Dogs On The Train!

Very interesting tablemates on the train back tonight... a pair of women accompanied by three large lurchers. I got talking to them (well, who wouldn't?) and the tale was an interesting one.

Minty and her friend (whose name I neglected to get) had just picked up the three dogs from their previous owner who was unable to keep them due to some unfortunate family circumstances – they live out in the countryside and look after dogs and other animals temporarily while their owners are unable to, a kind of fostering service for pets. They were telling me that the next animal guests they were expecting in their menagerie are a pair of reindeer...!

So the dogs – Ben, Bella and Scruff – were incredibly well-behaved to say that they had just been taken from their home and on a train for the first time. They were very chilled out and super-friendly. The train guards made a fuss of them and brought them water to cool them down.

Minty seems to be a bit of a local celebrity, and was telling me about her features on the radio, her charity events and fundraising efforts, and her current project to visit all the racecourses in the UK to test out their disabled facilities, as a wheelchair user herself.

She was certainly a character – I wouldn't dare to guess a lady's age, suffice to say she's old enough to do exactly as she damn well pleases! But both her and her travelling companion were camera-shy and insisted my photo today be of the dogs instead of the humans :-)