I’m sure I listened to a weather forecast that said the rain was going to stop for a few days. Maybe that was just the idealised weather forecast for the optimists among us. The garden furniture is still being blown over and the water is still seeping down out of the sky. Looking on the bright side, I can’t see a drought being on the agenda any day soon, at least not round here anyway. The wet muddy ground means we get less chance to run around madly outside. The downside of that is that I rather enjoy the fresh air and the upside is that we run around madly inside instead, although we sometimes get into trouble over that. It’s mainly because we knock things over, rearrange rugs and generally leave a trail of destruction. On the whole I’m fairly careful but Shadow hasn’t completely learnt the art of cornering yet. It does rather take me back to my puppyhood and the difficulties of trying to get complete control over your body.
I was alarmed to hear that cows in Dorset have increased their milk yields since being played music by failed X Factor contestants John and Edward. I can only think that on the whole the cows don’t get out much and that if they had the opportunity of hearing some decent music their milk yields might go up even more. In fairness this was after the farmer switched them away from classical music which had had no effect on them whatsoever. We can deduce from this that cows in Dorset lack a certain amount of sophistication. I think that where a farmer is trying an experiment of this sort, he should take the time to try out many different types of music and ask the cows to give them marks out of ten. I can actually see a whole new game show developing in which it is the cows rather than the X Factor judges who comment on the different acts.