July 15, 2002 - 8:32 AM
I'm home. I'm home. Thank Gawd I'm home.
That was The. Most. Awful. Weekend. EVER.
'Cept for spending the day yesterday entertaining my 4 year-old cousin, Markychops (read: keeping the tyke out of the mouths of fucking BIG dogs. heh).
Basic run-down of everything from Thursday night until now.
1. Got to Gordon on Thursday night around about 8pm after having my hair cut (it's soooo short! ARGH!) at Highpoint and then having dinner with SK at Nandos (chicken burgers...mmmmmmmm). Slept in the haunted back room (I'll explain later if you really want to know). It was freezing. I was playing on the laptop (yes! I have a LAPTOP! Mwhahaha!) and I could see my breath, it was that cold. Went to sleep around... ooh... 1.30-ish-am.
2. Woke up at 5.30am Friday (ugh). Fed dogs which weren't coming with Nessa and I (all of them save Blaze and Shilo). Played with the puppy (Riva) while Nessa wrestled Shilo into the crate in the back of the ute. Loaded the car sans second mutt who was going to be sitting in the backseat in the cabin. Loaded said Nessa into the car. Loaded said dog into the car - who promptly decided that, no, he was going to sit in the passenger seat next to mum and Ren could sit in the back. After a minor altercation, things were settled (read: I won that argument) and we were off.
3. Stopped in Avoca for an hour to trapse through a graveyard and take pictures of nifty headstones - some sad, some surprising - and walk dogs.
4. Arrived finally in Mildura to the sound of Mima (read: hag-witch-bitch-nazi-grandmotherly-wannabee-type-person) screaming at Markychops and the Monkey Boys.
3. Said awful granmother then proceded to ket a major bee up her arse over Nessa's so-called mistreatment of the dogs - even the one that didn't belong to her. I ask you, gentle reader, if you had one huge malamute (with bad manners) who likes to eat anything smaller than it, who does NOT like other dogs other than other malamutes, why the fuck would you let an untrained heeler off it's chain BEFORE said malamute was safely crated in the backyard? Yes, Mima did this. I couldn't believe it. All hell broke loose and I ended up screaming at her to sit down and shut the fuck up - over the din of kids squealing because a big fucking malamute was mauling their dog. Mima just does not understand that these are show dogs. As show dogs they are specifically fucking TRAINED to accept being crated for long periods of time. According to Mima, we were the cruelest people on earth because we wanted to crate Shilo while we were unpacking. Fuck me dead, she would not shut up. "Oh you shouldn't do that! It's cruel! Oh those poor dogs! Vhut you DO to them Daniella-Elvira-Erin-Robert-Frank-Vanessa!" (She goes through all the names of her family until she arrives at the right one.) I swear, I lost it. I got my hand bitten by a frightened Sparky (who is alright, thank god, no thanks to Mima). Now, I way a tonne, and Shilo pulls ME around. Mima wanted to take this dog for a walk. Shilo. Mima. 100lb dog and a 71 year old witch...er.. woman. Not a good mix for harmony, eh? I grinned at Nessa, but she shook her head at me. As much as we don't like Mima, she is Nessa's mother, and my grandmother, and she is old, and decrepid, and annoying, and... but she could honestly get hurt by Shilo. Eventually... we had all the mutts crated and relative peace resumed until Danni came home.
4. Saturday, piled all dogs back into the car plus two rambunctuous boys (sans Markychops who would be joining us later) and off we went to Wentworth, just over the NSW border for the show.
5. Both dogs got dumped. I took photos of a bee-oooooo-tiful dog called Ace (really, he's lovely, big sook and a good-looker, perfect combo!) Said Markychops joined us. We all went home again.
6. Grandmother caused more distress by telling (not asking) Danni that she wanted to take Sparky home with HER because she thinks it's cruel to keep her locked up on a chain all the time. Nessa firmly stated that it would be crueler to let a dog like Sparky to waste away in the 2x2 metre square backyard of a unit rather than be chained occasionally on a 50 acre property.
The dog is chained overnight. That's it. It runs free the whole day. It's used to following tractors and having a huge area to play in - and this old hang wants to turn her into a house-dog? Nuh-uh, ain't going to happen. MonkeyBoi was immediately on the defensive - "You're not taking Sparky!" Seriously, how would you feel if some old bitch wanted to take your pet away? I don't blame Monkeyboi for getting upset. Then Mima was all "He hates me, they all hate me. No respect for their grandmother, none at all. They misbehave. They're BAD children. And you're a bad mother for letting them get away with it."
I honestly felt like choking her then and there. The kids she was talking about were 9, 7 and 4 (I finally have their ages right now *L*). All boys. Three brothers at that age means chaos. Ask anyone. What Mima doesn't seem to understand it that you have to RESPECT children as children. Some a wild, some a quieter, it's the luck of the draw. But they are CHILDREN. If they feel threatened, then fuck yes, they will rebel. They will defend what's their's down to the last whisker (in the case of the dog and Monkeyboi's outburst) and fuck anyone who gets in the way. Mima hounds everyone until she gets what she wants, but she can't do that to the kids because they still possess an innocence that allows them to question her and say "no" if they don't like what she's saying or doing. They haven't yet learned the trick of biting ones tongue and nodding and just agreeing to save getting into an argument. She gives them no respect as children, that's it. She's already thinking they should be little adults - seen, appraised, but never ever heard. She wants the adoration and respect befitting a woman and grandmother of her years, but she does fuck-all to actually earn that respect. And so she gets none.
And she hates it.
Anyway...
7. Sunday, much of the same, this time taking Markychops with us, who is a little angel. He hums, he sings, he wriggles, he grins oh-so-cutely when he wants something but doesn't want to SAY that he wants it (batteries not included). He was adorable and I loved having him there. We watched Ace kick arse against some really ugly and badly-put-together malamutes. I took more photos. Then. Mima. Showed. Up. And boy, did she make her presence felt. She tormented everyone by insisting that we by her lunch and coffee, insisting that we were being cruel to the dogs (again), insisting that no, she didn't need to sit down, but made it fucking blatantly obvious that she wanted someone's chair. Then she actually told a handler off for the way their dogs looked. An English Sheep Dog is hairy, it has hair growing over it's eyes, yet it can see (perfectly well for a breed that's hundreds of years old!). Mima told the handler off because SHE thinks that the dog can't see and ought to have the hair around it's eyes cut off. Mima - telling a complete stranger off! Oh my fucking GOD.
8. Anyway, the end of Sunday came around, Mima left to go to play BINGO and we watched the last of the shows on before heading back into Mildura and then making a mad six-hour dash home again.
9. I walked in the door at 6.30am this morning.
10. I'm stuffed. Goodnight.
(Postscript: There were some really funny moments with the kids but I'll detail those later.)
