Silly Season

 Every winter is a little bit of a silly season.

This year we are using 4D toilet paper that promotes sensitive sexual healing - though that seems rhetorical as I am not sure that there is any other kind of sexual healing. It also claims to be a 4D paper even it is only 2-ply. Please do not ask me why they make these silly statements.

Just to be clear, I do not ever need to use toilet paper myself as I prefer to do my business al fresco somewhere in the woods or in the park next door. Do not worry - I always make my mum or dad pick up the poops if they are on public paths.

This year is so far a lot less cold than last year, though it makes up for that by being extremely wet. There is a mountain stream behind the house and it is constantly roaring with excess rain water from the hills around us. The roaring this year is louder than ever because a few large rocks were dislodged into various spots in the middle of the stream, causing little waterfalls which the torrent tumbles over relentlessly. But the sound never bothers any of us - in fact it helps us sleep pretty nicely.

In fact, it gave me an thought, of which I am pretty certain even if it sounds a little silly: If Sleeping ever became an Olympic sporting event, then I think I am in with a good chance of a medal. It does not matter which class I am entered in: Light, Medium or Deep - I can sleep anywhere anytime after a few cuddles. All this supposes, of course, that they allow dogs to compete in the Olympics - they allow horses so there is always a chance one day. It has been said that pugs need around 14 hours of sleep a day but as I am such a genius pug with a lot of things to mull over when I sleep, I am not taking any chances. So sometimes I can sleep practically non-stop day and night, apart from the al fresco toilet trips which is usually combined with a good walk.

This contrasts a lot with my dad, who seldom needs more than 5 hours sleep a day, preferring to spend his time awake reading, walking or cooking or quite often working on his desk while watching me sleep (he brings my little cot to his office during the day). I am never sure what he does but sometimes he used to mutter things like "default risk charge" or "intensity models" - but these days he mumbles more about "glycosidic bonds", "aspergillus oryzae" and "proteases". I try to help him whenever I can.

Snow came down hard here a few weeks ago - and snow is very good fun. I like creeping through the snowdrifts though the cold does tend to freeze my flat nose so I need to keep warming it up with my tongue. Still, it is worth it as there are always interesting smells in the dead leaves on the ground when I scratch away the snow. If you are curious, leaves turn brown, yellow and golden due to the trees stopping the flow of water and chlorophyll to the leaves, preferring to save the energy for spring. Chlorophyll needs water to work, so without both the leaves are now useless. Deprived of the green chlorophyll, the colours of the other stuff in the leaves get exposed - an example would be carotenoids, and some trees also produce anthocyanins which is a lovely red colour and is thought to help absorb the sun's heat better and keep the leaves alive a little longer. But eventually, all the leaves fall off. There are several reasons why trees go through this complicated, almost wasteful process each year, but mainly it seems that trees got tired of the winter cold freezing the water in leaves and killing them, which would be even more destructive. To get around this problem, trees actually force their leaves to fall by sending a hormone signal to the leaves to quit working. As if that is not enough, trees also produce abscission cells at the leaf stems which push the leaves away from the branches until they fall off. So now trees are smart enough to ditch their leaves just before winter and save their energy for a time when it is of more use. This took many thousands of years of evolution before the trees figured out this solution to winter, so if anyone tells you evolution does not exist, then tell them that even a pug knows that they are completely wrong.

My parents also like to take me to a nearby lake where we can feed the ducks slithering on the frozen water. This is quite funny to watch, especially as they look so bemused with their feet on top of the ice above the water - and it really tickles me when they fly in for the food and slide tens of metres on the ice before toppling over.



Oh, I recently caught a very strange man in a red and white suit climbing up a rope ladder in the cellar. It is a long story but I gave him a good proper ticking off! I did say it is the silly season, did I not?



Pof the Pug



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