A present from Santa and delivered by Cupid!

Evening, 

To think that this time last week as I wrote to you all and told of how upsetting and worrying it was about Pooch's aural haematoma (similar to a blood blister in humans) which has now thank goodness, cleared up to almost all gone, I had no idea of what would come. 

Luckily unlike most dogs and cats that have an aural haematoma Pup has recovered well and not suffered or been left with a cauliflower ear, crumpled and disfigured from the trauma. However should this happen again, I think that surgery is going to be the only option. However, all that worry seemed to melt away as I waited patiently. 

Gazing out of the window at the setting sun I had been waiting all day for this moment. Truth be told, I had been waiting for this moment for pretty much my whole life since being a toddler. Seeing the blue rickety old van pull into the street I came running down the stairs, the pit of my stomach flipping nervously as it filled with anxiety and anticipation at what was to come. 
"They're here! They're here!" I squeaked excitedly at Mr. Warehouse as he too peered out the window at the arriving vehicle. 

You see this all started on Tuesday evening, as Mr. Warehouse and I had prepared ourselves for bed with Pooch as we normally did, turning off the telly, closing down the lights and going into lockdown making sure all doors and windows were shut. It was about quarter to ten at night when the phone rang. I looked at Mr. Warehouse as I showed him the caller ID. It was his Mom, my future mother-in-law. Worried I answered and before she even had a chance to explain I promptly told her that this was about the time that people call in the night when someone has died. 
"Do you want to see some puppies?" she said simply and calmly like some sort of child molester. I mean, of course I did. Immediately hitting redial to facetime her. No sooner had she accepted the call I saw a bundle of fluffiness. A little white girl with patches of brown and black splodging her body, another smooth black and tan puppy and a third wirey black and tan fur baby. Instantly I start freaking out. 

"I thought someone had died or had an accident. I thought that you had got engaged or something. God Damn women you scared me half to death" I said. After showing Mr Warehouse and getting close-ups of all the cuteness it was time for some seriousness. 
"I am being serious. We're leaving in five minutes and were taking one of the girls so which one do you want?" Suddenly everything seemed real and I focused my twilight mind from puppies and cute faces on a screen. Like a child to her parents, I turned to my beloved fiance and pleaded with him to let me get one. After a few pushes, he seemed to give in reluctantly knowing I would probably do whatever I would want regardless of what he had to say. 

"I can't make a decision like that I am afraid, as much as I would like to," I said to my excited mother-in-law-to-be. Reluctantly I ended the call and Mr. Warehouse shook his head. We needed to talk about it and I needed to make sure it was the best decision for the family as a whole, not just me and my selfish dreams of being a dog momma to a baby puppy. Talking it over that night and the following day, we called Momma Warehouse back. After further talks, we discovered that it was a friend of a friend who used to breed toy poodles who gave it up to look after her sick husband at home who was rapidly deteriorating into dementia. Unfortunately one night back in early December the Husband had let the breeding stud in with the family pet, a Jack Russell terrier and she fell pregnant. several months later and around Valentine's day a surprise, or nine, were delivered. The lady herself knew nothing about it as she had been so busy with Christmas, New Year and looking after her husband and home she had neglected to notice her dog's belly growing. 

With the unexpected litter now twelve-weeks old they were already a month passed being legally allowed to leave their mother and so she took the decision to find them homes. One of the first questions I asked my future mother-in-law was how much. Bearing in mind that the Toy Poodle / Jack Russell mix would already be a popular choice for families as they are intelligent, active little things, small enough to be around kids and hypoallergenic so great for allergy sufferers. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. The reason being is that not only was it a terrible accident because her poorly husband had not known that they no longer bred dogs, but also that as a result of this expenses had already been stretched by extra food and what not. The added vaccinations, chipping, insurance and everything else that normally comes with a new puppy would have financially not been possible for the poor lady and her husband and so she wanted to give them away to families that would love and care for them as she had, making sure they were their forever homes. 

Which leads us up to the moment I started with. Opening the door I stood patiently at the front door with the rest of the family, like a mother ready to accept her newborn. Ushering me over to the van I peered in and saw the sweetest little bundle of tuft. Black and tan, with a white belly I scooped him up and took him into his new home. Welcome home our little Frankenstein - An homage to my love of all things spooky, Halloween and macabre. That but also the fact he was made by mistake and pieced together from two different breeds of dog. 

'Til next time, Love A.Lou xx

Eau De La Fromage

Hi Ya'll, 

So another week and yet again another fail from yours truly. Last week when I made the sorry mistake to not book a flight when it was on sale via Ryanair, and now I have screwed up again. I think I just need to go to bed and rewind to the beginning ... 

