- Coming home
- Licking lips holding hen
- Watching hen in nest box in New enclosure
- Poorly eye
- In the window for children passing
- Escaping the back garden to the street
- Walking down the street on the other side.
- Weight on my legs
- Likes egg breakfast
- Two people at the table means two plates to lick no brown sauce, not much gravy
- Picked strawberry at Chiltern dog show
- Played toys in his own terms, buy red ones. Bucket of toys, tip over and have to find the right one
- Hair grown between eyes likes pulling it out, usually in a train
- Likes eyes rubbed and around corner of lips
- Wait on sofa or carpet for dinner
- Office bed ok to make tea but too long and he’d follow
- Blame for rotten beard
- Snow walk eldwick, ice underneath. Sink bath
- Dealing with Stanley
- Loved wearing jumpers
- Parks are boring, kings cross ace
- Bounce and skip up the station stairs
- Reluctant to go past the postbox before 6pm dinner
- Three inside wee: sheer, Wales hotel, conservatory
- Weekend want to get up soon after 6
- Sigh before sleep under duvet
- Train over bridge, tuck in tail and run
- Leave red sparrow early
- Rush home for Timothy
- Carry upstairs after lunch
- Glass on pavement
- Corner sniffing Cornwall Victoria
- Bark at motorbikes
- Beat up buster
- Turn nose up at Apple core
- Loved ice cream. Canterbury tub of his own
- Loud snoring on bed, heard over phone, people smile on train
- Liked wearing clothes
- Purr of appreciation for a tuck
- Sit by softest touch at dinner time
- Always left some meat, cut up and share with Annette’s plate
- When first arrived, biscuits in washing machine
- Asked for milk in evenings some times
- Everyone stand quiet while he drinks
- Slept in bedroom when office bed moved
- Knew his bed when camping for Bonio, proud
- Yellow beard from curry
- McDonald’s milk
- Run in circles after hearing a bang
- Annette & Grace both like him being posted through window and welcoming me home 10 seconds later
- Clocks changing mean dinner according to dog time
Videos
https://youtu.be/Ef9xiLX-Os0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD5xu7h9viE
Choosing biscuits
Playing with ball and boxes
Learning how to sleep in the pushchair bed
Watching hens
Telling me he wants to play
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7lumf7yGEM
Strawberry
Hot days
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YZl8H6XEsc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSiuaYnRsLA
Bones
Getting lamb bones from the butcher
We sometimes go to Rayners Lane to buy a big 10 kilo sack of rice, some vegetables for making curry, and then to the Medina Butcher for a kilo of diced lamb.
When buying meat from the butcher we’d ask for “a bone for the dog” and they would wrap up a couple in a blue carrier bag.
Timothy KNEW that the bag was for him. he knew what going to that butcher’s meant. After a few times, he even knew how to GET to the butchers from outside Rayners Lane tube station.
Rayners Lane is a busy and dirty dump of a place really, but Timothy loved it – not just for the butcher – but also the smells all along the rest of the street.
Once his bones and our meat were in a carrier bag, he’d walk more quickly, keep his nose on the bag, and if Annette was carrying the bag, he’d stick right bit it all the way home. He’d pull on his lead down out street, race inside, and wait in the kitchen, barking, asking for his bone. He’d done his shopping, got it home, and wanted to get stuck in.
Cleaning the chopping board
When cutting up meat on the chopping board – be that tenderising beef, dicing anything, or chopping Timothy’s own lamb heart, Tim would always get the job of licking the wooden chopping board.
If there were chunks of meat, he’d of course take those first, but he’d then lick every bit of the board that had any meat on it.
He’d take full charge of and control of the board – sometimes standing on it with one paw to stop it escaping, and sometimes he’d stand on it with all four feed – he’d look like he was on a raft!
He took it seriously though – he was completely focused on his job. He never returned to the chopping board – he always finished it properly, first time.
Licking out plastic meat trays
Timothy loved a bit of meat. When cooking something with diced or minced beef from a plastic supermarket tray, he’d expect a cut for himself.
We’d squash a bit of mince into the corner of the plastic film and drop a couple of bits of meat into the tray. He’d push the tray around the kitchen floor while fishing everything out.
