Contemplation

It was with complete and utter delight that Fing happened to stumble across some Worcestershire Sauce flavour Wheat Chrunchies in a small newsagents on St Giles earlier.

He had quite forgotten they existed and was over the moon.

He stopped to consider Monster Munch, had they really been much larger than they are today, or was it just that his paws had got bigger?

Never take

Last night was horrible.

Trotter had some sort of seizure and didn't know who any of us were. He was frightened of us all and wouldn't come for a cuddle. He sat at the top of the stairs and wouldn't speak to anyone, even though Fing, Faggot and Fizzgigg tried their hardest by weaving their stupid slinky bodies around his and miaowing in his face.

It got so bad we wanted to take him to our vet, Mr Gore, but he advised us to leave him to his own devises and see how he was in the morning, 'He is, after all' he said 'a very unusual little dog'.

He didn't come to until this morning, after a night of shivering and unhappiness.

I sat and stroked him and suddenly he looked at me and it was like the mist was gone from his mind and he suddenly wagged his tail and grumbled at me then went to lick Faggot on the head.

A bit of a lesson never to take anything for granted I think.

Quiet night out

As you are aware we live on a very noisy estate full of unexpected and unusual sounds, if it isn't the pets singing carols, or Andre making his penthouse kennel for Hercules, Uncle Ernie on his motorized wheelchair or Varne and I coming home drunk, then it's something else.

Sometimes, in fact a lot of the times, the noise can stem from youths who tend to loiter indiscriminately and clutter up our street corners. Having no set bed time, curfew, or a desire to wake up the next morning, they can be outside well past half past 9 most evenings.

Until recently the estate has put up with the rapping, shrieking and general noisiness of the youths, but not any longer.

Oh no, Mrs Warboise has snapped!

She has taken to leaving the house in her long white nightie and dressing gown and floating towards the indiscriminate youths with menaces in her eyes.

The indiscriminate youths, who may be young but are not foolish, have taken to scarpering with apologies tumbling from their mouths.

Rock on Mrs Warboise!

Quiet night in

'Silent Night Holy Night
All is Calm All is Bright,
Round yon virgin Mother and Child
Holy infant so tender and mild

Sleep in heavenly peace
Sleep in heavenly Peace'

Sings Trotter, practising his solo piece for the Carol Concert from the top of the stairs.

'Silent Night Holy Night
Son of God Oh loves pure light
Radiant beams from thy holy face
With the dawn of redeeming grace
Jesus Lord at Thy birth...Oh Jesus Lord at Thy birth'

He can hear a muted noise in the background which he takes to be applause so increases his volume for the final verse!

'Sleep
Sleep
Sleep in heavenly peace
Sleep in heavenly peace
Sleep in heavenly peace'

Tragically it is not applause but an angry mob outside with pitchforks and burning effigy's who are shouting, 'HOW THE FUCK ARE WE SUPPOSED TO SLEEP WITH THAT RACKET GOING ON?'

'Heathen's' sniffs Fing in disdain, peering out of the bathroom window.

Formal Apology

We at Trotter and Fing would like to make a formal apology to Rez, from Cuddesdon, who we have formally referred to as Res.

We did not intend to cause insult or injury by the misspelling and hope your viewing pleasure hasn't been impaired.

Trotter

Trotter

A dog for all seasons.

The Oracle at Delphi

Fing knows the meaning of everything, life, the universe, pork scratchings, everything.

If you look deep into his beautiful eyes you will find the answer. That or feel compelled to feed him.

It can work either way for me.

Today is the day that is

Lulu is guarding something in the bedroom. We don't know what and with every probability, she probably doesn't know either.

Faggot is laying in the bath on a towel that Marth puts there for him every morning.

Tutz is playing boules underneath the bed.

Giggsey Girl the stupid slug face is doing jury service in the crown court and is currently listening in on a very interesting fraud case. She has decided to find the man guilty as she finds his appearance very distasteful and is irritated by his ingratiating subservient manner.

