Wolds Diary: Mindless flower vandals leave my friend in needless distress

On the Monday I took the dogs for a long walk by the Pocklington Canal, on a part of it I had not visited before. My lab, Boo finally washed the remains of the white emulsion from her tail by frequent dips into the water.

I did meet a few other dog walkers but managed to avoid any confrontations with Brock and all of them had a lovely time sniffing new things.

Once I got home however I saw that something had caused my doberman shar-pei cross, Looroll’s, face to swell horrifically and I took her straight round to the vets. We suspected some sort of allergic reaction to something on the walk. After a couple of injections, the swelling subsided and she was on the mend. My vet is wonderful and so helpful.

The next morning, I went to sit with my friend’s husband while she went to the dentists, and once she returned got on with essential things such as washing, tidying and refilling the bird feeders. I then took off and did some much needed shopping.

After taking the dog back to the vet for a check-up on the Wednesday I went over to the charming village of Dunnington, not far from Beeford. My friends there are an elderly couple who have a beautiful house and glorious gardens and a couple of fields one of which is planted up with trees and shrubs that means something to them as they were donated by friends.

On the roadside my friend has planted a host of golden daffodils which are just coming into bloom. Last Sunday night some malicious being had gone in, chopped most of the centre branches off the young trees, pulled up the shrubs and then cut all the pig netting fencing into dozens of short pieces, totally destroying it. There is only one reason for doing such wilful damage, and that is to deliberately cause hurt. Such a person is beneath contempt. I went to see if I could do anything to help and whilst I was there I was introduced to the most wonderful true Yorkshireman, called John Brown, their gardener, who had also been most distressed by the damage and had tried to rescue some of the shrubs, trees and plants.

My friend had reported the damage to the police who sent out a couple of Community Support officers a few days later. Meanwhile I picked up hundreds of the slashed daffodil heads and my friend was so distressed that she begged me to take them home with me. Now I have a living room filled with glorious daffodil and narcissus blooms.

That evening I went to a parochial church council meeting that lasted nearly three hours as we were discussing finance matters.

The next morning, I was up early and after a short walk I was called by a lady in the Cancer Research shop in Beverley, who lets me know if she has a collection of used ties for me.

I do like Beverley. I went down that afternoon, and while I was there invested in a new phone, which is much better than my older basic one and the shop arranged to have it delivered as they did not have one in stock.

I went to help with campaigning for my political party in Driffield the next morning, and got very cold as I was out in quite a hail storm. Having warmed up, I got back home and then washed and changed into posher clothes, donned a hat, and in the afternoon went into Pocklington, and had a very joyful afternoon, joining the choir there as we sang at the wedding of our youngest member, a hugely popular young lady, who looked stunningly beautiful and very happy, as did the groom. I felt very privileged to sing at their wedding.

On Sunday I took the dogs out early to the most wonderful hidden part of the Wolds, a coombe that is almost a secret.

I had checked that it was totally clear of stock earlier in the week, and had been invited to run the dogs there; but it has stunning views and the dogs had a terrific run.

It was an inspiring start to the week.