In which the humans go to another funeral. By Bessie

Mummy got a new car.  It is a white car and the minihumans said there is lots of room in the back and we has more room too so we likes it lots.  After them picked the car up Mummy, Daddy and Bryn went to Cardiff to look in the place with all the antique shops.   Them had toasties in the cafe and a cup of tea and then they was looking round this shop.  Mummy walked off round the corner and noticed there was signs on EVERYTHING in the shop.  "Don't play the piano".  "Don't touch the gramophone records."  "Don't open the drawers."  "Don't sit on the chairs."   Then she heard a man shout, "EXCUSE ME.  DON'T TOUCH THAT."  So she comes running round the corner thinking Bryn must have done something but the shop owner was cross because a middle aged man had opened a drawer in a chest.  Apparently you are only allowed to open the drawers if you are planning to buy something.   (Silly arse that shop keeper was.)  So my humans and the other humans walked off laughing and telling each other not to touch anything or breathe near anything or think any thoughts near anything.

Great Grandma's funeral was last Wednesday so after school on Tuesday Mummy and the minihumans drove up to Aunty Mic's after school.   Great Grandma didn't want a funeral.  She had never been to one in 94 years.  She had written a will which her friend Winnie had signed.  Luckily Winnie is not a solicitor so nobody had to do what Great Grandma asked for in her will.  Which was to give her body to the lions at Knowsley Safari Park and to give all her money to the Daily Mirror cos they "haven't got 'a'penny."   Nobody really wanted to do those things so instead they had a funeral that was as unfunerally as possible.  All the ladies wore bright colours and the men wore checkered shirts and jeans cos Great Grandma had a thing for checkered shirts.   The flowers were lovely bright colours and when the hearse arrived at Aunty Tracy's the driver was told not to go slow cos Great Grandma hated to go slow, she was a bit road ragey when she got stuck behind slow drivers.  Unfortunately the funeral people took this a bit too far and lost the funeral procession at the first corner when they jumped an amber light.  This didn't go down very well as you can imagine and the rest of the cars spent the rest of the journey to the crematorium trying to catch up.  Mummy's cousin in car 5 overtook Grandad in car 3 on a roundabout.  

The funeral was led by a humanist lady and she said nice things about Great Grandma.   Grandma read a poem and Aunty Tracy read hers and Uncle Tim's eulogies.   Uncle Tim and his family didn't come to the funeral cos when they came to visit from Americaland last summer Great Grandma made him promise not to come if anything happened.     It was very sad, Great Grandma was very special to everyone who knowed her.

After the funeral the family went to the masonic hall and had some lunch and then they went back to Aunty Tracy's and wrote messages on balloons and released them for Great Grandma.   Aunty Debbie said she hoped she didn't get home and find one of the balloons stuck in the tree outside her house cos she would be scared Great Grandma was watching her.  

The next day Aunty Tracy and Sapphire got one the balloon that they hadn't released cos it had gone down slightly and they wrote "I've got my eye on you" on it and they went to the office in town where Aunty Debbie works and tied the balloon to the windscreen wiper of her car.    Later that night her did send Aunty Tracy a text telling her she been trying to think of a comeback all night but her gived up.   It was funny anyway.   I know it sound disrespectful but Great Grandma would laugh at that, her was naughty and liked to play tricks on people.

All the daughters and grandaughters got an angel whisperer.  It is a little colourful bead that tinkles and it's in a little pretty cage that you hang on a necklace.  Mummy got a purple one.  She wear it everyday so her know Great Grandma is watching over her.

On Thursday Grandma and Mummy went to Tesco and the minihumans played on the wii with Grandad.  Aunty Mic and Uncle Rob and Ben came over for tea and afterwards Mummy whooped everyone's asses at Trivial Pursuit.  And she was playing on her own and everyone else was in teams.  Well Katie was supposed to be on Mummys team but she was too busy on twitter.  Mummy said she going to get her own Trivial Pursuit.  She likes Trivial Pursuit.

On Friday Mummy and Grandma went into town to do some shopping and meet Aunty Tracy for coffee.  Then they went to Primark and bought some rubbish in the sale.   Katie went to meet her friend Georgina at Subway and Grandad and the boys went to McDonalds.    After Katie came back from meeting Georgina it was time for my humans to come home.

We was very happy to see everybody.  Daddy looked after us good and taked us for a walk every day but we missed our Mummy and minihumans lots.

