We’ve got a routine now of looking for dog leaks and the occasional carpet cigar, but the old darling is over 20 and we could forgive her for just about anything.

Georgey used to go about as far from his sleeping place as he could get. Under the dining room table was a favourite.

Poo volume, we’ve found, increases dramatically when he has had any processed/commercial dogfood. Alone with the smell (oh my, the smell.) On raw, the output is small and dries up fast, and he doesn’t fart much or have skin trouble – a far cry from my previous dry-food-fed dog.

OMFSM dogs and their chewing. He had a trip to the vet not long ago after swallowing an entire stuffed toy. When he was teething and we forgot to buy bones for a couple of days, he chewed the walls off. Literally. Chowed down on the plaster all along one corner. And I’m on at family and houseguests to STOP leaving pens lying around on the tables… when he chews those up, not only do I worry about shards in his intestines, but the ink gets everywhere. Shoes go in a cupboard near the door.

He once sneaked a slipper right off the dangling foot of my snoozing father-in-law. Which was hilarious, I admit.

The lad’s toys all go in his bedroom, cordoned off with a baby gate. I bought him a copy of “Bad Dog, Marley!” (the picture book), too.

It’s definitely not a housetraining thing – he never wees inside and he only poos when no-one is looking, and then only overnight.

One of his foibles that I forgot to mention is that he loves to eat plastic, and will chew up (and swallow) any small objects such as ballpoint pen caps and little toys he happens to find. I’m trying to convince the kids to be tidier as I don’t want any late-night dashes to the Lort Smith animal hospital. But he doesn’t touch shoes. Absolutely does. not. touch them. He must have had some shoe training from his former owners!

Crate report: He didn’t object strongly to the crate, no barking or shaking of the prison bars, and was curled up asleep when Boychild came to let him out in the morning. No revenge shits have been done. So far, so good. He actually curls up in there to relax during the day, which is nice.

Toilet training went from hair-pulling to easy. He no longer sat under the bed chewing electrical cords in the night. It became his “safe place” – he trots in there at night and curls up to sleep without any fuss. He can use it to get away from marauding toddlers. Also terrifically handy when we have a reason why he can’t be out and about, like an allergic-to-dogs visitor or needing to have the gate open for a while. Much better than locking him howling in the laundry.