Here’s a couple of pictures of Jack by the sea – a happy dog if ever there was one!

If you’ve got any good holiday snaps of you and your dog, we’d love to see them so please email them in to sales@petskitchen.co.uk

The trip was to a photo studio in London so MORE TH>N could get some photos of me for their website  – and they’d asked if Jack could come along too. The day started bright and early as I took Jack for a walk in the crisp pre-dawn air before getting in the car and heading off to the station to catch the early train down to London. I was a little nervous about how Jack would cope with all the noise and busy people at the station but he was absolutely fine and instead of being stressed he spent his time charming the commuters and getting his back scratched! The early morning travellers seemed fascinated by seeing a dog on their train and it was strange how Jack’s presence seemed to make the whole experience of being on the train much more relaxed and friendly – rather than sitting silently ignoring each other, people were engaging with me and Jack and each other far more than usual and by the time we got to Paddington there was quite a sense of community on the train!

At Paddington we were met by a woman from one of the agencies organising the shoot and a car took us across town to Shoreditch to the studios. Not suspecting that he was about to be cooped up in a studio and asked to perform for camera all day long, Jack bounded enthusiastically from the car and half-dragged me along the corridors to where the photographer and his team were waiting.

The shoot itself was quite something, with a full team of people including photographer, 3 assistants, creative director, make up lady, advertising agency representative and 2 marketing people from More Than, in a large professional studio.  Thankfully Jack seemed to take the whole thing in his stride and really turned on the charm for the camera – I’m sure he knows what media work is all about as he always seems to perform whenever there’s a camera about!

It was a long day, both for Jack and me, as we took literally hundreds of shots trying to get the exact images that the creative director was looking for. There was much standing, sitting, moving slightly to the left then the right, smiling, grinning, frowning and gesturing (and that was just from Jack!) before the team were happy with the shots, and it was late in the afternoon by the time we’d finished.

It was well worth all the effort though as the photos looked great, and it really made me appreciate the value of having such a professional set up for a photo-shoot – it may seem over the top to have such a big team of people to just take a few snaps, but it makes such a difference to the end result to do things properly.

At the end of the day it was back on the train and home. Jack was wonderfully behaved all day (apart from a minor misdemeanour where he tried to follow me to the toilet on the train and got caught up in the automatic doors!) and really seemed to enjoy his day out. I had a great day too – but I must admit that however exciting it is to spend a day in the big smoke, it’s always a relief to be back in the countryside again at the end of the day.

So as he’s been getting gradually smellier and dirtier recently I decided it was time to treat him to a proper trim, bath and blow dry. Our local ‘Dial a Dog Wash’ service came out and within 30 minutes he was a different dog – clean, well trimmed, fluffy coated and sweet smelling!

However I then made the mistake of taking him out for a long walk as a reward for behaving himself in the wash, and by the time I got him home he was absolutely covered in mud – back to square one! Maybe I’ll invent a walk through dog wash to install inside our back door!

This week, for example, I dealt with a couple of cases where I really felt as though I’d made a significant difference to both my patients and their owners. One was a dog called Charlie who’d been limping for several weeks on his front left paw. He’d been seen at another surgery but his owners weren’t happy and had brought him to me for a second opinion. It’s not often that there’s a simple answer in cases like this, but in this instance the previous vet had missed a fairly obvious problem – Charlie had a thorn imbedded deep in between his toes. Under a short sedation I was able to remove the thorn, and Charlie was back on all four feet almost immediately which was very satisfying.

The second case which really reaffirmed my enjoyment of my work in the surgery involved a cat called Missy, and her problem was had started several months previously when she’d first started licking and biting at her stomach. At the time I’d suspected an allergy was to blame, and I’d started her on a special prescription food and some medical therapy to try and control her symptoms. Now, 8 weeks later, Missy was almost a different cat, with none of the raw patches on her skin that had been so obvious at her earlier visits. It was great to see her looking so well – and it gave me great satisfaction to see that I’d made such a positive difference to her life, and that of her owner who’d been sick herself with worry about Missy’s condition and was now much happier.

After getting stuck back into work in the surgery I decided that it was time that I tended to the needs of two particularly special patients before the week was out. My pets Jack and Lilly are generally well and healthy, but as with all pets it’s important that they get a thorough check over every now and then to make sure they really are as healthy as they look. So at the end of the week I took them both into the surgery for a once over and to have their routine vaccinations and worming treatments.

Thankfully both Jack and Lilly got a clean bill of health and they were very relieved to be back home from the surgery and happy to get back to their own routines – Jack scouring the carpet for dropped food and Lilly hounding the wildlife in the garden! And I’m back in my own routine now, happy to be making a difference to pets and owners for a while – although I’m sure it won’t be long before the excitement of the TV world draws me back in again!