Over ten years ago I bought a clock from Ikea. It is a fashionable clock with a pendulum, a combination of modern and ancient and I loved it. Since then, we have moved several times and at one time, I thought the clock was lost but later recovered from one of our boxes. I wasn’t ready to part with it just yet and I was glad to find it. Then at a later stage the clock started to go slow and I thought perhaps it has run its course. No, one new battery made it all alive again.

Years gone and I thought it was about time to change a new look on the wall. I got another clock but the ticking noise was far too loud for me to bear. It was like living with a time bomb 24/7. I took it down and put the old Ikea clock back on the wall.

Since then, I have almost forgotten the idea of a new clock when yesterday I passed by a street seller and he got something which I loved at first sight. It was a clock with the picture of two plush bears sitting together, very cute and loving. I bought it with no second thought.

When I got home, I placed it on the wall, replaced the old clock (with some nostalgic feelings of parting but still!) and it was great. The colour of the clock matched our wall paint and the pair of cute little bears warmed our sitting room. I went into my bedroom happily and that’s when the trouble began.

My dog went back into the sitting room, barking non stop at the clock. Apparently he thought those two bears were enemies! I went out to fetch him, took him back into my room but within half a minute, he was out in the sitting room, barking at the clock again. I could not stop him! So I took a chair, carrying him and stepping on the high chair with him to face the two bears, and said, ‘hello, see these two bears, they are friends, they don’t bark at you, do they?’ He seemed o.k. then and got quiet, so I took him down and we went back into our bedroom. No luck, the next minute, he was back to the sitting room, barking at the bears again!

By then I was getting impatient, I took the clock down to show him that they were unreal, they weren’t alive, and they weren’t even real bears! They were toy bears! But he behaved as if he seen a ghost! When the clock was getting near him, he ran from kitchen to bedroom, as though there was an earthquake. So at the end, I have to give in! I picked up the old clock, which was just about to go to the bin, and put it back on the wall. There it was ticking its way as if it was laughing at me saying, ‘hey, you can never get rid of me, this is my territory, even you dog knew that, you silly old fool!’

Yes, I think my dog wants the old clock back, what can I do? Now when I get some new furniture, do I have to get permission from this dog?