I kid you not. For £12 Tess has been registered with the Kennel Club. Well, Ok not exactly the part where she can enter Crufts and the like. Tess has been registered in an off-shoot of the Kennel Club known as the Companion Dog Club (CDC for short). She can also be registered as an Activity Dog, which allows her to compete in agility classes, obedience classes and so on. But as Dad said, we should register her as a companion inactivity dog. Tess doesn't do jumping or heel work. Her obedience just about stretches to waiting to be told she can eat her food and waiting sort of patiently albeit drooling slightly after a few seconds. So last night I filled out a form on the Kennel Club website registering her as a companion dog. I think it has gone to her head to be honest. She has started to take an interest in the collar I bought her for Christmas last year (leather, with diamante detail and gold plating) I put it on her for the first time yesterday to see how it fitted and it was harder to get it back off her again than it had been to put on. I dred taking her for walks, she'll be checking out every dog she meets to find out if they are in any way connected with the Kennel Club and ignoring those that aren't! Tina was never that fussy. I should talk a little bit about Tina, our last dog. Tina was never Kennel Club registered despite being a pure Border Collie in every way. We got Tina when I was 3, from my auntie Sandra. It was only a few weeks after my 3rd birthday and I was staying at my gran's house when Sandra came home and handed me a red check tea towel telling me that it was a late birthday present. I opened the tea towel to find a bundle of black tan and white fur with 4 sticks, a sort of tail, and a tiny wet patch under 2 eyes looking up at me. From being a puppy, Tina was beautiful, black with a white tip to her tail, a white stripe down the middle of her face, 4 white paws, white underside, one tan back leg and tan eye brows. Her favourite past time was to lie against the back yard gate in sunny weather sun bathing only moving occasionally to ensure that she got the sun all over. She jumped out of the yard 3 times, trying to get at a cat. The walls she jumped over are about 5' 10", give or take an inch. Our neighbour told us the first time she had never seen a cat move so fast in all her life! We had Tina for 16 years, before she had to be put down after she stopped eating in 2001. As I say, Tina was never KC registered, but she considered herself above all other dogs and would sit if any approached her rear end to have a sniff. It was her policy that she, obviously being an itelligent, well brought up Border Collie, should not be consorting with these common dogs she met every day. No doubt if she had met another Border Collie she would have consented for it to sniff at her bum, but we will never know.
On a different note, I have set up a petition on the government's website to change the sentance for Causing Death by Dangerous Driving to the same as that for manslaughter. You may wonder why I am not petitioning for it to be brought in line with the sentancing for murder, this is because, murder, although it carries a life sentance, that can only mean a minimum of 10 to 15 years before parole. The sentance for manslughter if found guilty is to be imprisoned at Her Majesty's Pleasure. Work out which you would prefer. If you want to sign the petition the adress is :
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/dangerousdriving/
I am not going to beg people to sign it, as there will be those who do not think there is a problem with the current sentancing for Causing Death by Dangerous Driving. I leave it up to each individual, but please let me know if you sign it.
