I have a lot of sympathy for my dog on the subject of hot air balloons. 
 

In the early summer, when evenings are still, they tend to glide overhead, giving bursts of roaring flame as they try to lift themselves up 500 feet to get over the peak of the South Downs, just above the village. 

If you are a dog guarding a few acres then that is an incursion up with which you will not put. 
 

She starts with a swallowed gruff looking up. That turns into a more assertive woof which then develops into a full Bow Wow and from there it escalates into a wuff wuff wuff wuff wow wow so big that she can’t keep a front legs on the ground.

Fortunately, the way of balloons is that they move on, and so does the dog. All is forgiven and forgotten. 
 

Imagine then the difficulties of a lovely summer evening such as this evening where the moon appears above the house and will not leave. 

God bless her blinking bones. She is telling the moon to get fvcked. Now she has sat down and is mumbling about it. Gruff. She knows it rejected her suggestion. It should have gone now. It did not. Mwahruff, it is not heeding my command. Bwah. It is stubborn but I am steady. 
 

i say to her ‘it’s just the moon!’ but for years of hot air balloon incursions I have been saying ‘it’s just a balloon’ and now i see that they sound entirely the same and bless her constant vigilance we have not, as yet, been attacked by the moon or a balloon. Creds to dogga. But I am sorry for causing confusion. You are old and struggling. But still you do your duty. Point for me to note ahead. 
 

she is accompanying me as i am at the barbecue and she knows that bodes well.