The Rainy Day, an adventure of Roffa, the excellent dog

Roffa liked the rain, she like the way the drops fell from the sky so she could catch them on her tongue, she liked the way that the drops bounced on the pavement and the plants, she loved the smell of the world in the rain.

Most of all she liked getting her fur wet. She would run around in the rain, rolling in the grass, dancing amongst the drops until she was a very damp dog. She would then come back indoors and would lie in front of the fire steaming, the humans would say things like “Aaargh! Wet dog smell!” and complain but Roffa was happy

Normally Roffa would have rushed straight out of the kitchen into the garden but today her normal exit was blocked

The humans called it a “doggie door” but Roffa thought of it as the Roffa Launcher; she would walk up to it, touch it with her nose then back up four or five Roffa lengths before throwing herself forward with a loud “Woof!” and bursting out into the garden, causing panic and confusion amongst the squirrels, cats, and humans.

Today however the humans had been tidying up. Roffa was not entirely sure what tidying up meant but it seemed to involve emptying cupboards, making lots of small messes in different places and then complaining about not being able to find anything.

Humans were forever losing things. Roffa thought it was because of their noses which hardly seemed to work at all.

So Roffa carefully wound her way to the kitchen door and found her launcher was partially blocked by some boxes. She pushed her snout against the boxes and felt them move slightly. She pushed harder. They moved more. She went “Roffa!” and pushed hard and the boxes cleared the door enough for her to at least get out, even if she could not do a proper Roffa Launch.

As she pushed the flap open her tail wagged against the boxes and the topmost box fell over and the contents spilled onto Roffa as she entered the garden.

Roffa had felt something land on her but she was too excited to be out in the rain to pay it any attention.

There was a strong earthy smell coming from the flowerbeds which Roffa immediately wanted to investigate. She ran over to them and engaged in some top quality sniffing.

As she sniffed she started to smell something else. It smelled like … the washing?

But even the humans would not put the washing out in the rain. Roffa looked around and saw no washing. As she spun she saw something out of the corner of her eye. It was a bubble.

Roffa liked bubbles. They were like big raindrops that floated. So she span faster to catch it and suddenly there were more bubbles and an even stronger smell of the washing!

Roffa span and span, faster and faster. Bubbles! So many bubbles!

Alpesh looked out of the window. He was bored, it was raining so he could not go out into the garden and play with his friends. He loved playing with Nat and Ben and their dog, Roffa. But it was too wet.

Alpesh sighed, and looked across to their garden where he saw a very strange shape. It appeared to be lots and lots of bubbles spinning around and round.

Could it be? It must. It was an alien! There was an alien in next door’s back garden!

Alpesh grabbed his anorak and ran to the front door, “Going next door to see an alien!”, he shouted excitedly to his mother who was busy in the living room writing something complicated about biology on her computer.

Alpesh bounded out the door, in what if he had known was actually a very Roffa like way, and knocked loudly on next door’s front door.

Nat opened it. “Aliens!”, shouted Alpesh and ran through the house and to the back door.

There was an empty packet of washing power lying on the floor by the kitchen door with quite a lot of spilled powder and paw prints.

Nat put down the astronomer doll she had been carrying and walked to the back door.

“Aliens?”

“In your back garden. Bubble aliens!”

Nat looked at the floor and said “Hmm”.

“Quick! Before it escapes”, begged Alpesh.

Nat opened the back door and there in front of them in the garden was a spinning, dancing mass of bubbles.

“Aliens!”, cried Alpesh.

“Roffa!”. cried Nat.

“Wuff!” went the bubbles.

“Oh”, said Alpesh.

“Sorry, it’s just Roffa after a close encounter with an open box of washing powder”, sympathised Nat.

Roffa shook herself one last time and wandered back into the kitchen after them. Rain, bubbles and friends. What an excellent day. All that dancing had quite tired her out. Time for a snooze in front of the fire.

Roffa!