Hercules is looking at his unfinished kennel with longing through the back door, it would be finished apart from the fact that some arsehole complained about the banging and a drilling in the dark and Andre has been forced to down tools.

At the pub Captain Jack and Lucas by Day (Duncan by Night) have a new exercise routine. They have a new treadmill and are taking it in turns to run whilst watching old Catherine Tate DVD's.

Tiny Margo has driven her Lamborghini to Biscester Village and is shopping for a new beaded collar and a satin jacket to keep out the cold.

Lou and Res are at Whittenham Clumps, just for a change, and are admiring the view of the Oxfordshire country side.

Ginge is asleep on his favourite blanket next to the attractive singing lobster that Uncle Ernie purchased for Varne from the Antique Market.

Trotter has made a comfy place for himself on the landing by dragging my dressing gown out of my bedroom and rouching it into an attractive heap by the bathroom door.

Fing, having no respect or care for the feeling of others, has pissed in it, and left it there to upset Trotter later.

Little bastard.

Together

We go together like
rama lama lama
ke ding a de dinga a dong
remembered for ever like
shoo bop shoo wadda wadda yipitty boom de boom

Chang chang chang-it-ty chang
shoo-bop
That's the way it should be
Wha oooh yeah!

We're one of a kind
Like dip di-dip di-dip
Doo-bop a doo-bee doo
Our names are signed
Boog-e-dy boog-e-dy boog-e-dy
boog-e-dy
Shoo-by doo-wop she-bop
Chang chang chang-it-ty chang
shoo-bop

We'll always be like one
Wa-wa-wa-waaa!

Ra-ma la-ma la-ma ka ding a da ding de dong
Shoo-bop sha wad-da wad-da yipp-it-y boom de boom
Chang chang chang-it-ty chang shoo-bop
Dip da-dip da-dip doo-wop da doo-bee doo
Boog-e-dy boog-e-dy boog-e-dy boog-ed-y
Shoo-by doo-wop she-bop
Sha-na-na-na-na-na-na-na yip-pit-y boom de boom
Ra-ma la-ma la-ma ka ding-a de ding de dong
Shoo-bop sha wad-da wad-da yipp-it-y boom de boom
Chang chang chang-it-ty chang shoo-bop
Dip da-dip da-dip doo-wop da doo-bee doo
Boog-e-dy boog-e-dy boog-e-dy boog-e-dy
shoo-by doo-wop she-bop
Sha-na-na-na-na-na-na-na yip-pit-ty boom de boom

A wop ba-ba lu-mop

A wop bam boom

28 days, later

The pets had an enormously exciting shopping spree and loaded up the trolley with boxes of Turkish delight, sets of smellies from Boots, slipper socks and all the other weird shit that you can only find at Christmas and no one really needs.

They decided that a little pat on the back was the order of the day so popped into HaHa and accidentally discovered that all bottles of wine and most cocktails were a 3rd off which was a recipe for disaster to be fair.

They staggered home, 2 hours later, having completely forgotten they were supposed to be buying a Chinese for everyone. When they did, eventually get home and looked at all they had bought, they realised it really wasn't all that much after all and were left feeling slightly tarnished by the whole affair.

28 days before

Fing is taking the other pets Christmas Shopping today. The other pets are very very excited.

Trotter is stood expectantly by the front door in his favourite woolly scarf and hat, wagging his tail. Tutz and Giggsey are in the shopping trolley, Faggot has a cashmere scarf and a Prada bag over one shoulder and Lulu is bringing up the rear in a lovely tartan jacket.

Fing has everyone's pocket money firmly in his grasp and they set off towards Primark singing the Pogues 'Fairytale', can you hear them?

'You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot' sing the cats in purrrfect harmony

'Happy Christmas you arse, I pray god it's your last!!!!' sing the dogs.

Oh, how we love Christmas

Sting!

Its awful having a great big itchy sneeze up your nose that just wont go away.

