Tuesday *A Dachshund's Guide to Visiting your Friend's House*

Dear Diary

Correct etiquette when visiting someone else's home is very important, or your human will get all silly and growly and you might offend your chums.

When first arriving it is extremely important that you announce that it is you by barking and yelling as loud as possible. This will let your chums know that it is you arriving and not some border incursion by evil badgers and their minions. 

Once your chums know you are there they will return your greeting with gusto and the formal invitation into the house will be given. To humans this probably seems the same as other barking, but it is our secret language to ensure that no spy from the badger camp is admitted into a friend's house.

Once inside there are different rules for different members of the household. Firstly my favorite sort of chum, the gentleman of the household (note, this only applies to female visitors, male visitors must wait for the female of the house to initiate). If the gentleman of the house wishes to welcome you into his home by having his wicked way with you it is important (and fun) that you comply. It would be rude to do otherwise. This is the most affectionate of greetings and should be carried out away from humans who just don't get it and will try and break it up. It is important not to carry it out ON the humans, that seems to particularly distress them - sensitive souls.

At the home I visited last night there are two gorgeous girls, one is a wise older woman. When dealing with your elders try not to jump all over them if they seem reserved. The elderly dog deserves you respect and ear pulling and pushing over are not manners. If the elderly dog wishes to play he or she will come to you and they will tell you in no uncertain terms when they are finished. 

It may be that there are shy dogs at the home you are visiting. You must not scare the shy dogs and you should try not to be grumpy if they tell you to go away with lots of barking. Just play with your other chum(s) and every now and then check on the shy dog. With time she (or he) will learn that you are fun and will stop shouting and want to play.

Now for some very very important advice. It is possible that the house you are going to will have cats! I know it is shocking. Obviously you need to put those cats in their place and teach them that you are the boss. However your human and the house human(s) will not like this at all. You need to learn to be sneaky and wait till the humans aren't looking before barking at (and if you are lucky chasing) the cats. Do not get caught, especially more than once, or you will be taken home and called a bad dog. Be warned though, some cats do not understand that they are below us and will attack you with their ninja death claws. It is a risk we all have to take. 

Finally before playtime can commence you'll need to run around and check the house for badger surveillance equipment (and any yummy dead flies) that might have been missed by the occupants. This is very good manners and one of the reasons sneaky badgers have not yet got the upper hand with us! 

Then it is play time and I think we all know how that works.

When it is time to leave be polite and say goodbye nicely. A few licks and quiet grumbles will suffice. And that is that. Another successful play date.

It's been a long dog, I mean time

Dear Diary

Seems I'm just about as good at keeping a diary as my Mum. Sorry to all my lovely friends for my long absence. So this will really be a quick update of some of my adventures.

When I left you I was in Timaru and having a great time. That great time continued. Mum and Aunty Sarah took me for a big walk through a thing called an estuary (it's just a fancy name for a swamp) and we ended up at a beach. It didn't seem like a beach to me at first, but Mum said that if I was in the UK (hi guys) this is what  most of their beaches are like. 

I had to check the beach for badgers, we had my little human friend with us and I couldn't let her get caught up in any evil badger plot. I was sure there was one where Aunty Sarah was sitting, but I must have scared it off with my awesome shovels of doom.

On the way back from the beach I decided that Mum really wasn't paying enough attention to what I was up to so I taught her a good lesson. It was even better because she was wearing her nice clothes and had the fancy camera! There was lots of long grass by the path, but I spotted a stream with some ducks in it. 

I've never really been interested in ducks before but they were just irresistible. A few bunny hops through the grass and then SPLASH! Ducks went quacking away and Mum came bounding through the grass. Unfortunately I had miscalculated the steepness of the banks of the stream and I couldn't get out. I was a bit worried till I saw Mum. Also it turned out the stream wasn't really full of water, but black stinky (YUSS) mud. It was hard to swim in. Mum whipped me out and I managed to get mud all over her. Then I spent lots of time trying to dry myself in the cut grass. 

Maybe it wasn't such a good idea (especially since I had to have a really loooooong bath to remove my glorious aroma).

That was my best Timaru adventure, but I also told lots of cows about how I'm the boss of them (they didn't listen).

I mastered the art of climbing up and sliding down the little human's cool slide.

And I partook of some civil disobedience. Mum says some rules are made to be bent a little!

Back home Mum has been poorly for a while, but we've still been meeting up with my new Pet Care friends. I've had great walks with them, although that sexy beast Kaiser seems to have fallen out of love with me now. Sad.

At least Otto still plays with me a bit. And after a rough start the tiny bully Millicent and I are getting on much better. 

I also went on an adventure to a Beech Forest, but I didn't like it. There were millions of wasps around and I got stung buy a wasp (but I showed it by eating it) and a bee. It made me really sad so Mum carried me. It was disappointing cause I love native forests. 

Below are lots of pics of my fun times. They say a picture is worth a really large amount of words so these will save you from having to spend the rest of the day reading this. 

Thursday *Living it up in the Countryside*

Dear Diary

What a day today. Mum and Dad took me for a big looooong walk on my long rope to a cafe. It was such a long walk the I had to walk through some deep puddles for a rest. When we got to the place there were so many exciting things. I meeted pigs and a bonky and grumpy chickens and leeeeetle horsies and something Dad called an alpalma. He said it was cause he wasn't sure whether they were alpacas or llamas. I don't know what any of those things are and the alpalmas wouldn't talk to me so I don't care for them.

I also met a really growlly dog called Jack. He is an old dog who works at the cafe. He didn't like me at all and Mum had to pick me up because he tried to bite my bottom! How rude. He got put away for that. Mum says I mustn't judge him because a naughty little dog probably bit him sometime and that's why he doesn't like me. I understand so I wasn't upset at all.