On Saturday Mummy, Daddy and Katie went to look at kitchens in Magnet and B&Q and then they went to Tesco to buy picnic food for Sunday.  Then Mummy made a picnic for her and Daddy cos everybody else said they didn't want to go out with them for the walk on Sunday.

On Sunday we got up early and us houndies, Mummy and Daddy got in Mummy's new car and we went to Burnham on Sea.  This is by the seaside in case you didn't guess.  We met our friends and we went for a walk along the beach.  This is the first time we ever went on a proper sand beach.   We been on Exmouth beach once but it was full of glass and rubbish and we went on Barry beach once but it was full of poo and chavs.   The other beaches we go on are pebble beaches.  But this beach was miles and miles of lovely soft sand.  We ran and ran and we had a great time,   there were 25 bassets and 4 not bassets.  Baby Melody had cuddles with everyone at the start but then her mummy Linda took her home cos her too little for a big walk.   Big walks is bad for basset bones until they is a year old.  Mummy wouldn't stop kissing baby Melody, it was a bit embarrassing.

On the way back to the car, about half a mile near the end Lotty ran in mud.  She was so dirty she had to have a baff when she got home.  Me and Carly were clean, we didn't need baffs.

It was Daddy's birthday on Sunday.  He didn't want to open his presents until we got back from our day out cos it would mean waking all the minihumans up.  So when we got back he opened his presents and cards and then the humans went out to an Indian restaurant for dinner.   Daddy had lamb tikka masala, Mummy had chikkin biryani, Bryn and Tom had chikkin tikka tandoori and Katie had chips and korma sauce.

Lotty was running along the beach when she fell in a hole.   It was a really deep hole covered with water and she fell right in all the way to her neck and lucky she scrambled out.  Daddy stuck his welly in the hole and it went down really far.  Mind you that night we saw on the news about a car that fell down a hole so Lotty was lucky really that she only nearly lost her tail.

On Monday night Daddy came home from work and told Mummy that a truck had driven over the manhole cover where the water meter (works water meter, not home) is.  It's on the pavement by the car park.   The truck had crushed the pipe and water had been pouring into the meter hole but cos it has been raining for so long nobody had even noticed the leak until that day when the people in the unit next door had reported a leak to the water board.  Anyway the water board had to turn the supply off cos the meter was spinning, there was so much water pouring in.  Nobody has any idea how big the water bill is going to be, it will probably be thousands.  The water people said it has to be mended but they won't do it or pay for it.  So work has no water, no toilet facilities and no heat cos there isn't enough water to start the system.  Daddy told Mummy to wrap up warm on Tuesday.

So Tuesday Mummy wears her thermals and her jeans and 3 jumpers, a coat and a scarf.   It is very cold in work and she tries not to eat or drink too much so she doesn't need to go to the toilet but unfortunately the only way to keep warm is to drink and eat hot things.

There was an accident on the motorway so, as usual, all the traffic is diverted through the town centre.  After work Mummy managed to make it as far as school but the traffic was backed up between school and home so she had to go back the other way and use the steelworks road.  Luckily not many people know this road exists so there was no traffic that way.  The bad thing is she has to go under a really low railway bridge to get here and it is scary.   Then us houndies had to go to the V E T so they had to go out again.  Mummy went back the same way, under the railway bridge and through the steelworks and then got stuck in the traffic going out the other side of town.  But they managed to get to the V E T on time.   It was busy in the V E T and we talked to lots of other dogs.   Lotty had her kennel cough booster and I had all my boosters, Carly's aren't due til March.   Because Lotty didn't have her kennel cough up to date we couldn't go into kennels cos they say it has to be done two weeks before and we didn't have time.  So that's why Daddy had to stay home and look after us and not go to Great Grandma's funeral.  Mummy hadn't bothered getting it done cos it is expensive and she hadn't planned on putting us into kennels any time soon.  We weren't expecting an emergency.  So anyway we are prepared now just in case, and the V E T are doing a promotion, this month kennel cough is £10.  

Carly had to go and see the V E T cos she has a sore teefy.   The V E T looked at it and said it needs to come out so she is booked in for next Friday.

When we came out the V E T we went to see Kate, the groomer next door.  We like Kate, she thinks we are pretty and she strokes our ears and gives us a party bag every time.  We don't even mind her cutting our toebones.  Mummy still isn't allowed though.