Who's the Daddy: It’s no dog’s life for spoilt Walter

The boy Walter doesn’t suffer from run-of-the-mill injuries – hypersonic sighthounds rarely do.
Who's the Daddy?Who's the Daddy?
Who's the Daddy?

But his latest ruinously expensive trip to the vet was caused by something leftfield even by our loveable 40mph lunatic’s standards.

Normally he eats like a pig, drinks like a fish and when he’s not fast asleep, charges around all day and is a general nuisance. But one morning this week he could barely get out of bed and hobbled around with his front left paw off the ground. Off his food, not interested in drinking, this looked serous.

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The thing is, sighthounds are world-class actors. Injuries that Labradors and beagles would shrug off without a second thought, they crack on like they’ve been hit by a car but often make a miraculous recovery at the mention of the word “cheese”.

In human terms, they’re like a Premier League full-back from a Mediterranean country. Fast, muscular and aggressive when chasing down a tricky opponent but prone to amateur dramatics when things go wrong.

Turns out that Walter, while noisily protecting us from next door’s kittens on the other side of a 6ft garden fence (it has to be that high, any lower he’d jump it), trod on a grass seed that jammed between two of his toes, which then splintered and by the following morning had knocked him for six.

The vet sedated him, got the seed out and put a plaster on his leg from his paw up to his elbow to stop him getting at it and prescribed a week-long course of antibiotics administered between two lumps of Brie (he likes that) and some medicine squirted on his morning eggiweg and fed to him in a dish while he’s sprawled out on the sofa in front of Sky Sports News (he likes that even more).

So he’s on the mend.

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He’s currently cuddling his teddy while lounging on garden furniture before the sun gets too hot for him while the last of his sedative wears off.

The boss says I spoil him, and was never as attentive when the kids were ill when they were little. But can kids do puppy dog eyes and pull a houndface? They cannot.

I rest my case.

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