Tonight I had a run-in with a pair of dogs. It brought to mind another run-in which took place a few weeks ago, so I thought I'd write about both instances.

Several weeks ago, I was walking through the Kingsley subdivision when I saw a large German Shepherd approaching at a trot. He was about a half-block away, loping through yards and heading in my direction when a jogger passed me on the other side of the street and then turned right at a T-intersection.
The dog saw the jogger and ran after her. I was relieved for myself and apprehensive for her. I watched as the dog reached her, sniffed around at her heels and generally made a nuisance of itself as she tried to go on her way.
Then he (for some reason I think of all dogs as 'he') lost interest and wandered off into another yard.

I continued on my way, and hadn't gone far when a little girl (I'd guess aged about 8) passed me going the other direction, calling her dog with loud yells of "Rusty! Rusty!" (Or maybe it was Buddy. Or Fluffy. Or Stumpy. I don't remember for sure. But if I remember Mark's stories correctly, Stumpy would be a good name for a dog in Wyoming.)

So I kept walking. Just as I was passing a guy working in his yard, helped by another little girl of about 6, I heard the "Rusty" calls again and looked back to see the dog running in my direction.

I picked a hefty stick from a pile of yard debris, just in case. Then I kept walking, but glancing over my shoulder frequently. The dog came right at me, I turned, prepared to whack it a good one across the mouth-

-and the dog veered off a little just as the guy in his yard also starts calling the dog, and I realized that the older girl and the dog both belong to him-

-and I walked a little farther and the dog came back, and I turned again, ready to whack it if it jumped on me-

- and both girls started crying and screaming because they thought I was going to hurt their dog, and the guy yelled for me not to hit it and kept telling me the dog wouldn't bite me'

-and I answered, still poised with the big stick, "You're damn right he won't bite me."

And then he managed to grab the dog collar and drag the dog away, giving me hefty doses of dirty looks. And I continued on my way.

Then tonight when I was getting out of my car, I decided to bring in the large assortment of books, CD's, etc. that had piled up in my backseat. I dropped a couple of things getting out. So I closed the door and bent over to pick the stuff up. I was moving very slowly so as to gather the dropped items without dropping even more, when suddenly I heard little jingling bells and something bumped my behind, and I jumped about 2 feet in the air as I saw a furry blur between my legs (insert dirty joke here).

Luckily, I was able to accurately assess the lack of danger before I administered a vicious kick, because the furry blur turned out to be two very small yellow Labradors. They were about as cute as it is possible for dogs to be.

The owner was in a nearby yard and the dogs had wandered off. He came over and we chatted for a while. The dogs were not quite 10 weeks old, and looked like this. I'm glad I didn't kick them.



I just hope the owner learns to keep them contained before they get bigger, because at the rate the clean-up is going, I bet in a year or two I'll still have no problem finding big sticks lying around.