Unfortunately Captain Jack happened to mention this aloud while Lucas by day (Duncan by Night) was having a lucid moment.

'I have heard', say Lucas by day (Duncan by night) that if you have a nasty itchy sneeze up your nose, that sniffing black pepper will help it to come out', then became distracted by absolutelty nothing at all and went to wag his tail whilst standing with his head to one side, looking expectantly into the corner of the room.

Why Captain Jack decided to listen to the words of of a dog who spends the best part of his day chasing shadows and looking at walls we will never know.

Poor Captain Jack.

FISH

Did you know that every year in December European Ministers meet to try and decide who can fish what from where, they make these decisions despite warnings from the scientific community that fishing should be suspended for fish stocks to recover.

For the past five years the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) have advised that no cod should be fished from UK waters, so that populations have a chance to recover.

But since this advice was first issued in 2001, 437,000 tonnes of cod have been taken from the North Sea alone, leaving the population at one third the minimum safe level.

Scandalously, every year tens of thousands of tonnes of fish are thrown back into the sea, dead or dying, by fisherman targeting other fish species.

Over half of North Sea cod are simply discarded overboard because they are too small.

And it's not just cod. Numbers of adult fish across many of Europe's fish stocks are just 10% of what they were 30 years ago.*

(of course in Iceland, the whales are to blame for the decrease in the fish stock, it has nothing what so ever to do with the idiot fishermen at all, but I digress)

So anyway - please can you log on to

http://wwf.org.uk/stopoverfishing

And take a couple of minutes to send an email to the secretary of state asking him, politely, to put his fucking foot down and do not give in the the whinging, whining fishermen and do something about this.

Before its too late.

*Info from the WWF website

Beyond Measure

People ask me how much I love Fing,

'How much do you love Fing?', they say

I love Fing so much, I reply, that when he pisses into my beautiful, BEAUTIFUL, brand new red shoes that I laugh, wash them, then put them on the shelves like some random ornaments to dry, and when I still can't get the smell out I borrow Milan's cedar shoe tree's and force them into my ruby slippers to try to get the smell out and even though nothing has worked and the piss has taken some of the coulour out, becuase I love them so much, I keep them on top of my wardrobe with the shoe tree's in in the vain, stupid hope that one day, one day, I will be able to wear them again.

Thats one fuck of a lot of love my friends.

Unmeasurable

Some people have asked me how much I love Trotter.

'How much do you love Trotter?' they say.

I love him so much, I reply, that I do not mind when he sits on my bare feet and his little hairy testicles nestle against my skin.

Thats a lot of love my friends.

Social Housing

There have been bangings on the estate of late, in the darkness.

Bangings, and drillings and sawing, all under cover of the night.

We all wondered what it could be that was causing the bang and drill and complained about the noisiness of the entire affair, we stood in our windows with nosy neighbour syndrome and twitched our nets in a dissatisfied way.

But last night all was revealed as Andre finally proudly uncovered Hercules new delux hand built kennel to stunned estate.

The kennel is 6feet tall and then four by four.It has a raised floor with underfloor heating, it has satelite TV and a jacuzzi for Hercules bitches (when he gets older of course).

Martha was so impressed by the kennel she asked Andre if there was any possibility that she could use it as her retirement bungalow, but I don't think Hercules will want to share.

Still

Trotter had a break from the old routine and tried calmness last night.

He stood quietly and looked at us.

He sat with inner peace and meditated.

He listened to whale songs and considered the power of crystals.

At bedtime he was tranquil and didn't bark at the doors.

All in all it was rather unsettling and we kept on asking if he was ok, as it was decidedly peculiar, especially if you consider that he has been on his hot line to the devil for the last week.

Why?

Have I told you that Fing has taken to waking me up just before 6am every morning?

I can only wonder at his motives and reasons.

Then, If I knew the reasons and motives behind all his odd behavioural patterns I could probably become a famous cat psychologist and travel the world persuading illmanned and unrepentant cats to behave in a seemly and pleasant manner.

