Happy Birthday to Mum

On Thursday 29th November is was my Dear Mother's birthday.

Of course I hadn't got her a present, but then she acknowledged that she's impossible to buy for and generally people just buy her food.

So after a walk at the creek and a very easy taking down of the tents and packing, we stopped off on the way home just past Mount Mee at the Ocean View Winery.

Where a fine meal was consumed by all, al fresco as it were, with the dogs beneath our feet. One of whom was bleeding profusely, but we'll come back to that.

Regular trips were taken down to the vineyards, a mere thirty metres or so from where we were sat, to have twirls or to spot the wallaby -sorry, wobbly - that was hopping around in there.

Occasionally we visited the toilet to perform and performance was undertaken flawlessly.

Now back to the bleeding dog. As I said we went for a quick jaunt down at the creek in the morning. The dogs were quite exciteable and Matilda got herself into a fenced off area and obviously caught a whiff of something as she let out a clarion whoop to which, needless to say, Tiny responded enthusiastically.

So enthusiastically in fact that even though she's an old lady she cleared a four-foot barbed wire fence in one of those "Oh Shit" moments that sometimes happen.

They didn't come back for a quarter of an hour or so, then Tiny trotted back with a cut eye and a gaping wound on her inside front leg.

The thing about dog skin is that it's pretty elastic so if it gets cut, by barbed wire for instance, it springs apart, leaving the flesh underneath exposed.

In her younger days we would have - and did - whisk her off to a vet to get the wound stitched but that would mean general anaesthetic, which is a bit of a risk to take for something essentially cosmetic.

But she won't stopped licking the damned thing...

Anyway, erm, Happy Birthday Mum...