Then we had a really loooooooong walk back and I found an even deeper puddle for walking in! I like to keep Mum guessing about whether I'm a water dog or not. 

In the afternoon I got to play outside with the little human that lives with Aunty Sarah and Uncle Greg. She's really cool and I want to give her millions of kisses all the time. I'm not allowed though so I'm getting A LOT of Leave It! training and the little human is getting much braver too. We'll be friends soon. We got to share a carrot together and run around in the sun. 

I looked for badgers again in the big pile of grass, but the sneaky badgers had put some sort of hot burny thing in the middle of the pile and I burned my nose. I guess I won't be digging in there anymore. Naughty badgers. 

Then Mum went away and I helped Dad and Aunty Sarah stack a big pile of wood. I made sure there were no badgers in the wood pile and got all tangled in rope and got stuck under a shed and had a great time. Dad said I was hard work. I don't know what he means!

Tonight everyone got cool sausagey things out to play with. I had so much fun chasing them and biting them and pushing them round and best of all - making them go BANG! I liked that a lot. Mum always rushed in a picked up the dead sausage bits, but I don't even care about them, only the live ones are interesting. 

Wednesday *Road Trip - Eventually*

Dear Diary

A lovely sunny day today and Mum AND Dad were both home! Fun times. Lots of playing and snuggling and playing and napping and snuggling. That black cat is still not running away from me as much as I'd like but I can't work out how to get things back to the way they were before. He keeps hitting on the nose when I try and chase him!

Mum took me up to the high dog park and there were lots and lots and lots of dogs there today. Some of them were really fun, like little Atari the Staffie cross, we played lots and he was a great ball chaser. Mum tried to get me chase my new frisbee, but for some reason she kept throwing it away. If she doesn't want it then it can't be very good so I just hunted for badgers.

There were some grumpy mean dogs at the park too today. They barked and barked and barked at me and their owners just let them bully me lots. Mum rescued me and took me away. Luckily there were lots of other fun dogs so I forgot all about the bullies. 

Once we got home all sorts of strange goings on went on. My den got packed up and all my toys put away, then some got put in a bag with my blankets and bed and stuff. Mum got the cool sucky machine out, but I wasn't allowed to play with it. Dad gave me treats for not playing with it. 

Then lots of things got put in the car. Then I got put in the car with Mum and Dad and we drove and drove and drove! We finally got to a place I've been before. Aunty Sarah and Uncle Greg's! Their place is really fun because it's out in the countryside and there's sometimes big white fluffy dogs to play with (I'm a little bit scared of them), and they leave delicious treats in the grass. 

No fluffy white dogs when we arrived, but I made sure to check their paddock and drink from their trough. Then I found a ginormous mound of grass to play. It was sooooooo fun, I was sure there was a badger in it, but there wasn't. I'm going to check it again though, when Mum isn't looking, just to be sure. 

I ran round and round and round the house lots and played with a ball and then had to go to bed early because I was just too excited. I can't wait to go adventuring tomorrow! 

The Weekend *Giving my Secretary Time Off*

Dear Diary

I am very kind and loving and since it was Mum's birthday this weekend I decided to let her off for taking dictation from me. Aren't I the best?

It was a totally amazing brilliant so very good radtastic weekend because our boss from work gave me a BONE! Now I've had little bones before and they are great, but this was a hugemungous bone that was almost as big as me! And it had meat, so much delicious meat. Oh the bone is so good. I'm having trouble concentrating because I just want to go chew it more.

Of course the first thing I did was go and put it in the dirt so no one else would want it. 

And I made sure to tell Mum that she couldn't have it back once she'd given it to me. Of course she did have it back for a bit and gave it back to me. But I really didn't want to let her have it. Lucky she is lovely and understands and doesn't keep it from me for long.

The only problem with the gorgeous dirt and grass covered wonderfully sticky and awesome bone is I'm not allowed it in the house. Not fair! How am I supposed to be near Mum and Dad and eat my bone? It turns out I can't so I didn't really see much of them this weekend. 

I did make time on Mum's birthday to go for a special just the two of us walk early in the morning. We had the whole dog park to ourselves and Mum threw pinecones for me and I chased bugs through the long grass. It was nice. 

Of course back home it was straight back to my bone so I didn't mind when Mum and Dad went out without me. When they came back they let me play with some of the cool things from the party bag. I think I should have got to go to the party, but Mum said that it was in a cool place called C1 and that dogs aren't allowed inside and I would have had to leave my bone at home. 

Then for Mum and Dad's dinner we went for an awesome picnic and they ate things that smelt so good called burritos and I didn't get any cause Mum and Dad are greedy and mean. But I did get to explore lots of native bush and play with some other dogs and practice my recall, which was perfect.

Then a cool thing happened these little nozzle things popped out of the ground and made it rain. I had to investigate.

Now I know badgers live underground so I think the nozzle things are some sort of evil ploy by the badgers to take over the world. (I'm not really sure how, but I'll figure it out!) Knowing this I decided that I had  to stop them so I attacked the little nozzle thing and the hard fast water. Mum and Dad were laughing at me lots and Mum was so overcome at my bravery that she completely stuffed up filming my daring act. Sigh.

The badgers must have known what I was doing cause the nozzle things moved round and got Mum when was she was trying to film me. She made a funny high pitched noise and Dad laughed at her lots. It was fun, but I decided I'd foiled badgers enough for one day. And of course when we got home there was my bone!

What a great weekend. Glad you had a great time Mum, I love you!