Of course, the other option is that he's an artifact of an alien intelligence sent here to test me.

If so the aliens must think the worlds a totally fucked up place.

Time and a place

Dogs do to not like it when humans play ball games without them.

There are places in the world where Dogs have become quite militant about this and have taken to forcing their way into pool halls and clambering onto the pool table.

Once on the table they like to show their dissatisfaction by barking at would be competitors and by licking their testicles in an openly defiant manner.

Dragon

Can you tell what it is yet?

Dark or Light?

There is a real Christmas Spirit in the house and it's not the ghost of Christmas Past, Oh No!

In the kitchen Martha is furiously chopping dried fruits and making chutney in a frenzy, a large pot of simmering slop oozes over the top and the whole house smells of cloves and cinnamon.

In the sitting room the pets are practising their carols, they will be performing at the Royal Albert Hall on the 14Th December. Tickets are already sold out as they are the 'World Famous Preachers Lane Pet Choir' after all. Today they are practising the Calypso Carol but unfortunately Trotter keeps on getting the lyrics wrong,

'Concentrate Trotter!' snaps an irritated Fing, 'Its 'See him a lying on a bed of straw, a drafty stable with an open door, Mary cradling the babe she bore, the prince of glory is his name'

'But the prince of darkness sounds much more fun', sulks Trotter.

Do Androids dream of Electric Cats?

Tutz lies asleep on top of the NTL box, warm and cozy, dreaming psychedelic dreams of pandemonium and chaos.

Inside her tiny mind she floats in big multicoloured bubbles over unusual landscapes made of giant scratchy poles and lollipops.

She sees giant bumblebees and dragon flies, blamange in the shape of pink rabbits, she sees drums and briefly, Snoop Dog Dog floats by on a magic carpet.

Suddenly she is tap dancing in ruby slippers, then belly dancing next to a blue elephant wearing a sequined dress, then she is wind surfing in the lake district.

She wakes up slowly and stretches, opens her eyes and finds Trotter standing looking at her.

Some things are just as insane awake as when you are dreaming.

War

In the Second World War it is estimated that 60 million people died, or which 6 million were Jews.

The Allied forces fought for 6 years in order to stop fascism taking over the world, in order that we might have freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom of religion. Freedom to be the people that we want to be.

From the Allied forces the United kingdom lost 306213 servicemen, Australia 29395, Canada 39319, China 1324516, India 36092, New Zealand 12612, The United States 297723 and the former Soviet Union 13 million.

Today is the day that we remember the sacrifice of the men and women of the armed services, who have no say in which battles they will fight, in which one they will be wounded or in which they might die.

We at Trotter and Fing wear our poppies with pride.

Pedigree's but not as we know it

Introducing Tom and Dexter.

The Moiwitch Cuckoo's.

Joy

'God rest ye Merry Gentleman' sings Trotter from the top of the stairs, 'May nothing you dismayyyyyyyyy',

'Remember Christ our saviour was born on Christmas day' Sings Giggsey Girl the stupid Slug face from on top of the TV,

'To save our souls from Satan's power' Sings Lulu from the kitchen doorway,

'When we were gone astray' sings Fat Boy Faggot from the bathroom,

'PPPRRROOOT' harmonises Tutz from the bedroom on her scratchy pole,

'OH TIDINGS OF COMFORT AND JOY', They all sing together as Fing conducts, waving a tiny baton in the hallway, 'Comfort and Joy, OHHH TIDINGS OF COMFORT AND JOYYYYYY!!!'

When you're part of the world famous Preachers Lane Pet Choir you've got to practise early!

Industrious

Fing has has a very busy night.

Once again he got into the food cupboard and hooked out the dog Iams, leaving a cascade on the floor. This time we have an interesting twist as Trotter went downstairs to see what the noise was and bought the bag of Iams back to bed for a midnight feast.

The small grainy nuggets that he missed were to be found by Martha when she woke up, embedded in the backs of her legs and up her nose.

'FING!' she cried in despair.

