Iain Maciver writes …

SHE only went out to the shed for the strimmer. When she came back, she had her bike. With the promised summer still round the corner, Mrs X decided that she would get rid of the winter bulges and get fit, and be environmentally-friendly, by clambering on to her bicycle to go everywhere.

Well, we’ll see how long it lasts, but she is doing very well so far.

We were planning to get a new environmentally-friendly car, you see. It was one of these fancy ones that runs on water.

Amazing.

Imagine gliding past the queues at the Stornoway filling stations in a cloud of, well, steam, I suppose. Wouldn’t that be fantastic? Yeah, let’s order one of those.

Then we looked at the small print and there was a catch. The water had to come from the Gulf of Mexico.

So she has been on her bike and I have been walking as much as I can. My little hairy legs are all walked out, because I have been taking our dog, Hector, with me everywhere. It is such a palaver nowadays. You have to take the treats, the lead and several bags for the you-know-what.

We were out for our early constitutional the other day. Going up Smith Avenue, Hector was so impressed by the neatly-trimmed hedges and gardens that he had an uncontrollable urge to, well, unburden himself.

So I had to get my wee bag out and pick up all he had left behind. Now where’s that bin? No bin. Dash it. So I just had to keep walking.

Then I heard my name being called and there was one of our local prominent churchmen running after me.

I wasn’t really in the mood for talking, especially as I was carrying this plastic bag in which was that unwanted present from Hector.

He, however, was in the mood for a right old chinwag.

Seeing my plastic bag, he immediately thought I must have been down at Engebret to pick up a spot of breakfast. I thought I’d better say nothing and just agreed.

We spoke about the golf club and the sports centre and whether they should be open seven days. He was not as vehemently opposed as I thought and, although I was very interested in what he had to say, I realised that the plastic bag had a big rip down the side of it.

My mind was playing tricks with me. I feared the tear was getting bigger and the contents would spill out at any second.

That would be disastrous. I had led the churchman to believe the bag contained my breakfast. There was no way he could be allowed to see what was in that bag. It certainly wasn’t a bacon roll.

Hector

I had no choice but to grab the bag by the bottom so the split was on top, if you follow me. As I cradled this bag of still-warm doo-doo, the smell was now apparent to anyone within 20ft of me, never mind two. I just had to cut short our discussion abruptly.

As the poor fellow explained his interpretation of Colossians, I just shot off and left him to it.

Not only was I afraid he would catch the smell, but I was afraid the bag would fall apart completely or that Hector would decide Smith Avenue was such a nice place that he’d have a second go.

So this is my chance to say sorry for leaving the churchman talking to himself. I didn’t mean to be rude. Honest.

Hector, of course, is a miniature schnauzer. Originally, they were dogs bred for finding and killing rats in Bavaria. But many people are still intrigued by the name schnauzer.

They haven’t a clue what it means. So they just come to their own conclusions.

“Doesn’t schnauzer mean hairy?” people ask.

No, it doesn’t.

Someone else said they were sure schnauzer actually meant playful. He is certainly that but, no, it doesn’t mean that, either.

A woman with a spaniel thinks it means beard.

Well, close, but not quite. It’s actually from schnauze, the German word for snout.

There you are; don’t say you don’t learn anything from reading this column.

However, the confusion that people have with the word schnauzer came home to us the other day. These dogs have to be groomed, otherwise they look like the greasy pile of hairs that I often had the job of clearing from under my uncle’s Harris Tweed loom.

One task we forgot to attend to recently was trimming his ears. They were packed with hair, so poor Hector went a bit deaf. Not that he is obedient at the best of times, but he wouldn’t even come when Mrs X shouted “walkies”.

Or when I shouted: “Yes, mutt, it’s bottom-sniffing time.” Funny, that usually got him going.

Another owner quickly spotted the problem. She told us that, to prevent it happening again, we should get a certain hair remover and dab a little on his lugs every month. That would fix the problem.

So Mrs X jumped on her bike and went down to the chemist for a pot of the said ointment.

The pharmacist she met was very helpful and assumed it was for herself. There were a few precautions she should take with that particular hair remover.

“If you’re going to use this under your arms, don’t use deodorant for a few days,” said the pharmacist.

My better half said OK, but she was not actually going to use it under her arms.

He said: “Ah well, if you’re using it on your legs, you shouldn’t shave them for a couple of days.”

No, she insisted, she was not using it on her legs, either.

“If you really must know,” she added, “I am using it on my schnauzer.”

“Oh, I see,” said the discreet druggist. “In that case, you may have to stay off that bicycle of yours for at least a week.”