Bruno's Blog – a complete animal at work

Let’s start by building up a list of UK cafes, restaurants and pubs serving food that DO allow dogs – if you know of some, email us the name, address and phone number & we’ll publish the results!

I want to eat in restaurants.

I mean I like restaurants. They smell good. Frankly I’m not that fussed if I don’t get to eat there, but sleeping under the table in amongst their feet sure beats staying in the car or moping around at home wondering when they’re going to come back. Or IF they’re ever going to come back. Or whether they’ve finally decided to leave me for ever. Or if they’ve been abducted by aliens or whatever it is that apparently 20% of Americans believe happens all the time.

I’ve also just been to France, where, incidentally it’s just FINE for dogs to go into restaurants. France, gourmet capital of the world. An entire nation state as gastronomic temple.

On Sunday morning we went into one of the small local eateries, me trotting happily along with them. They sat down on chairs and I lay under the table.

In comes another family. Two dogs, four people. First off, the giant-sized huge fat Freda Bassett Hound wanders in and appears to collapse by the side of their table, causing no trouble to anyone, although her head was sagging so much it did look as if it might be melting into the floor.

Second dog up is a little blue Cocker who rushes around frantically wagging her tail and immediately stands up to put her paws on the table edge. Her owners make two feeble attempts to put her back down on the floor. They then draw up five chairs.

As I said, four people.

One chair, then, is for the dog who sits upright at the table throughout the meal. The waiter even brought her a biscuit… 

As I said at the start, I want to go to restaurants.

There is no law against dogs going into restaurants, it’s purely local preferences. Almost all human families with proper dogs would like to be able to take their dogs with them when they feel like it, so LET’S START A CAMPAIGN tp allow dogs into restaurants!

I’ll be think about a name for it, but meantime, get those emails moving – tell me you’re with me on this one!

The old man was reading out an article form the Veterinary Record the other day.

No one was actually listening as you can probably imagine, nor in the slightest bit interested, but bless him, we let him carry on anyway until he came out with this show-stopper.

An internet-based survey of 222 owners of pet minature pigs revealed that 142 of them had experienced at least one occasion when the pig had snapped at, charged or bitten a person, and 69 of them reported similar episodes at least once a month.

There was more guff about how the sex, age, number of toys (?) etc had no influence on the frequency of these incidents, BUT

“The keeping of another minature pig appeared to be the only way to reduce a pig’s aggression.”

In my small canine way, I found myself wondering whether there was a message somehow enshrined in this fascinating text.

What was going to be my take home message to the Jack Russells of this world (or indeed of any other world – I have reason to believe that I have living relatives in the far-flung corners of the universe, but more of that later)?

By the way – keep on registering on the blog, we have a surprise coming up for you!

 

So much so that they’ve been top of the suicide charts for years.

4 times more likely to top themselves than your average Joe. More likely to say goodbye cruel world than dentists, pharmacists, doctors and farmers, so that’s going some.

And you thought they were all such nice, kind, friendly, caring, warm-hearted souls (just too expensive). 

Torn apart with inner torment is apparently nearer the mark. And unfortunately both well equipped with the means to do it and quite accustomed to the line of argument that leads to a decision to call a halt when it’s all become too much for Fluffy and her tumour or Buster with his failing kidneys.

The old man complains that in any new social encounter where the other person finds out what he does for a living, THE commonest comment that pops out is..

“I always wanted to be vet.”

On the basis of the above, they might want to rethink that. 

Mind you, the profession has now got Raj Persaud on the case, so maybe next time the old man hears the ‘I always wanted to’ starting, he should take the person quietly aside until the men in white coats arrive. It could be a plea for help. 

I’ve heard the old man recount a story that when he was in his travelling days, he’d come back to England and was visiting his Mum. Over breakfast, he opened her copy of the Daily Telegraph at page 14 to read the article entitled ‘Vets and Stress’ to see yet another article on the profession’s propensity for suicide. It was illustrated by a quarter page photograph of, er, him. No ropes and nooses or lethal injections, just him as generic vet, in case anyone didn’t know what one looked like.

He penned off a letter to the editor asking them to reassure all clients past and present that he was alive and well and had no intention of departing this mortal coil mid cat spay, but for some reason there was no reply.

Oh, and by the way, can I just mention that I hate fireworks?

Can I just say that I hate fireworks?

I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks. I hate fireworks.

They scare the crap out of me and I hate them.

If you have to do them, please go and do them a long way away from me.

Oh, and did I mention that I don’t like fireworks much?

The girl had to make a presentation to her class this week. She had to talk for 10 minutes about something that was important to her.