But Fing had remained in the cupboard, where with sheer brute force and bloody ignorance, had forced the lid off the tupperwear container filled with cat biscuits and had gorged until he was almost as fat as a boa constrictor full of sheep.

So fat that he fell asleep and stayed in the cupboard where Martha found him by accident when she went in for a tea bag.

'FING!' she screamed.

Sometimes I wonder what we have done to deserve all of this naughtiness.

Hasn't that cat always had everything he always wanted?

Manicures and peticures, dancing lessons and trips to Vienna?

He did want a copy of the National Dictionary of the National Biography but we had to put our feet down somewhere.

Ok Corral

'Did you know' Said Trotter to Fing, ' That on this day in 1887, Doc Holliday died?'

'who was Doc Holliday?' asks Fing in surprise,

'Why, ' says Trotter, 'Doc Holliday was a gentleman sir'

Palmolive or Sanctuary?

Fat Boy Faggot choosing which bubble bath to have in his bath.

3 days

Its been a few days of Uppers, Downers and all arounders to be honest.

Saturday dawned cold and bright and found Trotter and Fing visiting a poorly Shane in Hospital. They sat on his bed and made him laugh, they pushed him around in a wheelchair but were forced to stop for fear it might induce vomiting. They then sat and watched the South Park firework display and 'ooohhhhhh'd' and 'aaahhhhhh'd' in all the appropriate places. They popped into the pub on the way home and ended up going clubbing at Cloud 9 before returning home and collapsing exhausted.

On Sunday Martha noticed one of the goldfish swimming upside down in the pond and decided that he must immediately be removed and placed in a bright orange bucket on the draining board. With Stuarts help she dismantled a pump and placed it in the bucket, which kind of created a Jacuzzi effect and left the poor fish hurtling around the bucket like he was caught in some hideous 100 miles an hour whirlpool. I managed to persuade Martha that this may be a little strong, so she switched it off and went and got Asia. Asia, it transpires, is the local authority on goldfish and came bearing swim bladder medicine, a smaller pump, and portents of doom. We would, she advised, best not get our hopes up, dashed some medicine in the bucket and left us all feeling rather pessimistic as we stared at the goldfish, upside down and still revolving in his bucket.

Later that night an assortment of youths landed on the estate from an alternate, hoody, reality and let fireworks off just outside Varne's. Martha went out full of concern for Hercules, but the Youths told her to Fuck off, then lit some squibs in open defiance. The fireworks were not well received by Lulu or Tutz. Tutz spent the entire evening in the airing cupboard while Lulu tried to drown out the fireworks by barking as loudly as she could.

Monday found the goldfish the right way up but with nose pressed against the pump like an oxygen junkie. We borrowed a tank from Authority Asia, and popped him in there instead, where he took to sucking pebbles and sudden bursts of speed.

Much later Fing and I went to bed where we started to watch Braveheart. I had forgotten Fings aversion to the Scottish, and so was a little surprised when he got off his pillow and went for a sleep in the airing cupboard. Sometime later there was a rattling from downstairs. Fing, bored of the airing cupboard, had gone downstairs, opened the cupboard and deliberately tipped the dog Iams all over the floor. Not content with this he also opened all the other cupboard doors to see if there was any more mischief to be had, none found he came back upstairs and stared at me with a steely glare until I was forced to switch off Mel Gibheart and lay down and give him a cuddle.

Today it is Tuesday and I don't know what the pets are up too. I would imagine that most of the cats are asleep, Trotter will be sat at the bottom off the stairs waiting for Martha to come home and Lulu will be watching a crap film on channel 5, or looking for new cake recipe's or some such jazz.

Grim

The news this week has been grim indeed.

No fish in the worlds oceans within the next 40 years.

The worlds oceans to rise, displacing 40 million people.

No water to drink.

All the worlds animals will die.

Will it make a difference if you recycle? Will it matter if you remember to switch off all your electrical appliances when you are not using them?

It will, but probably not in your lifetime.

