When I’d finished clearing up (her one saving grace was that the floor did need washing) she came and leant against my leg and looked up at me with those big brown eyes. Now you’re probably thinking that this was in a shameful, penitent fashion, but oh no, she could see I’d bought a packet of treats from Tesco. Grrrr.

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