Thank you, the folk behind the statistics

I don't thank my visitors enough. I'll try to make amends.

"Thank you", the 1,307 visitors who have looked at my profile. "Thank you, too", the 14,426 (including me) who have visited the blog. You have looked at pages here 22,120 times, which is great.

I'd like to thank all the people who lost their instructions for erecting a gazebo. On quiet weeks, at certain times of the year, you form the majority of visitors and you tend to spend up to 15 minutes here. I suspect you're running in and out from the computer sticking lots of little metal tubes together. Fair play. I was doing the same only this afternoon.

Special appreciation goes to those who find the blog by Googling the phrase (sometimes in ALL CAPS, sometimes not): "I PEED MY PANTS." I hope you're feeling a bit drier now.

For everyone who is looking for a solution to a puzzle, "Hello!" and "Thanks for dropping by!" I've no puzzle pieces except the individual blog posts you briefly examine.

"Hi!" to the Laurel & Hardy fans who find the blog by clicking on the toothache photo. And to the occasional person interested in the George Best five pound note, I'm glad you stopped by.

"Cheers!" to those who use a saved version of an old email to come here, or have bookmarked my profile, or who otherwise use an old visit to make repeat jaunts. Your calling cards are dutifully noted by the hit counter and gratefully received.

And to anyone using the various blog aggregators to which this site is connected, I hope you're not disappointed in your visit here.

I'm not forgetting those using links from other blogs: I hope your use of those links so kindly provided by the thoughful authors of their own sites proved worth the effort.

Lastly, those who find the site by random or misdirected hyperlink: "Thank you" and I hope you, like all of us, find what you're seeking soon.

There are many people who think that blogging is an idle, futile, even embarrassing pursuit. They wouldn't do it themselves and they certainly don't understand anyone who does.

If you're one of these uncomprehending people, then please just move along. I've no great words for you, except that one of us, either you or me, has missed the point entirely. We should get out more. Probably.

Or something. Definitely something.

Countdown to dentistry...

It's gloomy in Dublin this evening. More like a November afternoon than a June evening. Rain has been coming down in meteoric showers all day and I had to let the gazebo down as there was no way it was going to survive intact against the sudden violent gusts that puffed it up to hover an inch off the ground.

I'm at home recovering from another attack of the dental abcesses. Two of the resident trio came on me together, skirmishing with me on Friday and Saturday; opening up the main battle late on Saturday night. I think this time I was about 30 minutes from sending for an ambulance, the infection was so severe. I had a fever of a million and a bit and the whole room was jumping with the uncontrollable shakes I suffered. Herself was at a loss, because I was well-supplied with horsepills, water, painkillers, the lot. But the waves kept coming. I finally managed to get some internal heat back into the bod on Saturday night / Sunday morning as the worst of the attack eased. It was fever and pain and discomfort since then for much of Monday, until it all broke in the wee hours of Tuesday morning and I woke refreshed but exhausted.

The appointment with the dentist isn't until Tuesday, 7th July, at 10.45 am.

You wouldn't want to have something seriously wrong with you, would you?

A neighbour gave me a phone number of her dentist this afternoon. I may phone them tomorrow and see if I can't get an earlier slot. These three buckos have to go. Or, next time, I will.

I forgot about music radio and DJs

I had 2FM on today as I scraped old wallpaper off the walls. Refreshing to hear some repetitive music instead of repetitive Lisbon Treaty news all day.

The DJ (remember them?) said:

"This zero and a number eight are walking down the road.

"The zero says:

"'Why is your belt so tight?'"

Like it.

The one with the waggily tail...

The young pet-shop assistant and I struggled for ten minutes or so with the wooden kennel but it wouldn't all fit into the car. The body almost fitted into the boot, but the detachable roof just wouldn't fit at all. Of course, I'd forgotten the rope that Herself said I should bring. So he did his best with some shop twine. The first bump we went over the twine snapped. The bus driver in the bus behind us tooted the horn a little as the rear door of the car was waving up and down distressingly.

"Pull over up here," I suggested. "I'll take the kennel out and you can go home for the rope."

So that's what we did.

As I'm standing there on the side of the road watching the traffic go by, drivers and passengers occasionally wondering what I'm doing beside a half-built kennel, a large woolly dog trailing a lead rushes out of a side road and into the middle of the road.

A car swerves and the one behind brakes heavily. The dog runs on in a blind panic, disappearing into the Watergate estate.

I resume my vigil by the kennel.

A red car pulls up.

"Excuse me," a man says through the open window. "Have you seen a grey dog...?"

I tell him it went across the road and into Watergate...

"Heading in the direction of the park," I add.

He thanks me and tries to drive out onto the main road, which is very busy. Eventually he rushes off down the road and the car goes into the estate.

Herself arrives and we wrap up everything like a B-movie heroine on a railroad line waiting for the chap to come to the rescue.

Herself drops me off and goes back out to get the roof section from the pet shop.

I muse as I struggle the big, expensive wooden crate through the house and into the cat's shed that I'm glad we don't have a dog. They're just too much trouble.

You could put someone's eye out with that, too

Our elderly cat doesn't care for the warm air blowing out of the hair dryer and she usually runs away when it's switched on. So, I turned around from my sitting position on the side of the bed to see if she had moved from her spot as the hair dryer was going good-o. The cat was still there, but making the unmistakable hunching and unhunching movements of an approaching vomit. I stretched out and gave her a nudge to move her so that at least she'd get sick on the floor and not on the bed covers. She thumped down and disappeared. When I'd dried my hair, I went around to survey the damage. She'd got sick in my shoe. Sometimes you have to know when to give up.

You could put someone's eye out with that

I put my slippers on and went downstairs. Then I discovered there was something in my right slipper as well as my sock and my foot. A penny, I thought. So, I went back upstairs, took off the slipper and took out the penny. I put the slipper back on. I opened my jar of small change and tossed the penny. It struck the side of the jar, rebounded and went back into my slipper. So I left it there. Sometimes you have to know when to give up.

Cake