She chose chocolate.

Another girl spoke about her sister who has autism, another spoke about her father’s job a a journalist in some of the toughest war zones around the world and of her fears about never seeing him again every time he went off to work. One of the boys spoke about global warming and the carbon footprint of cars. So they all chose pretty lightweight subjects, too.

The boy and his cars made an interesting assertion. His case was that it was actually more eco-friendly to drive a Hummer than it was to drive a hybrid Toyota Prius. For those of you not in the know, the Hummer is the road-going version of the American military HumVee, the huge monster gas-guzzling go-anywhere 4 wheel drive hulk truck whilst the Prius is the super economial wonder car that runs almost silently on tiny sips of petrol and it’s own self-generated electricty. It is much beloved by the Hollywood A-list and by Londoners trying to avoid paying the Congestion Charge.

His argument was that the hi-tech battery system for the Prius is made in Ohio. It is then shipped to the Far East where it is installed in the car along with bits and pieces from all over the world, before the finished product is then shipped back to London or quite possibly Ohio again in order to be sold. Whether or not any of this is true (and being a simple Jack Russell Terrier I am not able to check) the idea is that the carbon expenditure on all this travel and technology far outweighs any paltry fuel savings later on in life.

Hence ‘Get a Hummer – they’re better for the environment.’

By a curious coincidence the old man was actually looking at buying a Prius recently and raised the issue of carbon footprint with someone who should know. It went something like this:

“I want to buy a new car but I’m worried about the environment. What’s the most economical option?”

“Easy. Don’t buy a new car. In fact don’t buy another car at all. The environmental impact of building a car – any car – far outweighs the small differences in carbon footprint of actually using it. Stop making them, with all their metals and plastics and electronics and glass and bits and peices. Use up all the old ones first. And then cycle or take the bus.”

But then, THEN, out from way left field, comes the zinger.

It turns ou that it’s all the cows fault.

Cows and sheep. In fact cows, sheep and worse still, the Norwegian Moose. The slightly shocking figure is that the cumulative effect of all their burping and farting (mostly methane) accounts for something like 30% of the world’s greenhouse gases. Recent research from Norway  shows that yer average moose produces the methane equivalent of 2,100kg of carbon dioxide a year. Which is about the same as 8,000 miles in a car or flying from Oslo to Santiago 2.38636 times.

Now there’s a statistic you won’t forget easily. Oslo to Santiago 2.38636 times. I wonder where that means you have to land on the third leg of the journey? If you’re a moose, that is. Maybe I’m missing the point here.

And just how many cows, sheep and mooses are there? Are they all going to have to go under the Kyoto agreement? And what about dogs with wind problems? I’ve heard there are some.

 

 

Clostridium difficile is apparently the name of the latest superbug – hundreds of people killed in Kent alone according to the old man’s apoplectic response to the news the other morning.

“What’s the matter with them? Why don’t they just get down and scrub the place out properly?”

It was only a week or two ago that our lovely dog groomer Jess was telling us about her experiences in St Mary’s. Jess is the one that turns me from a woolly mammoth into a smooth suave young man about town, all with a few deft strokes of whatever it is she uses to hand strip me. Incidentally, for all you boys out there, if anyone proposes an afternoon’s stripping with a pretty young girl like her, I’d give it a yes, if I were you.

A couple of weeks before, she’d had a kidney infection and had been admitted into hospital so that she could have intravenous medicines. She spent a week there and rapidly became terrified that she’d leave far sicker than she arrived, and having heard the grisly details I can see what she meant.

Toilets that were not cleaned.

Bins in the toilet overflowing with the same dirty and blood stained tissues for days on end.

No hand washing between patients despite the presence everywhere of antiseptic hand gel bottles.

Medicines left lying around, including pills seen scattered on the floor.

Medication prescribed to be given on a strict time schedule, but often given hours late and then only after persistent asking.

Unhelpful and unfriendly attitudes from clearly over-worked staff.

She was so horrified, she told everyone again and again until the old man began to wonder whether he should start putting antiobiotics in everyone’s tea in the morning, just in case. 

At the same time one of our lovely vets was in another ward of the same hospital having her baby, and had nothing but compliments and praise for her time there.

So I don’t know what to think.

The nurses at our place always seem to be washing and scrubbing things. I have to be a bit careful where I go for a nap or else – and this happened more than once, I can tell you – I get scooped up on the grounds of ’smelling a bit ripe’ and rather unceremoniously dumped in the bath for a wash, every bit as if I were just another mop head or pile of food bowls.

