On the left is Cindy on the right is Nikki and I'm holding Bambi.

I'll leave it to my sisters to tell you about their dogs because no one believes me when I tell them about my rabbit!

I bought Bambi for Ten Shillings (Ten bob, later to become 50p, half a quid, or in those days around a dollar!) from a boy across the road whose rabbit produced a litter(how was a mystery to him!).

I hadn't told anyone so Father wasn't pleased. Luckily, my Dad had an aviary and bred budgerigars, so he built a hutch and we put it in the aviary.

The hutch, unsurprisingly for those of us who know my Dad's constructions, outlasted the rabbit but Bambi lived for TEN years! Incidentally, the aviary, also built by my Dad is still standing 40 years later!

Now before you ask, yes I know Bambi was a deer and the rabbit was called Thumper! I wanted to call my rabbit WhiteSpot because he had one right in the middle of his forehead. My big sister put a stop to that, Miss Knowitall, because that's the name of a tropical fish disease! So they all insisted I call him Thumper but damn it all it was my rabbit so I was going to name him!

Bambi was amazing to me. He was very pettable, I used to bring him into the house and he would sleep with Cindy (she being a big softy). Nikki we weren't quite so sure about... What I never understood was how he never got covered in budgy poop as the aviary was quite a mess to keep clean! Later when Dad enlarged the aviary to have a flight cage he had a big enclosed area of grass and a pond, quite palatial accomodation for a rabbit which is why I guess he lived so long.

While not a dog I also learned the lesson that Bambi was mine. One day just as I was to leave for school with my sister I noticed he was paralysed in the back legs and his eyes were runny. My parents were at work so my sister ran us to the vets. It wasn't the big M but it was a similar incurable infectious disease so I had to sign the vets release form.

It was some number of years before I got my first dog.