Deep Breathes


Well, that was a wasted evening. I should have known just to give it up when my evening started out with being turned away from the Red Cross - That alone should have told me that I should just go home, take a long shower, and go to bed early.

Of course I didn’t take the hint. Instead I went home and gathered up Dogger and took her to the park. I should have known to turn back when I saw the crowd hanging around the gate and my friend Eno on the ground being soothed .I should have taken the hint. I should have kept her on her leash. Dogger has the smoothest landing at the park when there aren’t a lot of other dogs gathered around the gate, I think it gets her over stimulated. It’s best for the both of us when she is able to make a quite entrance, if she can pee, sniff around a little and then go greet her fans - preferably at a hundred miles an hour ( all the better to burn off energy) When Dogger has to enter into a mass of dogs it never ends well. I should have known better but I stopped paying attention when I saw that Drama Dog wasn’t there. Next time I’ll know better.

We walked into a post-fight park. The dogs were all hyped up and the people were stressed and Dogger just dove right in or as it was humped right in. I pulled her off one dog only to have another dog start humping her. When Dogger turned to tell the other dog to hump off - it decided it didn’t like her tone of voice and one thing led to another. Other Dog is fine. I have scraped up knees and elbows where I hit the ground dragging Dogger off Other Dog. Other Dog squealed first so Dogger was the official aggressor, it didn’t matter who started it.

I don’t think it would have escalated like it did except for the previous fight. As I was bent over Other Dog, another woman also tending to the dogs hurt feelings mentioned it was the second “fight” since she had gotten there and she blamed it on the heat and the phase of the moon - until another dog person noted the moon was full Saturday.

Sigh. I guess I should be thankful that the only thing that Dogger hurt was Other Dogs feelings. Dogger doesn’t bite dogs she get’s into it with, she bulks them into submission. I was really surprised because lately Dogger has been really cowering away when other dogs tell her to step off, Other Dog has even scared her off in the past weeks as well. I think there was just a bad vibe in the air and she got carried away with it. I don’t think Other Dog would have reacted the same way either had there not just been a confrontation (Other Dogs people were thankfully very cool about it) I have noticed in the past that once there has been a dust up between dogs, that there mostly likely will be another. There’s just a lot of extra anxiety in the air and everyones on edge and the dogs pick up on it, and one thing leads to another... But damn, we were there for 10 minutes!, Dogger was just so excited to be there, we hadn’t been since Friday. Maybe I should start taking her over the weekends too?

After Dogger and I did the walk of shame out of the park ( we didn't have to go, I was just too embarressed to stay) my first thought was to take Dogger home and lock her in her crate while I went to Ross to undergo a little below-retail-therapy but then I thought better of it. Instead I took Dogger for our regular walk and then kept her outside with me while I did the watering. She did go right to bed though, no TV for her.