That dreaded time rolled around this morning. A ritual detested by Jackie and Jillie and not held in great favour by me, either. The thing of it was, they were beginning to look like black, fluffy blobs. And whenever that state of affairs arises there is little option but to grudgingly gather grooming tools and snip away at their haircoats. They recognize the signals. Down comes the vacuum, out comes a gathering-bag, the container of various sized scissors. Last, but not least, I change into hair-repellent clothing and put on as many lamps as I can to throw light on the scene and go to work.

Whichever one of them is incautious enough at that junction to be closest to me is the one I grab and begin to work on. Usually that's Jackie. He's the more curious of the two, and forever dogging me, and this time that physical proximity gained him the disadvantage of being the first to be groomed. Squirming in my grasp and defiance of motion does them no good; I'm firm and unrelenting. It takes three-quarters of an hour to an hour to finish up each of  them. The excitement when they're released from that purgatory, is amazing. They are as joyful when they're freed from my malicious grasp as they were trepidatious when they understood  there was no escape.

And I'm relieved because the dreaded task is finally done. And they look presentable. All I have to do at that point is clean up the mess everywhere; black hair sticking in clumps to rugs and sofas and wherever their delight in liberty has taken them. It's quickly done, the tools put away until next time, and they're ready to be admired. And so, we admire them.

Usually the next step to follow that event is a nice long hike in the woods, and so that's exactly what we set out to do. Another mild day with the temperature hovering around 5 degrees, windy with the occasional bit of sun. We came across plenty of acquaintances, some of them without dogs, all of whom we spent time schmoozing with before carrying on. Someone told us they'd seen a deer the week before. In all our years of hiking through the ravine we've never once seen a deer there; some people have all the luck....

We came across a number of dogs, the last of which was tiny Daisy, the Maltese terrier, with her nonchalant air despite our two surrounding her in an act of pure intimidation. She carries on, undaunted, fully half the size of Jackie.  They're rude to all the dogs we come across, small or large, imposing their bumptious presence with the emphasis of true self-regard. Most other dogs, particularly the large ones, take their impudence with calm assurance of their own. In the end, they all tolerate one another.