I've been lucky to know a whole range of characters, including Granny Clarke, and her dog, Ruff. But let me introduce Ruff properly with his own story.

When my youngest uncle, David, he was only eight years older than me, got married and moved out of the house, everyone decided Granny Clarke needed a dog to keep her company.

Granny Clarke put up a stout resistance saying she couldn’t take it out for decent walks and it would get fat. John, her last bachelor son insisted he’d take it walks for her and, since she could deny John very little, someone found a dog called Ruff, a kind of collie all-sorts.

Ruff moved in and began a platonic relationship with Granny. I’ve known many dogs who enjoyed having their heads patted or ruffled but Ruff was too liberated to be treated as a pet.

The rest of my first encounter with Ruff is among the short stories in Bees in my Bonnet but is on its own at - 

sullatoberdalton.com/pen-sullatober/short-stories/ruff-times-in-a-dogs-life/

 A lady said to me the other day that when we first met she thought I was dour, which I can be, but it reminded me of a boilermaker I worked with, Jock Russel. One of the bright young Engineers went to Jock with some plans and explained what he wanted made and how it worked and asked Jock if he could make the thing. Jock said nothing at first but then told the Engineer, 'I'll make it a' right. It'll no' work, but I'll make it. Now that was dour.

Jock taught me to play bowls. I've watched some coaches recently and the spend time explaining how to hold the bowl, how to stand and the elements of a good delivery. In addition the the learner practicing, it takes several one hour sessions and the learner never has any fun. When Jock took me in hand, he told me 'Take the bowl in your hand like this, put your foot on the mat, and don't take it off, then roll your bowl next to that wee white one.' We rolled once up and once down and Jock snapped, 'I said, put it beside the wee white one.' That was it!

Jock and I played in many tournaments, him as skip. He didn't demonstrate, waving his hands to show how the bowl had to come inside this one, and round that one, he just stamped his foot and shouted, 'I want it there.'

So many people talk about how it should be done, Jock told me how it should look when it was finished.

www.sullatoberdalton.com