Star

As I type this, Star is lying in a patch of sunlight in front of an open door. This is one of her favourite positions. She likes it best with the door open, so that should the need arise, she can potter out into the garden, but she will accept a door closed situation. Eventually. Today though, the door stands flung open, because on opening it a lovely spring day, complete with warm sunshine, was waiting for us. (It had been waiting an indecently long time in fact, as we tend to lie in on a Saturday morning.)

I mentioned in a recent show that Star, our Bichon Frise, has certain preferences. Call them preferences, or idiosyncrasies, or eccentricities. Whatever you call them, she has them. She has definite ideas on how her life should be; when she should go for a walk, when she should have access to the garden, when she should be on your lap, and so on. The basic rule seems to be that all these things should happen whenever she jolly well wants them to happen, thank you very much!

You know some people say that dogs and children don't mix? Well in my opinion dogs and violins don't mix. I have recently started to learn to play the violin. I can play piano a little, and quite a few woodwind instruments ( it's all the same basic concept - a tube with holes to make pitch variations), but stringed instruments have always eluded me. I was bought my first guitar when I was under ten years old. Now, quite a few years later, I still only know a few chords, and most of those I get wrong. I also take ages to change from one chord to the next.

So I decided to ask for a violin for Christmas. Not Christmas just gone, oh no, this was way

We've had snow this week, which has brought fun and problems. Working from home, and home schooling too meant no snow days, but we managed to get out and have some fun. The dogs were so excited by this sudden covering of strange white stuff, and ran around exploring it. We have learned from experience not to let Star go out in the snow for too long. We learned this late one Sunday evening when we were so excited ourselves about an unexpected snowfall that we were all out in the garden at ten o'clock in the evening. Because it was dark, we didn't realise until we went back into the house, that Star had amassed a huge amount of little balls of snow in her fluffy coat.

This is a photo of Star at Carols in the Square tonight. We learned a lesson when we attended the switching on of the Christmas lights in the square earlier this month. The lesson was that in a crowd with a small dog, you spend most of your time making sure the little dog doesn’t get trodden on. Or you give in and pick up the little dog, and then you can’t hold both your coffee and your brandy snap. Or your mulled wine and your roast hog, if you’re that way inclined.