Most importantly though, AFTER that meat, no matter the nice smells coming from the cooker, he’d leave us to it: he knew that was his bit, so he wouldn’t pester for more.
Choosing a seat in the living room
As much as Timothy loved being with us, and as cosy as he liked to be with blankets, he didn’t THAT often actually want to sit on our laps.
When he was younger, as we all sat in the living room he’d only properly settle if I was there too – but even then, very rarely sat on or with me. He would regularly sit on Annette’s lap, but not mine.
As he got older and more comfortable and confident, he’d nearly always sit on a chair on his own. A different one each time, no set chair, unless there was a blanket on one chair and no other – then he’d pick that one.
Towards the end of his life, he’d have the WHOLE three-seater sofa to himself with a blanket at one end, his bed in the middle, and the bare leather seat at the other end. He’d move between all three in an evening.
If either of us were in the “wrong” seat, most often Annette, he’d pace around looking at the crap seats and turf us out of the way. Regularly – nearly every time in fact – if we got up for something, he’d be in OUR seat when we got back. We never minded of course, we just wanted him to be comfortable and happy.
Timothy joined in with Dogs at Polling Stations
Starting about five years before he died, people took photos of their dogs outside polling stations and posted them on Twitter with the hastag #dogsatpollingstations. Timothy, of course, joined in.
We have photos from at least two elections – outside the Ruislip Manor library with the “Polling Station” signs. We used the photos on his calendars for the May page, too.
We of course never left him in his bag unattended, and but for a couple of seconds if walking somewhere tricky, would never even break eye contact with him while he was hung somewhere. he liked the reassurance that we were still looking out for him while he was hanging.
His polling station photos had him in his bag, but two of us went together to the polling station we only ever went to actually vote one at a time – we’d never have left Timothy unattended in his bag.
Being caught at Heathrow airport with Timothy
Dogs are allowed on the underground. The Underground goes to Heathrow Airport… but dogs are NOT allowed in the airport. We’d been to meet people before, and left Timothy at home, but (and not just when he was getting old) we liked to take him with us as much as we could: because HE loved to go with us whenever he could.
So we took him on the Underground to Heathrow one day. It was before his “dog in a bag” days, but we had already by then snuck him into a couple of places in a bag. He didn’t have a specific bag at the time, just whichever bag we had available that was about the right size for him.
While at Heathrow, I kept him in a bag of course, hiding him on the other side of my legs whenever we were near anyone. A BA-uniformed lady approached us beside a glass balcony wall somewhere by a lift or escalator. We thought we were in trouble… but no! It was the charm of Timothy: she stopped us to ask if she could take a photo because she loved what she saw!
We floated around the airport after that. He went back to Heathrow a couple of times after that, the same way, too. Whenever he got to go somewhere like that – where there are lots of people and no other dogs, he’d always make the most of it: twisting and turning his head to see everything and to make sure he took it all in. He never tried to get out – I’m sure because he knew that the bag was the safest, and only, way to stay there.
Running along a train platform
One of the great Timothy photos is of him RUNNING like a greyhound down a station platform to catch a train. I don’t remember where we were going, but we were all together for the whole day: one of Timothy’s favourite things.
He was so game and eager to get on the train that when we started to run, he immediately picked up the pace and ran flat out. I’m so glad that I took those photos – even though it was tricky to capture: he really did love trains
Long Saturday walks with Timothy
In the week after Tim died, I started going for a walk on my own. I remember taking Timothy on longer “Saturday walks” down Torrington Road, past Ruislip Gardens, South Ruislip station, and back via Victoria Road. He always wanted a carry after Ruislip Gardens and then again somewhere along Station Approach. It wasn’t because he couldn’t walk, but either his heart was racing or he got disappointed that we didn’t go into the station to catch a train.
Another route we took was through the Torrington Road width restriction and up towards Ruislip – either passing the station and vets, or longer via the War Memorial at the duck pond. We went that way a lot in the ice around Christmas when Annette went to Singapore one year.
Everytime I walk through the width restriction and turn right towards Ruislip I always remember Tim in the ice with me in my massive duffle coat: he was so eager to keep going, and had a much better grip than I did.