G'day.

My name is Bilbo Baggins and I live with my hobbitoids (giant hobbits) at a place they call, Darwin? I think it means "hot place near the sea" but I can't be sure about that. Well apparently it's a piece of a country (whatever a country is) called Oztrailya.

Now that's got me a bit confused 'cause the hobbitoids seem to be forever changing the name of this 'country' thingy. While I don't have many recollections of when I was a small puppy, I do remember hearing one call the 'country' Bell Gym. As I started to grow up and understand things a bit more I noticed the locals were now calling it Frawn Say. As it really didn't concern me too much, I just put the whole thing out of my head.

But then, when I was two summers old, we went on a trip in a big wheely bug through this long hole under the water. When we came out all the hobbitoids sounded really queer, in fact I couldn't understand a thing they said. Even the dogs sounded like they had a plumb in their mouth. Anyway, by the time I had learned to bark this strange 'new speak', I thought I had it all figured out. This 'country' thingy (that seems so important to hobbitoids), was actually a piece of my anatomy called my En gland, and apparently, it had been surgically removed at some stage while I was asleep. To this day, I still can't believe that I didn't wake up.

So all the next summer and the two summers afterwards and another summer again ( I only count in ones and twos) I spent my time blissfully exploring woodlands, fields, marshes, beaches, lakes, rivers, canals, highlands, lowlands, B&B's, houses, restaurants, bars and banks. You don't believe I visited banks do you? Well they have this hole in the wall which says "deposits", so I just naturally assumed ...

Then one day while travelling in another wheely bug I saw a sign saying Heath Row, 10 miles. Well, I could hardly contain my excitement, we were obviously going Grouse hunting. Now I'd never seen a Grouse before and I of sort of imagined they would be a something in between a quail and a pheasant. You must be joking mate, these things were ginormous, and you probably won't believe me when I tell you that one of them had a weird animal painted on it's red tail. I absolutely know you are not going to believe what happened next . Have you heard the story of Jonah and the Whale? Well, to cut a long story short, by the time I got out of that thing winter had arrived. I remember a hobbitoid saying "welcome to Oztrailya pooch". I'm thinking, who's he calling pooch, my name is Bilbo and I'm an adventurous Cocker Spaniel that's just survived being swallowed by a giant grouse.

So I got to thinking some more (it comes naturally to me), I should chronicle my life...