My new career path - puppy couture - LJN Blog Posts

Yawn - it's been another busy week in the life of the commuting tortoise (AKA me with backpack carapace nicknamed Mildred traversing the west coast line)... Tuesday night saw me somewhere south of Birmingham eating my evening meal in a bunker with work colleagues before hastening off into the night to hit London's Marylebone train station just before Wednesday morning.... having never been into Marylebone before, I found it a truly pleasant surprise. Everything was still open - and there is the most lovely florist in the station. I resisted the temptation of getting a coffee from the AMT stand - and a real struggle it was, AMT is my absolute favourite - and headed out to grab a taxi across to Islington where I stay with friends when in town. Pulling up just past the gate of Arsenal stadium, and falling out of the cab, through bleary eyes (just very tired - not phished, honest, gov) I vaguely registered what appeared to be a very large cat mooching under one of those pavement bound trees which seem to be all the rage in London. The subconscious pulled the emergency cord and I realised that it wasn't a cat at all, but a quite large and rangy urban fox.... just chilling, not legging it off, but watching me watching it.... and we stood there for about half a minute, observing one another before I woke up to reality, realised I was loitering on a darkish street in the middle of the night and legged it round the corner to the house.A day long conference on Wednesday and then back to Islington to catch up with my fellow City slave and roomie over dinner and a nice glass of wine... she travels down from Staffordshire every week, so we're very sympathetic towards each other about travel, leaving the family at home (mine - Fereday and rabbits, her's - the fiancee and four puppies), and the general inanities which we deal with day in / day out at work. This brings me on to puppy couture.... I've been bringing down various elegant, specially selected (by me) dog clothes from a local pet shop in Halifax for my friend's brood - or should that be 'pack'. Although the local shop is very good, the range of pret-a-porter items available for man's best friend which are reasonably priced is limited and this led to me spending a good part of this evening happily stitching up a bespoke jester's hat for one of the pups - I could run through all the very technical stuff I've been working on this week and wax lyrical on how important (I think) it all is... but, when all is said and done and I look back on the achievements of the week, I have to say that I am proudest of my little handmade felt dog hat with blanket-stitch detailing. My index finger and thumb are tender from pushing the needle through four layers of felt (necessary to give it the appropriate stiffness so the jester points could be bend at a jaunty angle) and my eyes are a bit strained. Tomorrow I need to pop into the haberdasher's stall in Halifax market and pick up some pompoms and ric-rac to embellish it, then I need to get one of the bunnies to model it while Fereday does some fashion snaps before I parcel it up to take down to London next week.... so I suppose that leaves me free to spend Saturday and Sunday planning to assault the world with handmade, organic, free-range, responsibly sourced puppy ponchos so that I never have to return to the 9 to 5 again.... it's good to have a dream, no matter how bonkers!!!!

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