Introducing Roland

Dogs are good, and dogs are excellent, and dogs are great. I think we can all agree on this.

However, not unlike Orwellian pigs, some dogs are better than others* and with a view to proving that I think it is time for you to meet Roland.

Roland is a 4yo Labrador, who is owned by my nice boyfriend, SJ**. I‘m sure you would also like to see photos of SJ and learn about him, but I looked through my phone and almost all my photos of him are of the “I have shaved myself a novelty mustache” variety, and so perhaps we will save those for another day and learn about Roland instead.

Roland is a dog who is fond of wearing hats.
This is entirely his own personal preference and nothing to do with the people around him who think he looks hilarious in hats.
Observe:

as soon as the dame walked into my office i knew she was trouble

why do they keep putting hats on me

I put that second photo on Instagram and Placemakers (a hardware store, for those of you not in the hardware know) commented and said he was a good boy, and now Roland is more of an influencer than I am and frankly I’m not sure how I feel about that. On one hand I am proud and happy for him but on the other hand if all you have to do to become instagram famous is put a hat on your dog at 4am then why am I not a kardashian yet.

Roland is very personable, except for babies, which he does not like. If a baby comes to visit, Roland will sit in the corner and growl intermittently in the general direction of the baby. While it is important to have character flaws in order to be a truly rounded person slash labrador, this is not one of Roland’s better traits.

What is one of Roland’s better traits is that no matter how cheerful he is at any given point in time, he looks like he is about to fling himself off the nearest bridge while simultaneously judging you for it.

This makes him good for comedic purposes:

Side note: I’m very aware that so far this post is just pictures of a goofy labrador*** with minimal commentary but I’m pretty ok with that and I’m nowhere near out of pictures so hang onto your fedora/placemakers bucket hat because we are just getting started and also did I mention Roland does not know how to work the cone?

oh boy he does not fucking know

Luckily he doesn’t have to go in the cone very often, because one of his other less good traits is a tendency to wake up at 2am and walk around the room crashing the cone into walls and doorways like some sort of terrible bumblebee. Then attempt to jump onto the bed and crash the cone into your leg. Sometimes I worry that perhaps Roland is not a very good boy.

Next introductory fact: Roland is a dog of many nicknames. These include Rolls, Roland Poland, Roland Polanski, Royce (as in Rolls), Roller Coaster, and Plums.

Why Plums, you may ask? What sort of person would call a dog Plums? What sort of dog would earn this nickname?

A dog that fucking LOVES plums, that’s what sort.

SJ has a plum tree in the back yard and Rolls is 100% about these plums. From the day of the first windfall until far past the last plum of summer, Rolls can be found outside at every opportunity, bumbling around the base of the plum tree, cramming himself full of delicious plums with the finesse and delicacy of a small child at a buffet. Rolls has been known to go outside at 11pm and disappear for 40 minutes and SJ or I will begin to worry for his safety and then you look out the window and there he is, snuffling for plums. He is like a truffle pig but far, far less profitable.

(Once Rolls was out plum-hunting at night and SJ and I were watching him out the bathroom window because he is hilarious, when he suddenly spun around and saw us, and we both immediately leapt backwards out of sight as if we were the ones in the wrong.)

So this year, I decided that rather than let all the plums disappear into the gaping maw of Roland, we would put them to use and make a nice jam.

But it would have felt rude to make jam out of Rolls’ favourite plums without at least paying some kind of homage to their biggest fan, and so I found a photo of him as a puppy and made a small custom label order and -

“tastes like real jam!” - my friend Caroline, with an unnecessary air of surprise

“very nice jam, Als” - my mother, with an unnecessary air of surprise

So now if you hear mention of Roland or Rolls or Plumbo or RP, you will know who it is that I’m talking about.

Here is a bonus picture of him having a snooze because look how fucking cute he is.

he hold he own foot

*this is an absolute lie, all dogs are equally as fantastic.

**I told James he could choose his own nickname for the blog and he thought long and hard and said he was fine with James, and I said BUT YOU NEED A NICKNAME and he said “Speckled Jim” and I liked that because it shortens to SJ, which of course also stands for Sexy James. And Supermarket Junkies and Superb Jaguars and Shit! Jump! but none of those are important right now, unless you are about to run headlong into a pit, in which case, shit! jump!

***what do you call a magical dog? A labracadabrador