I have retold this story to my great amusement on several occasions. There are two very certain responses … confused silence or belly laughter.
Straight from the horses mouth I pass you over to Gramps …
Unfettered by your mother’s good sense and guidance I was adrift in a sea of confusion and chaos and I was applying, sometimes, bizarre ways to deal with household chores. Washing the dog was an example.
Tessa our dog had to be washed for a reason that I can’t recall now. She had probably rolled in some indescribable substance; otherwise I wouldn’t have thought it imperative that she had to be washed. Applying the logic that as I, the owner, needed a shower too, (Just for reasons of normal hygiene, not because of rolling in any indescribable substances) Tessa could join me. This was creative thinking; this would save my clothes from getting drenched, the usual result of dog bathing.
All went well. The bemused dog was shampooed and rinsed along with the happy owner.
The drying was where it all unravelled. Wrapped in a towel and crouching behind Tessa, with my back to the bathroom door I started to vigorously dry the dog and failed to hear the door, which unwisely I hadn’t bolted, swing open.
“Hi Dad! What are you doing?”
I looked round (probably furtively) to see you, my eight year old daughter framed in the doorway. Worse still, your two friends from across the road were standing behind you and I could read in their expressions that this sort of thing didn’t happen in their household.
“Washing the dog.” Me, hopefully stating the bleeding obvious.
“Right.”
“What are you doing?” Me, trying to sound as though everything was quite normal.
“Going to play in the garden”
For days I worried if news of their friend’s father’s perceived peculiar practices had reached the parents. It was a real concern; you had told me tales of how their mother would pounce across the lounge to turn the television off at the merest hint of swearing or inappropriate nudity, indeed any exposure of flesh at all. I could be in deep trouble.
A couple of days later, when in the front garden engaged in some minimalist gardening activity I saw the mother walk out of her drive and set off down the road.
“Hi Margaret!” I called out in a friendly but nervous greeting to her retreating figure.
No reply. “Hi Margaret!” I called again; again no reply. Oh God, I thought, she knows!
I looked down at you and say in a light hearted jocular way “She’s not talking to me”.
“That’s because her name’s not Margaret, Dad.” you reply in that smug way that eight year old daughters speak to their dim fathers.
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English Mum on January 12, 2010
LOL! I love Gramps! And I do the dog-in-the-shower thing too – not weird at all…
*cough*
Dawn/LittleGreenFingers on January 12, 2010
When I actually read it first time, I failed to notice Gramps said he had a towel on (worryingly, I’m beginning to prefer this version of the story).
Also, I have to say this seems an emminently sensible way to wash a pet. I may suggest my husband tries it with the cat…
Gramps on January 12, 2010
Washing a cat in the shower. Sounds a bit risky. It brings to mind the joke about Claude Balls the Lion Tamer……….
Jo Beaufoix on January 12, 2010
Laura, that is fabulous. Can I have Gramps? Just for a little while. He sounds hilarious and very sensible. And can I just say, showering with pets is fine, but never, no never shower with your baby, like they do in that film “Three Men and a Baby”. Because, well, babies get slippy. I swear I didn’t drop Miss E, but bloody hell I nearly did. I am lacking gorm. ;D
Heather on January 12, 2010
Well phew. Thank goodness they never told.
Cocoro on January 12, 2010
Japanese showers are much better for washing dogs (or other animals) as you shower outside the bath which means you don’t have to worry about getting water everywhere as its all tiled. Might be a bit extravagant traveling to Japan just wo wash a pet though…x
Expat Mum on January 12, 2010
Ooh, I bet it was all round the village – whatever her name was!
Bec on January 12, 2010
So it looked like Gramps was bumming the dog. Oh my. Oh my.
There is a sitcom in all this I am sure. Victor Meldrew plays Gramps and Renee Zellwegger plays me (My character is the head of the Gramps fan club in said sitcom)
No?
Jodie at Mummy Mayhem on January 13, 2010
Hilarious!
Hubby has washed the dog in the shower. But not with him in it. I might just suggest it after reading this.
Hmm.
goonerjamie on January 13, 2010
I love the way gramps is still sticking to his ’story’. Am so glad I was not drinking when I read this, way too funny and am fed up of snorting wine out of my nose.
Tamsin on January 13, 2010
LOL, that is how we used to wash our dogs, (although, it was my Dad that started it!) they used to put on 10 stone and turn to jelly if anyone tried to lift them in the bath, but would walk freely into the shower.
Fab story, I love the way daughters talk to their dim witted fathers, Amy’s starting it already with daddy (actually with everyone) and she’s only 3!
Dulwich Divorcee on January 13, 2010
Hmm, kind of reminds me of a poodle parlour in Brussels when I lived there. It was called ‘Doggy Style’.