Posting days: Sunday and Wednesday and, sometimes, maybe, extra bits in between.

Sunday December 9th 2018

Very disappointing. Just uploaded a video of Isis in Highbury park. Played back on the phone, the quality is as good as it used to be, but when transferred to the blog, it’s horribly degraded (like the last one I published).

I’ll have to take the camera next time.

We’re in Highbury on Saturday and today. And is Isis too nervous to leave the car after her fall last week?

Not at all, though when I give her free reign to decide where she wants to go, she shuns the woodland walks and stays in the lower areas.

She elects to spend most of her time cavorting around her favourite rosebay willow herb patch, before exploring the alternative routes which run roughly parallel to the main path.

These areas are much more enticing than the tarmacked paths. Not only do they smell much more interesting from a canine point of view, they also require a dog to clambour over tree trunks, slide about on rows of slippery logs pushed together to form little bridges, barge her way through mini plantations of straggly saplings, and detach herself from trip-upping creepers. Best of all, they also require a human to follow her in case she gets lost. I imagine doggy sniggers.

Isis tells me that her decision is nothing at all to do with being frightened of falling off a wall. That wasn’t a mistake: she meant to do it.

Dogs are very courageous. They’re not afraid of anything – well, only stripy sun- and-shade weather. They just choose sometimes to stay on terra firma.

Now and then though, she explains, they land up somewhere they’ve not been before and have to stop to think. That’s what this dog is doing.

Her tail isn’t down because she’s nervous. Absolutely not. It’s down because she’s thinking.

She’s not at all nervous. No way. She’s pondering the advantages of high up and low down.

In her opinion, apparently, standing on these bark chippings

is quite high up enough for any dog.

See. Here she is, below, tail up and ready to begin the obstacle course.

“Ready Human?”

Sigh.

Isis came from the Aeza cat and dog rescue and adoption centre in Aljezur, Portugal. For information about adopting an animal from the centre, contact kerry@aeza.org or  www.dogwatchuk.co.uk