Labradors Eat Anything - True or False?

Dear Drontal

Every month my vet sends me two of your big white worm tablets.

They look like pessaries.

Actually, it would be a lot easier if I did just have to shove them up the arses of my two black Labs.

But no.

I have to make them eat the damn things.

"Just swallow the pill, Goddammit."

I mean, Labradors aren't dogs, they are garbage disposal units. I live on a vineyard, and it's commonly known that grapes, the pips in particular, are fatal to dogs.

Not for Hawk and Whetu. They just eat the grapes and poo out the pips. Whole.

Whetu will eat anything - zucchini which have swelled into marrows because I forgot to pick them, chook poo which gives her an itchy bum so she's developed this method of planting her anus on the ground then sticking her back legs in the air and pulling herself along on her front legs so she can scratch her toosh, cat shit, windfall apples, rabbits they catch and devour every scrap including the fur and claws, crayfish - they both love crayfish bodies, in short nothing is safe from forever hungry Labradors.

Except worm pills.

I wrap them in tasty mince.

Every little bitty scrap of mince gets eaten then the pill gets spat out.

I smother them in honey. The honey gets licked off.

There's only one way to worm these dogs. Every month I wrestle them to the ground, wrench open their jaws, thrust the pill far down into their throats past those sharp white teeth, past their gagging mechanism then quickly hold their jaws shut until they're forced to swallow.

They hate me for it.

Until they get a little treat one second later.

Please, Drontal, do you think you could come up with rabbit flavoured worm pills?



Ten Commandments from Parliament

INCASEYOUMISSEDIT (as the NZ Herald loves to proclaim when it repeats stuff from Buzzfeed) the National Cabinet issued new edicts. Ministers were influenced by the Minister of Corrections' extremely thoughtful directive of last week in which MPs were rescued from potential attacks from savage criminals due to so many random prison visits.  Henceforth, SHEWHOMUSTBEOBEYED wrote, MPs must ask for permission from the Minister's office when they wish to visit prisons and bugger the Corrections Act 2004 (my swear word).

So the following visits are from this day off-limits for all MPs without express permission:

1. Minister of Finance: Thou shalt not visit a bank lest thou borrow money thou canst repay.

2. Minister of Education: Thou shalt not ride a school bus if thou name be Winston.

3. Minister of Education (yes, again): Thou shalt not visit a school lest thou be a teacher not under supervision by the Education Council.

4. Minister of Health: Thou shalt not visit a hospital lest thou wait too long in ED and end up on front page of Dominion Post in its weekly OIA sweep.

5. Minister of America's Cup: Thou shalt not go to any series lest thou stay away from The House for months and never want to come home.

6. Minister of Justice: Thou shalt not drop in on a court case lest thou be tempted to remove all thou clothes and end up in the Herald on Sunday.

7. Minister of Internal Affairs: Thou shalt not visit the Office of the Chief Censor lest thou become addicted to porn, wrestle with thou addiction, then out thouself on social media.

8. Minister of Agriculture: Thou shalt not visit a farm lest thou pee into a river.

9. Minister of Social Welfare: Thou shalt not visit Housing NZ house lest thou be tempted to attack mould with bleach and a scrubbing brush and deprive media of sob stories.

10. Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery: Thou shalt not visit Christchurch lest a wardrobe fall on thou with its key poking out and thou give birth to baby wardrobes.

Amine, waiho ki tena.

Can we CrowdSell New Zealand?

Sometimes I wonder.

If two mates over beers can galvanise the country to crowdfund and buy an inlet, why can't we reverse the process and sell the entire country?

CrowdSelling. Cos that's what Kiwis do.

They weren't celebrities endorsing. One even had an apostrophe in the middle of his name where someone forgot how to spell.

Why do I suggest selling three main islands and assorted cling-ons, lock stock and barrel?

Because who appreciates this place any more?

Look around and all you see is a glass-half-empty attitude.

Take that latest Fonterra survey. It found just over one in ten dairy farmers are feeling pressured by banks so that means more than one in eight farmers are doing okay.

But nah mate. You'd think from the radio reports we're all going to hell in a handcart.

Sit down with a gin at six to watch the news on telly, which should really be called the olds because it's not new, and it's car crashes or stabbings, crime or some munter in court yelling at a judge. The cops are bad and the crims are saints.

Everything's the fault of the gummint.

The minimum wage is raised but it's not high enough. Students go to Dunedin to burn down houses and couches, generally destroy property.

Gangs abuse their missuses and kids but live the life of Riley on welfare and drug-dealing cos they're just "misunderstood", while honest women (mostly) who clean up shit and piss and care for elderly in old folks homes earn fuck all.  And if you're dying of cancer you have to beg a career politician with a Bouffant Billy hairstyle and a penchant for wearing a bowties for permission to go gentle into the good night with the aid of medicinal cannabis.

Shoot me now.

We're finger-wagged and lectured over what we can drink, how much we eat, we're too fat, too thin, swear too much, mustn't streak across a cricket pitch, shouldn't eat peas with our knife, drink coffee, keep a rooster, eat pies, go naked at a nudist camp, smoke cigars, fuck the hottie at a Xmas party with the blinds up, be Mayor and have an affair, be an MP and buy wine, be PM and touch head hair that belongs to someone else, (are we there yet? No, but that's e-bloody-nough, Ed).

Am I grumpy?

Yes I am right now.

It's out of character for me, because recently Andy Sutherland, a contractor and grape-grower asked if I sleep with a smile on my face.

Life is not a dress rehearsal. New Zealanders don't appreciate what we've got. Listen to Joni.

Goodbye Mr Smith, Let's Go Slumming

A song today to farewell a good friend and a good young man, Mr Smith, who died at 6.30 last night.

Gone too soon.

As his daughter Verity said in her text to me this morning, "The Coddington Taylor Marshall Smith kids meant the world to Dad."

Mr Smith was a regular at my first restaurant at Russell, The Cavalli Beachfront Café, and then again at my second, The Gables.

When Mr Smith knew he didn't have much time left one thing he wanted to do was go for a blat in a Ferrari.

We tried to organize this, so big thanks to my good friend James who, when I asked if he could take Mr Smith out in one of his Ferraris, said yes immediately. Alas, the Reaper intervened.

Mr Smith liked to listen to Genevieve Waite in my restaurants; we played LPs back in those days.

So here's a song for Mr Smith.