REG is grounded.

At the time of writing, he is lying in front of the fire, curled up in the tightest possible ball on his blanket, his nose tucked under his tail.

If he is dreaming of fleeing rabbits and long summer evenings and strings of sausages in butchers windows, just like in the Dandy, you can't tell.

Apart from the rhythmic movement of his breathing and an occasional involuntary grumble, this little Jack Russell terrier is completely motionless.

The reason he is grounded is that he has once again proved himself simply unable to behave properly when out with his best mate Baxter, and he has come home plastered in mud. He just won't learn.

It has been a weekend for catching up with friends, not just for Reg but for the human members of the family as well.

The daughters were up in Bath with their respective friends, catching up on the gossip and, apparently, exhausting the local bars' supply of cocktails.

For me it was a Saturday morning in the supermarket, a Saturday afternoon at the football, and a Sunday trying to stop Reg and Baxter from destroying much of Yalberton and Stoke Gabriel.

The morning in the supermarket was most unusual. For a start, everyone was smiling.

When two trolleys met head-on among the cooking ingredients and the jams and spreads, there were smiles all round as one shopper graciously gave way to another.

For a while I wondered what on earth the explanation for all this bonhomie could be, and then it dawned.

It was because it was almost all men in there on Saturday morning. We are united in our fear of shopping, and therefore prepared to smile and give way. It is a kind of shared suffering, as we toil up and down with our scribbled lists and our furrowed brows, trying to work out where everything is.

Some are old hands at this, and cruise confidently around with no visible shopping lists, casting disdainful looks at the rest of us. We continue to check and scribble, and scribble and check, as we try to make sure we get through without forgetting anything.

I never did find the freezer bags, despite retracing my steps more than once.

If anyone knows where they are, do let me know.

And you meet all your old mates in there — an old school pal here, a radio station veteran there, a quiz league champion, too — all united in the search for their own personal Holy Grails.

Freezer bags, probably.

It was like a gathering of the clans. One day we should all just park our trolleys across the end of the beer aisle, knock the tops off a few bottles of ale and sit down on the shiny floor for a chat.

We'll ask someone to pop down aisle four for a few bags of nuts and Doritos.

Then, of course, we'll count up what we drink and pay for it at the end. Our civil disobedience will have the accent on the 'civil' bit.

Saturday afternoon's gathering of old pals took place at the White Rock Soccer-o-Drome, which this week came complete with its own animated water feature, a little river running down one touchline.

The occasion was the Herald Cup encounter between Hookhills and Stoke Gabriel, which ended in a 3-0 win for Hookhills although both teams deserve a big pat on the back for playing some good stuff on a surface on which some spectators were having enough trouble just standing up.

Underfoot it was so wet that the slightest flexing of the ankle muscles caused large pools of red-brown muddy water to form around the feet. A full-scale Dixon of Dock Green 'warm night, madam' knee bend created a lagoon of filthy water.

Just for good measure a band of hefty showers laced with sleet set in for the second half, so it was good that one spectator had brought her giant plastic see-through umbrella.

Good, too, that this gathering of old friends was convivial enough for four of us to squeeze in under the brolly without a hint of embarrassment and spend much of the remainder of the match indulging in Carry On Football-style dialogue unsuitable for repetition here.

As the afternoon wore on, so the green of the grass gradually disappeared to be replaced by a red-brown film of floating mud.

Most people were glad just to remain upright on it.

Two young lads, however, kicked a football around oblivious to the conditions. The general consensus was that if we had ever seen two muddier small boys, we couldn't remember when.

In the adverts they would charge through their front door, leaving great muddy footprints on the carpet while their mother smiled indulgently, shook her head and reached for the magic vanishing cleaning liquid.

In real life they could have had no complaints if they had received a good old-fashioned clip round the ear and no supper.

Which brings me to Reg and Baxter, both of whom are currently in the 'no supper' category.

Not having seen one another for a week or two, it seemed like a good idea to get them out in the fresh air for a couple of hours.

But Baxter has changed in the last couple of weeks.

He is a Border terrier/Yorkshire terrier cross, and is somewhat younger than Reg. The first time they went out together, Baxter was a tiny whirlwind of black and gold fur and flashing teeth, and Reg was able to cope with his antics quite well. The next time, they were almost the same size, and Reg was a little less dominant.

Suddenly, in the last couple of weeks, Baxter has drawn level with and outgrown Reg. He is a strapping lad, and the walk has become a constant battle between them.

Fans of the sitcom Father Ted will recall an episode in which Father Dougal receives a visit from the rowdy Father Damo from the next village, and the new arrival leads Dougal right off the straight and narrow.

And that's how it is when the two dogs get together now. On their leads through the lanes down past the orchards they were as good as gold.

Butter wouldn't melt, and all that.

Off their leads down Lixey Lane to Byter Mill they were a nightmare, clashing teeth, jumping over each other and pinning one another down in the mud, all with their tails wagging of course. We gave up shouting their names and just let them get on with it.

By the time we had reached our refreshment stop at the Church House Inn in Stoke Gabriel they were crusted in muck, wide-eyed and panting. Fortunately the hosts at this most welcoming of village pubs said that of course they could come in, and they napped fitfully while we consumed real ale and an excellent lunch.

Surely they would be too tired for a repeat performance on the way home?

In fact by the time we emerged at Yalberton once more it was hard to tell if Reg was a white dog with brown patches or vice-versa. Baxter boasts better anti-mud camouflage, but he too was coated in a thick sludge.

It took ages to scrub Reg clean in the bath, and it took even longer to scrub the bath clean afterwards. We gather the picture was much the same in the Baxter household.

Hence they are grounded, at least until the weather improves.

I wonder if the two lads kicking the football around on Saturday afternoon suffered the same fate?