I should know better

Poor Merlin! Life just throws everything at him.

At the last show, he was really up for it. Showing well, not barking at the judge even when he made duck noises at him, looking good.....

Until I got him on the table. Where he behaved impeccably - and then I realised that the judge, who had been investigating his knickers for proof that he was really the boy he claims to be, was holding something up something huge. At least the size of a golfball....

A mat. I gazed in horror. The judge said something very relevant about the difficulties of coat care. I stared at the mat. Everyone stared at the mat, now at least the size of a cannonball. Merlin stared into space, wondering what he had done wrong now and why he was still on the table.

At last Merlin and I and the mat, at least the size of the planet Mars, slunk off and the three of us were placed 4th, one of his very worst results.

Poor Merlin - always let down by something or someone. Fortunately he didn`t realise it this time.

But I did see his daughters, and they are lovely.

I thought it best he didn`t see them. He would be off home to count his dog biscuits again.

Last week I received the delightful news that Merlin has become a father. He now has two beautiful little daughters, both doing well, (after totally puzzling their mother, who had always believed that children only came in ones, and had to get her head round coping with two.).

Of course I told him at once.

When i break this sort of news to Marcus, I am usually greeted by a yawn (although if I mention that they are girls he does probably file the information away for future use.)

Not so Merlin.

He stared at me and over his face came the usual expression with which he greets anything new - worry with an undercurrent of panic.

You could just see his head spinning. Two! Was he supposed to support them? Out of his allowance of dog biscuit? And daughters! Clothes, college, thwarting the attentions of unsuitable dogs.....

He headed for the door at a very fast lick.

Not easy, being Merlin.

What`s defiantly orange, in your face, and frozen? No, not a Larkhall man at the North Pole - Irn Bru ice cream. I discovered it in a local shop in the current heatwave, and, having led a sheltered life, couldn`t believe it.

Irn Bru gets everywhere.For the rest of you out there, Irn Bru is a totally Scottish aberration. Glowing orange, and terminally sweet, it is marketed as "your other national drink". It pushes Coke well into second place in the fizzy drink market. A national institution for about a century, it began as a health drink (and so did Coke, but that stuff we don`t mention isn`t in it now, and hasn`t been there for over a hundred years). It still contains a small amount of iron, and is usually said to owe its continued popularity to creative advertising, but every Scot knows it is really indispensable because of a legendary reputation as a surefire hangover cure, capable of raising the dead....well, lots of water and sugar can`t hurt.

In the present warm spell, the orange bottles and cans are everywhere, contrasting luridly with the lobster scarlet bodies that a few days of hot sunshine brings out everywhere in this country.

The taste....? Well, sorta fruity and incredibly sweet, I suppose. I haven`t touched it in years, not since I was put off by an incredibly ageist advertising campaign, so I`m no expert.

I discover that now you can even get it abroad. Could Irn Bru conquer the world?

If a Scot ever gets to the moon, you`ll know it. Left behind, shining orange in the earthlight, will be a little empty can....