There are some people in life that are under the unfortunate affliction of being intolerant to substances used in food production including gluten, most commonly found in bread and other carbohydrates, nuts and lactose, the sugar found in milk and other dairy product. It would appear that for years even decades, but these sort of intolerance's and allergies were overlooked by food manufacturers and supermarkets in general with alternatives for these sort of products to be sourced in local and rather expensive health food stores that outside of London would be very hard to find on the High Street. 

In some circumstances babies and young children would be prescribed be advised alternative such as baby milk and or celiac specified food items. However with the NHS in the UK under crisis and getting worse every winter these luxuries soon stopped and now people with food allergies have to try and find out alternatives elsewhere. This is where the largest supermarkets came into play. Realising that there was a massive hole in the market the supermarkets soon plugged it with all of there versions of safe, free-from products. Everything from the simple and everyday things such as milk, cheese and bread all the way down to more complicated items including biscuits, juice and sauces. Tesco, ASDA, Morrisons, Sainsbury's, Waitrose and others have coined a sweet penny cashing in on peoples allergies and intolerance's. 

But it was not just the immune-sensitive people that had were not able to eat the normal versions of stocked produce. No. Here came the wave of people that will state that eating gluten-free and lactose-free products will help with weight-loss, sleep and all round healthier lifestyle. The health benefits, I feel anyway, just simply don't stand up and by eating a healthy and balanced diet including both meat, vegetables, carbohydrates and all other manner of tasty treats we can live a happy and fulfilled life. Vegetarians and Vegans seem to be the main culprits in this argument for they are always the ones that will state that there is no need to involve animals in the 21st Century way of eating. But I wholly disagree and in actual fact would go as far as to say that they also would be living an unhealthy lifestyle not eating meat, fish and other products that come from animals. The fact that most of these health fanatics that claim eating animals and animal products are barbaric and not necessary are the exact ones who walk around with leather handbags, belts and shoes all manufactured and made using ground up animal cartilage to make the glue. How do they sleep at night? Well probably on an ethically sourced duck feather pillow with matching duvet. But that is for another blog post ... 

Now don't get me wrong this isn't a stab at people that would like to live their life as certain way. Live your life, I don't care and in all fairness there are worse things you could be doing in the world with your time than munching on greenery. I just feel that the supermarkets target those on the other end of the spectrum who are not able to eat the normal products that you or I may consume. In all fairness I actually feel sorry for the fact that those intolerant to wheat, dairy and other food-stuffs, are forced to pay quite a high premium in order to eat what would some consider would be a normal diet. Some of the items for sale in the shop shelves at the moment don't even really tastes like the real thing and as a result the people with intolerance's and allergies will never get a chance to taste exactly what cheese, milk or bread really taste like. Obviously I have focused on dairy and wheat but there are many other alternatives that are simply nowhere near what the original would look, smell or taste like. 

My prime example of this is when I went to Tesco's a few days ago in order to pick up a few bits for home and lunches in the coming days. Heading round to my favourite area of a supermarket, the reduced section, I found some goodies and bargains including bread and ham for sandwiches, Chicken Sushi and 'Free-From' Cheddar Cheese. Now admittedly for 84p I should should not have held my hopes up high for it being the tastiest piece of cheese I had ever eaten, however what it was labelled as gluten-free and dairy-free cheese I assumed that it would taste very similar if not the same as all the other cheeses I had tasted in my life, which to be fair was a lot of cheese. Besides, over the last few years of living by myself and indeed with other people I had tried lots of different products I would not have normally tasted and even discovered products that I like such as milk alternatives such as almond, soya and oat.

However getting it home and laying out for Mr Warehouse to see all the wonderful goodies I had found in the woopsies aisle, my hench boyfriend soon discovered my cheesy secret and explained that he would not be eating or trying any of the 'Free-From' Cheddar. I didn't care though it meant that there was more for me, however, I may have spoken too soon as after Mr. Warehouse had grated some for my dinner of fajita chicken wraps this evening my taste-buds turned against me. Floral, perfumed and pungent fragrances came from both smelling and tasting the cheese. This was not cheese. I'm not entirely sure that there was any cheese flavouring in there at all. I have smelled feet that are cheesier than that cheese in my fridge. Unfortunately I think I will have to put this down to experience and in the end will never, ever buy 'Free-From' Cheddar Cheese again ...

'Til next time, Love A.Lou xx