I think my mistress has got a thing about paint brushes. She seems to want to play with one again today but with different coloured paint. I suggested a nice paw print pattern but she has declined my help, which frankly seems unreasonable. I’m hoping when my master arrives later that he hasn’t taken travelling light quite as literally as he did the other week. There are some things you can do without when the weather is nice, such as several extra jumpers, which he had packed and there are some things you cannot do without at any time, such as clean socks and a wash bag, both of which he had left out. He claimed it wasn’t deliberate but as far as I could see there was a bit of a theme and I thought he had finally seen the logic of my thinking that it is warmth and comfiness that are next to godliness and not cleanliness. Cleanliness really is a woman thing! My mistress disavowed him of any such notion pretty quickly by lending him clean socks and wash kit from her more extensive provisions. Though to be fair, her travelling light did not permit a change of clothes to go out in the evening, unless it had only involved wearing clean underwear, which frankly would have caused more of a stir than my master having smelly feet. You would think the amount my master has to travel that he would have got the hang of packing by now. Perhaps he never remembers to take clean socks or a wash kit. There is a thought even I don’t want to pursue. I shall count how many socks are on the washing line the next time my mistress does the laundry to make sure there are twice the number of socks that there have been days.