Professor Barnabus's Christmas Adventure.

Christmas Day, 6:26pm, and I receive a text from my brother - 'Barney escaped. We're going to look for him. Do you know where he might have gone?'

And that was that, I was sat in work in Bargoed and Barney was off somewhere in the Llandaff North vicinity, possibly negotiating the night time A48.

'How did he get out?' I asked.
'Well, we kind of had both the doors open'

Barney had been out of sorts since my mum and Mike left to go to Great Yarmouth for Christmas. After whining, howling and scratching for a few hours, he resigned himself to the fact that they were never coming back, ever. That he had in fact been abandoned, again.

Nothing could draw him out of his lull, I tried to take him for a walk and he was having none of it. When I tried to clip his lead onto his collar, he bolted off as if I had the intention of driving hot pokers into his eyeballs. He then proceeded to run upstairs (tut, tut) and hide under the desk in the study. He sat there growling at me for the next 45 minutes as I tried to co-erce him downstairs. I gave up.

He was off his food and hadn't really touched his water. Treats were tentatively accepted and then carried as far away as possible for nervous consumption. He would not come out of his bed, apart from for the occasional toilet trip to the garden, and shook excessively whenever approached.

He had mine up his mind. The first chance he got, he was off.

So, off he went, sparking a two car, four person dog-hunt. The problem with Barney is, due to his nervous disposition, he scarpers whenever approached. He was sighted sitting in the front garden but then (of course) ran away again. The situation was further exaserbated by someone attempting to grab him, which of course, made him worse. He was last seen heading in the direction of the Taff Trail.

On the way back from work at 10:30pm, I pulled over by the river and called out his name for a while. I did think I could hear his collar tinkering for a while, but then I realised it was the bells on my Christmas jumper. No Barney.

The agreed consesus was that perhaps it'd be a better idea to just let him come home when he was ready, and to just leave the door open. A piece of bacon was left in his bowl as further temptation.

On my way out, I drove around again for a while. At on point I thought I saw him, but it was just a cat. I kerb crawled every piece of 'larger than normal' roadside litter with apprehension. No Barney.

The door was left open all night in anticipation of his return (luckily both my surfboards were still there on my return!). A noise was heard at 8:00am, and on further investigation it was confirmed that the elusive Barney had made an appearance. This was evident by the missing bacon. The bacon was gone, and so was Barney.

Then, at 9:00am, another noise was heard. Lulu went to check and there he was, sitting in his bed. As you can imagine, Lulu did a double take to check she wasn't dreaming. After staying up until 2:30am in the hope of his safe return and checking numerous times, it was unsuprising to at first believe her eyes were playing tricks on her. But there he was.

As you can see, he was ecstatic to see us.

He also smelled really, really bad. My mum and Mike had already cut their trip short to come back and find him.

I guess we will never know where Barney spent his night in the rough. Speculations include a bush in the Taff Trail, the front drive or one of our next door neighbours gardens. Reports are unconfirmed that he was visited by either of the ghosts of Christmas past, present or future during the night, but we can't know for sure.

The important thing is he's home safe. And he's had two baths...