Karen

Good news for Ruby, very pleased to hear that!

I've more or less called it a day on my family history and moved onto local history instead. Last years project was to take a photo of an ancient oak every week and make it into a time lapse video. This year I am using Twitter to highlight a different street in the town each week with photos and old postcards. The Abbey in the town was attacked by Vikings so there is the occasional reenactment of that on the green where the abbey once stood, I haven't been tempted yet to join in!

Welcome home Freddie! That made me smile, it sounds like a modern version of Heidi!

Clever girl Wispa!

Very excited for you Snow! I recognised his picture straight away, he has a very distinctive look about him.

I'm not good with the clicker but it has helped and the same sort of thing also helped prevent Fern from yapping at dogs we walked past. From memory we started with treats and a clicker indoors. Offer treat to dog and click as they take it. After doing that for a bit, add a word. We used look but you could pick something else. When you walk, start with saying Look when there are no distractions and offer treat and click when Cooper looks at you. After a bit he will hopefully look at you in case more treats are on offer - in which case click and treat. It's not an instant fix by any means, it needs working at and I would pick somewhere to start with where he is less likely to fail. Don't forget to cut his food down as you will get through loads of treats to start with. Fingers crossed!

Oooh Snow - look forward to seeing pictures of the new pointy nose soon! It's proper red hair that I fancy. I am definitely too old though and now the chemo has left my hair really curly I don't want to look like Ronald Mcdonald!

Change of hair colour Griff? I still fancy fiery red but I'm not brave enough!

Meg has had phases like that, she looks round every gate post and in every door way just in case there is a cat. Two things have helped - firstly a bold pair of cats who will walk right up to her and miaow (its the ones that run that look exciting I think) and secondly to do some clicker training. I'm not very good with my timing for clicker work, but I can see it makes a difference. We use "look", so every time Meg looks at me during a walk she gets a click, "look" and treat.

Happy New Year! We had lots of fireworks, mostly of the loud bomb variety. Luckily Meg doesn't seem to mind them despite her phobia of squeaky noises.

How is Archie doing Yantan?

There is a Facebook page for those who were DP lounge members and a new forum for a remaining few.

8 rotties! Good grief, your food bill must have been enormous. We now have Meg - a 12 year old lab/collie cross who came to us from the Blue Cross almost 4 years ago after spending the first 8 years of her life living in a shed. We are down to just 2 rabbits which is the smallest number in many years. There were still 4 rabbits a week and a half ago, but that's the penalty of having a group who are more than 13 years old. My new years task is to find a girl companion for Ginger Harry who is the youngest remaining one.

Very smart forum upgrade Mr Pingu, thank you! Glad that Archie enjoyed his steak. Funny you should mention about him not recongising his visitors... we met one of Meg's favourite dog walkers this morning for the first time in a week or so and I'm not sure she recognised him. She certainly didn't rush up to him the way she does normally.

Meg's problem has been a sudden fear of squeaky noises. Her very thorough behaviourist has decided that its probably down to to what she calls cognitive decline. A combination of vivitonin and Aktivait has definitely helped, although there is still the odd meltdown over odd noises on the tv. We saw more improvement when we started the aktivait on top of the vivitonin, which from memory was a couple of weeks later. We've also swapped to feeding all of Meg's food from kong type toys, to keep her brain busy. It does mean that half the house if full of trip hazards, but has had the added benefit of reducing the episodes of Meg's tummy gurgling (which also was a worrying noise to her). Keeping my fingers crossed for Archie!

Good thoughts for Archie. Meg takes vivitonin - hope it makes a difference for Archie asap!

Hope your dad is doing OK Eve. Merry Christmas.

I just logged on to ask you if it was the solstice today as I googled and saw two conflicting things - but you have very cleverly already given me the answer! Thank you. Happy Solstice to you and everyone else, looking forward to the longer days. Hope everyone else feels better soon. I took my dad for a blood test today and the waiting room was full of people coughing, hope they haven't generously spread their germs for christmas.

One of the employees at the office I work at on Wednesdays is a hindu and she is the most enthusiastic person in the office about Christmas. She even went off to France to find the best Christmas market! She brought in a pile of lovely veggie samosas for Diwali, so it's currently my favourite workplace for a great exchange of cultural traditions.

If nothing else I'm sure it it made a change from having the door not answered - I can't imagine they found many people at home on a Tuesday morning.

Smug emoticon needed!

Yantan, I forgot to ask how Ruby is doing?

Very sorry about Jerry. Good thoughts for Wispa.

Thanks for that. I've been meaning to research a bit more about a local postcard that I have. I got as far before as finding out the girl in the picture was the daughter of a man who collated/wrote books recording the servicemen who died in WW1 so am looking forward to finding out more before I hand it all to the local museum. I bought a poppy today and went back to buy one of their little enamel poppies saying 1918 2018.

I believe there are different types of pancreatitis - Rosie's was of the type that needed low fat food and no variety in her diet. I haven't heard of blood with either though, so perhaps a visit to the vet?