Daily Archives: 3 April, 2012

I just ain’t lovin it, innit? OK?

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Of course, I explain, English is an evolving language, as are most.

I try to explain that, even if ‘I’m loving your new coat’ can be heard (or something similar) everywhere in the UK, it doesn’t make it grammatically correct. A bit like innit, innit?

I then try to explain that inteligent people often take up these new ‘grammar’ forms in mockery.

But, then, at what point does the whole thing become a mockery as it becomes normal use?

I explain that I do it too (well, not so much with innit unless I’m trying to be clever). I use I’m loving something as if it were proper grammar. In fact, I wonder how many people in the UK would even know that I’m loving something is NOT grammatically correct. And, so, at what point does it pass into a well-known and well-used phrase?

I mean, this form of continuous verb has been used for ages already. When does it stop being bad grammar and just becomes grammar? And who decides anyway?

Like ‘And’ and ‘But’ to start sentences – terrible but justified by use?

Innit?

Cold to ‘Flu to something else?

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My body doesn’t seem to quite be with me, this morning. My legs seem as if they belong to someone else.

My eyes feel sore and, I think, if I were to look in the mirror, I would see them red and puffy.

I want to go home and go to bed. Not that I could. The cleaner will be in now.

And I know that when I DO go home, I have many things to do.

We are going away this weekend – as is usual for Easter. Tonight is my only really ‘free’ night and so I must get some things from the shops; arrange to have my tyres changed from winter to summer; take Dino to the vet.

The last one is a new thing, decided about 4 a.m. this morning.

I am now doubting (a bit) my thoughts I posted earlier about Dino suddenly becoming older and slower. Now I’m not sure that is the reason. Now I’m thinking it could be something else.

It really started the night before last. I heard some strange sounds coming from where he was sleeping. At first I thought he was having a dream but later, confirmed my thoughts, when we went out for a walk and he started again – on the walk. It seemed he had a cold.

Yet, when I am home and during the evening, he seemed alright. He had an ‘attack’ once during the evening.

The ‘attack’ includes him not being able to breathe properly and seeming to suck back the mucus in his nose and then swallowing it. It is all very loud. And sounds quite dreadful – but is just like a bad cold.

I wasn’t unduly worried. Although I couldn’t remember any of my dogs ever having a ‘cold’ before, I thought to myself that it must be possible. After all, we get them and the change in weather may be the key.

Last night F was awake and heard it. He asked me about it. I said it was just a cold. He said he would go to the chemist and try to get something for it. I said OK but make sure it was for dogs – our remedies are just too strong for dogs.

He said that I should take him to the vet. I said I would but only if continued for a few more days like this.

This was about 2.30 this morning after a particularly heavy ‘attack’ when F had got up and switched on the light which then woke me up, of course.

But then, lying there, not sleeping, I got to thinking that it was, indeed, a very strange thing, this ‘cold’. Not only had I not seen it before in my dogs but I couldn’t actually remember any other dogs catching a cold.

So, I thought to myself, what I would do is do a search on the Internet and see if a) they could catch a cold and/or b) what else it could be. I would do it this morning, at work.

Except that I couldn’t get it out of my head. What if something were really wrong? And after a couple more ‘attacks’, I got up.

I would check it now.

Of course, one must be careful not to read the Internet as gospel. One site said that, of course, dogs could catch a cold. Most sites said that, in the sense that we mean a cold, dogs did not catch colds but that it was something more serious.

So that would be no sleep for me then.

I nearly decided to stay at home and go to the vet asap – but then thought that that was quite stupid as nothing would happen in a matter of hours.

However, most sites suggested that the dog would need to be checked by a vet and so it is the thing I will be doing tonight as now, after F’s prodding me, I am a bit worried.

Probably, it is nothing much and a course of antibiotics will fix everything.

But you never know.

One of the causes of this flu/cold symptom is distemper. Although he has been fully vaccinated, one cannot be certain and his booster is due in May. So I have to go. Some of the symptoms include lethargy. Well, he’s certainly been a little lethargic. I put that down to his age and Rufus being gone. Maybe not.

Still, he seems to be eating and drinking OK.

But, you know, better to be safe than sorry, as we say? And I certainly don’t want to be sorry.

I told him this morning, as I woke him, that I would take Dino to the vet this evening.

Later he texted me and asked me why I was doing it when I had said I wouldn’t.

I said it was because Dino had kept me awake all night. There’s no point in worrying him too. I can do the worry for both of us and more.

But, truth be told, I feel like shit right now. I’m sure it’s a lack of sleep but the worrying won’t be helping. Maybe I will leave work a little early? Then I can take him to the vet earlier. Yes, maybe I will?