It’s my birthday today and nobody cares
I blame the cat. She broke curfew last night, snuck out after dark, didn’t appear back until dawn and ruined my birthday.
Here’s the scenario. It’s first light, I’ve just jumped up on the folks’ bed to let them know it’s ‘HEPSTA‘ time when Miss Kali appears at the back door shouting to be let in and everyone forgets about me. I know right, how rude.
That’s cats for you.
So, I sit there on the bed all alone, licking my bottom on this very special day that nobody else has remembered, and I’m the one who gets told off!
That’s family for you.
So much has happened since I came to live with the family. Remember when I was only 6 weeks old?
Some of it you already know… like the time I ate the jellyfish on the beach and spewed blue.
I also got stung twice by the jellies and ended up with my paws in hot water. Literally. People used to say you had to wee on the stings (which sounds okay to me) or soak them in stinky vinegar but it turns out what you have to do is sit with the bits in really hot water. Being a tough Koolie, I was very brave and didn’t whinge or bite at all.
Then I got stung by a bee, which had accidentally ended up in my mouth. And bitten by a few spiders hiding in my best sniffing places. I even had a tick but luckily the chew they give me each month sorted it out before it could do any damage. No snakes yet but I’m always looking!
And all the time that I was exploring the world, things were changing with my body. I already told you about the weird stuff happening to my nose in an earlier blog. Well, then I started to lose my teeth!
That was a bit of a worry but then I grew some better ones.
I went to stay with my pack in the Winter when the folks flew overseas. That was awesome. No baths, loads of running around in the mud. Grandma Envy showed me how to herd ducks, which I later put to good use at my friend Scoutie’s place.
I even got lost in the hen pen by accident. Don’t stress, I didn’t hurt the cute little chickies but I did scoff my own weight in chook poo!
In the Spring, mum decided I should be dissected. So I didn’t have puppies. Not that I wanted puppies (horrible greedy things always wanting all the food) but it would’ve been nice to be consulted. Anyhow, I foxed her by coming on heat 6 months earlier than anyone else in my family! Which got me out of the dissection but landed me in nappies for almost a month. Luckily, they didn’t taste too bad.
Being on heat turned out to be a total drag because I couldn’t go anywhere where there were dogs. Not even the beach, and that sucked because I’d made quite a few friends by then and needed my daily runs.
It was the most boring 3 weeks of my life. I had all this energy and nowhere to use it, so I daydreamed about Miss Kali being a super villain…
and Super Hep saving the world…
Thwarting Miss Kali’s endless evil plans got pretty tedious after a while. It was my turn to be the baddie!
Two Face Hepsta ruled the world for about a week. With each beach-free day, I grew bolder and more inventive. This eventually landed me in a spot of trouble and my plans for world domination came to a sudden end. It’s hard to keep your super villain street cred when you’ve been smacked and sent to bed without dinner.
Then totally out of the blue, Mum announced that I needed to work off some energy. She said I was old enough to start Agility and began setting up plastic sticks in the garden. She was convinced I’d be a natural.
I wasn’t.
We practised a few of times. There were jumps and a big snakey tunnel. Then some weaving stuff, which I totally ignored on account of it not making sense.
And then one day I went to the real thing down at the Park where there were proper hurdles and guess what! I got a ribbon.
Saturday afternoons at agility are okay but my best times have been at the beach with my friends. I’ve made some and sadly, lost some.
This is me and Jo. As you can see, she was super cool and shared her sticks. Mum let me sit with her at the Hospital when she got really sick.
And that’s my first year in a nutshell. I’ve left out the really smelly bits because they’re mine.
I’m totally up for whatever fun the next year brings and I’ll be sure to share the good stuff with you. Just not the cake!
Hep Hep Hooray!