I spent the night at Michael’s last night, and am now curled up on the old man’s lap, dictating the last wise words before slipping off into the arms of morphia…zzzzz

I know you’re out there. The old man has shown me the readership figures. There are literally thousands of you reading my words of wisdom.

I am a cult figure, after all.

It’s just that you’re all dead boring and don’t write back.

I want to hear from you. C’mon, Bruno needs to feel the love. He needs to hear your voices chanting outside the bedroom window, he wants to see your graffiti on the gate posts.

Register – it’s easy, just go to the little button on the right that says Register, or click this link http://www.vetscriptions.co.uk/blog/wp-register.php then start writing.

Tell me what you think, and if i like it I’ll post it up right here. You too can enter into my personal bloggers paradise…

You too can feel the love.

Talking of which, did you hear that horrible story on the news tonight? A Bull Terrier’s body found in the bushes in a park with 50 stab wounds to his neck. Poor little man, what madness could get into some filthy human mind to make them do that?

I know Bull Terriers are getting a bit of a weird press again these days. Years ago, the old man used to work in a clinic where there were loads of Pit Bull Terriers, back in the days before they were made illegal. Then came the Dangerous Dogs law. He always said it was an odd peice of legislation, a bit of a knee jerk reaction to a few nasty cases when many of them were such nice dogs.

I mean I wouldn’t go so far as to say that some of my best friends are Pit Bull Terriers, because I don’t actually know any and anyway, people’s description of them scares the c**p out of me.

But legislate against the behaviour, not the breed. Make it the total responsibility of the human hanger-on (I nearly said owner then, oops silly me) to teach us how to behave properly. We like you guys. We think a lot of what you do is great. Central heating is cool. Food served up regularly is fine by us, really. Walks are GOOD.

We’re happy to tag along. Just show us what you want us to do. It’s just that some of us are not as sociable as others and need a bit of guidance, a bit of coaching in the finer points of civilised behaviour. C’mon, we want to get it right – we’re pleased to see you, right? It’s just sometimes you’re not very clear with what you want from us.

If you humans can’t be bothered or won’t make the effort, you should take the rap and we should go to live with someone else who cares enough about us to do the job properly.

Lets take another look at this vaccination lark and see if we can’t put it to bed for once and for all.

Homeopaths have been banging on about the dangers of vaccination for years. It’s unnatural, they say. Stimulates the immune system in a way that nature never intended. Makes it more likely to over react. Can make inflammatory diseases worse: skin diseases, digestive problems, epilepsy, allergies.

The incidence of the major diseases we vaccinate dogs against is now very low. Many would say that this is due to good vaccine protection, some would maintain that this is due to better nutrition, better hygiene, better veterinary care & surveillance.

The human doctors have been arguing for years now about MMR. Is it or isn’t it implicated in autism and other nasties? The debate won’t go away. Despite surveys and research suggesting that it’s all completely safe, people keep coming up with stories saying ‘my child was completely normal until the vaccine and now look’.

Years ago, a journalist called Catherine O’Driscoll was behind a survey of vaccinated dogs that suggested that they were far more likely to develop serious illnesses in the 3 months after vaccination than they were throughout the rest of the year… The implication being that vaccination might be a factor.

The old man’s homeopath – who incidentally seems to do a pretty good job of keeping the show on the road – got very excited when the nippers got chicken pox.

“You wait,” he said “you’ll see a growth spurt -and a jump in their intellectual development – after this is all over. It’s very good for them to have these childhood diseases. Makes them stronger. Excellent news.”

Much more recently that venerable institution the Animal Health Trust was behind a much larger study entitled the Practice Overview of Canine Health (POOCH) which came to the opposite conclusion, namely that vaccination had no influence whatsoever on the time of onset of serious disease.

So what are we meant to do?

The old man was babbling on to a client the other day about how when he first qualified – probably in about 1643 –

“We used to give a Hepatitis shot once only at 12 weeks then never again, Distemper vaccine was given every other year and it was only Leptospirosis that we gave annually. What’s happened since then? 25 years of progress in vaccine technology, a huge drop off in the rate of occurrence of these diseases and yet we’re meant to now vaccinate every year. Can’t be right.”

Indeed.

Now at last the vaccine companies are going for longer vaccine intervals of up to 2,3 or even 4 years on their data sheets.

Better still, vets can now take blood tests to see when vaccines are really needed, so there’s really no excuse for just jabbing us every year. That’s not to say that there’s necessarily anything wrong with vaccines, it’s just the old ‘physician do no harm’ thing.

I think I like the sound of that.