I don't have any children, but I have a niece and I would like her to grow up in a world where there are Polar Bears and Penguins, Gorillas and Chimpanzee's, Giraffes and Hyena's, Whales and Dolphins. In a World where people are not warring over water or where millions of people have no where to live.

So, if all of us just do one thing.

Switch off the plugs, recycle empty bottles, if all of us did one thing then maybe there will be a beautiful world left behind for our children, whether they be son's or daughter's, niece's or nephew's, God Children or the Children next door.

We at TrotterandFing are going to stop eating fish from non-sustainable sources.

Remember, Cod made us in his own image.

Percy Thrower

'PPRRROOOTTTT!!!' She says! 'PPRRROOOTTTTT'! Yes, I'm afraid that teeny, tiny, insane Tutz has escaped, unsupervised, into the garden.

She stands beside the metal cat and pretends to be unnoticed.

She watches Selby the squirrel hide some nuts in the rubbish heap from her watching place on top of the gazebo, then after he has gone, digs them up and hides them elsewhere.

She sits by the side of the pond and watches the fish with a professionally disinterested eye, then dips an idle paw into the water on the offchance that a fish will be stupid enough not to notice her enourmous orange eyes, millometres away from the water, peering in. Unfortunately for Tutz, all the fish are member's of Mensa, and are discussing philosophy with the fresh water mussels who live in the weed at the bottom of the pond.

No fun there she thinks and sits on top of the rubbish heap watching the world go by.

She practises some bunny hops, she persuades Selby to play hopscotch, she sleeps for a while in the sunny place underneath the bench by the window.

She 'ppprrroootttts' to herself softly as she potters around in the garden, and if she is feeling brave, the ground beneath Thelma's bush that lays just outside the fence. But she doesn't go too far in case the mean stripy cat that lives across the way spots her and steals her pocket money. She hates the stripy cat.

When she is exhausted of the day she sits on top of the trellis and waits for someone to come home so that she can play her favourite game of all, pretending that she wants to be let in. She sits and waits, as patient as the Sphinx.

Why?

I was lucky the other day, in so much that when I picked up my umbrella, which had been left open and upside down by the side of the mop bucket by Stuart the night before, that I happened to notice a small spillage of urine to the side.

Had I of just whisked it up over my head and opened it I would have been showered with Trotters urine, but as I say, I was lucky this time.

Unlike the time that Martha's waterproof jacket was lying in a heap at the bottom of the stairs and I grabbed it intending to hang it up and got covered from head to toe by the pool of cats pee that had been nestleing unnoticed on top of it.

That time I stood there for a moment, as the pee dripped off the end of my nose and wondered what, exactly, i'd done to deserve this life.

Mines a chocolate eyeball

There was great excitement as the Pets prepared for Halloween, the biscuits were baked, the pumpkins carved and filled with candles and the Trick or Treat? sweets all ready in the bowl.

Fing had agreed that he would stay at home and dispense the sweets so that the others could go out in fancy dress.

Tutz was dressed as a tiny pumpkin, grey face and big yellow eyes staring out for underneath a little orange and green bonnet.

Truly Scrumptious Lulu, the chubbiest Dog in the West, was dressed as a spider, with 4 extra legs poking out the side.

Trotter, of course, was DRACULE!!! and had his favourite cape and false vampire teeth in.

Fat Boy Faggot was dressed as a zombie and had covered himself in face paints and was a rather unattractive mottled green and grey.

Giggsey Girl the Stupid Slug face has wrapped herself in lengths and lengths of bandages and was a Mummy.

And so they went out and knocked on doors and shouted 'TRICK OR TREAT' when people opened the doors, they said 'Thank you very much' when they were given sweets then raced on to the next house full of high spirits and happiness.

At home Fing endured the constant knocking and the shouts of 'TRICK OR TREAT!' secure in the knowledge that every treat was in fact a trick, as he had pissed in the biscuit mixture when Lulu wasn't watching, because, after all, that's just the sort of bastard that he is.