The Pleasures of Life

A good life is made up of many aspects.  Love, passion, companionship, interests, community service, connection to spirit, and use of the body in ways that it enjoys all come to mind on this day.  If this is true then my weekend was a good one.

Firstly, many thanks to all those who were so kind about Tess's loss.  Mum feels it the most  of course,  but Angus is running a close second.  He is not happy.

      
Mum said something that last day of Tess's that I think we all need to keep in mind. She was sitting on the floor with Tess's head on her knee, and Tess was so happy, and  Mum said she wished she had taken the time to do this more during Tess's life.  It's true.  It's easy to take a good dog for granted, and if they aren't the sort of dog who pushes forward for attention, sometimes you realise whole days have gone by where you've walked and fed them and talked to them, but you've hardly touched them.

Training mine has kind of fallen off the radar lately with so much else to do and no goals in mind, and because they are both not big fans of snuggles, I tend to be more hands-off with them than some of my past dogs.  Since Thursday, I've been making sure I give both my girls more attention in the ways they do enjoy, and gone back to doing daily training, and they do seem happier for it.

Sporting their new bandannas

Here's a happy dog.  This is Medusa, who is being fostered why the wonderkind brothers, Gogs and Thor.   We popped up to visit them as they were working on their block last friday and they had Deuce, as they call her, with them.  She adores those lads.  I hope she finds her forever home soon, but I think she will be sad to say goodbye to them.

  
Google offered me this funny animation of Gogs trying to get Deuce to jump up on the log they were slabbing.

On Saturday we had an early call-out to a fire.  I got to drive the 1.4 lights and sirens for the first time officially, and we buzzed around the tracks for a while but never found the 'burning fence post' that had been called in.  Then when we'd only been back to the station for ten minutes, we got another call-out this time to another bigger fire out near where the last one was.  I didn't go, because by then there were some very keen people who had arrived for scheds who rarely get to turn out.  I'm kind of glad, though.  It was very hot and sticky, and they had some long waits while the inaccessible area had 'tracks' bulldozed in for them.  If you can call them tracks...

Yikes!!! Glad I'm not Equipment officer any more!  These pics by Dave.

    
They did have some fun, though.  That Andyroo, what a ham!  :D

The helitacs were out in full force.  Always a glad sight to a Firey's eyes.

The guys were out at the fire till 3pm and missed the brigade friends' BBQ that Dave and Mandy had organised, but Roo and Rowdy did make it for food at the end of the afternoon.  Did I get pics of the humans?  No, but I did get a pic of their adorable little sprite of a dog, Lily.  Her tufty ears just killed me.

So expressive!

They also have a lovely cool and shady pond full of big koi and goldfish.  Google offered me this modified pic.  I like how the fish and water glow.

   
Mama chook Spotty managed to survive the last two hot days, and I made sure she got nice cold, nutritious and juicy food to eat.

Although Rover felt that this was vastly unfair and was not averse to leaping up to try and get at my bowl.

Yesterday was IMT training. I was a fake sector commander, reporting back on the fire conditions in my area and asking for more resources as the fire turned my way and got bigger.  Here I am getting briefed at the start.  It's kind of fun and kind of stressful, but always interesting.  Tom took this pic. Thanks Tom!  Note the sunnies AND reading glasses on my head.  It's a look I am attempting to make fashionable since I seem to end up accidentally doing it a lot!  :D 

It's a lovely cool and rainy day here today after two stinkers, and I am having a 'no shoulds' day.  That means there are still lots of things to do, but they are all things that I haven't been able to fit into the past few weeks, so it will feel like a holiday!