“She’s gotta go…”

He keeps saying that… laughing, mind you. I think….

She brought the ball guy home with her. Though balls are a touchy subject here… He was throwing them nicely and my best ball went down the side of the shed … again. Another one bites the dust…

I’ve been out there singing to it for the past two days. I’d heard about snake charmers and thought it might work… then I cried for a bit. She tried with sticks and stuff, but it’s still there… I only have one well-chewed one left… and she says they are hard to find round here in winter.

Still, I suppose it was worth it… he does talk to me and he doesn’t mind proper cuddles. Or if he does, he’s laughing too much to stop me. He even gives me cheese. Though why he has to go wash his face when I’ve done it for him I’ll never know…

Anyway, they were here for a bit doing book stuff after she came back smelling of strange dog. Says he’s called Fionn and is gorgeous. If he wasn’t just a puppy I’d be jealous… but I can smell he’s only little. I might like to meet him though. She says he’s a good boy… I’m sure we could work on that!

They’d been talking about stuff they’d found on my  her computer… I’d pricked up my ears when they started talking about birds… you know… and they were talking of boars and horses and dragons… Not sure I like the sound of dragons… sound a bit like helicopters… though even they go away when I bark at ’em. Then they’re sitting there hogging the cheese and stuff and I’m walking the magic circle around the table getting closer… it usually works… and he launches in…

“The Black Beast of Waddesdon…”

Well, I look around and there’s no beast in sight…

“Ani, the Black Beast…”

Oh I see… name-calling now are we? Ok ball-guy…. Didn’t want that pâté you left on the kitchen counter, no? Rats, she caught me before I could get it…Ah well. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from you two-legs it’s that you don’t always say what you mean. You do a lot of name calling, but as long as it is done with a laugh in your eyes it’s just like being stroked…

‘Course, he’s called me a fair few names… including Anu in their books… that’s a god, you know… the only reason he gets away with giving me a sex change.. And Ani is a goddess… so I’m not doing half bad really. Mind, you should see how often he talks about me in their new book… you’ll have to wait a bit for that though. There is something good coming out of their adventures then…

And apparently Fionn’s pet human has the same disease as mine… heather in the blood… and she says they only call folk names if they like them. So I can’t complain… maybe the ball-guy has heather in his blood too?

The Black Beast of Waddesdon… yeah…. That’s me….

Much love,

Ani xxx