Posts Tagged ‘poetic justice’
Tables Turned
First of all, let me say that Delilah is experiencing some discomfort but we expect she will heal and be back to her old self soon. At the same time, the details of her latest incident of ‘dog bites dog’ involve a bit of poetic justice when considering her history of being the attacker in a previous fracas up at the lake.
This time, our heroine was the victim. The versions I have gleaned from Cyndie boil down to an unleashed dog sprinting up and landing a chomp of fangs into Delilah’s hindquarter as Cyndie and Delilah attempted to make haste for the relative safety of the main cabin.
The intriguing aspect of the attack is that the aggressor is essentially an out-of-town cousin of the dog who Delilah bit one year ago. Was this a dose of revenge? Does the dog world work that way?
It’s unlikely, but it fits too many movie scripts for the actions of human gangs that it flows naturally to correlate it with possible canine pack behavior.
Who can know what the conversations of remote barking might have been between all parties involved during the day, or two, running up to the “hit.”
[Barking] “I know who you are.”
“You’re not so tough!”
“This is for Gracie.”
Since Delilah was in her harness and being pulled forward by Cyndie, the conflict was one-sided, which may be a good thing. Delilah yelped at the bite, the neighbor arrived to take command of his dog, and Cyndie and Delilah hustled back to the house.
There was some blood, but through Delilah’s thick coat it was hard to know the extent of injury. With time, her mobility declined and Cyndie decided to race home a day early to have her seen by our local vet.
Yesterday afternoon, the doc shaved that hip and inspected the area to find three deep puncture wounds. No nerve or organ damage suspected. Treatment is two versions of pain killer –pain being what was limiting Delilah’s mobility– an anti-inflammatory, and an antibiotic.
It’s hard to guess whether the long term outcome will change Delilah’s perspective one way or another. Will she be less prone to behaving with aggression after this humbling interaction or become more distrusting of other dogs?
I’m wondering if she will now associate going to the lake with having been bitten.
For the time being, she looks a little meaner with her punk hair styling. It’s offset a little by her loopy pain-free drug-induced stupor, but that should wear off before the hair all grows back.
.
.
Paving Paradise
We are experimenting with a new way to improve a particularly wet and muddy portion of one trail through our woods. Originally, I was hoping we could simply cover it with wood chips. It worked for a while, but we haven’t been chipping branches frequently enough to produce the supply needed to cover all of our trails.
The piles of wood blocks that I have been pulling off pallets salvaged from the day-job are suddenly proving valuable. Instantly, we have gone from having too many of these lying around, to not having enough to cover the muddy lengths of trail that need the most help.
It is interesting to consider the path (no pun intended) these pieces of former trees have traveled. Somewhere, trees are cut down and milled into boards. Then the wood gets cut into these shapes and nailed to pallets. The company that manufactures the products we receive at the day-job mount their units onto the pallets for shipment and charge the end customer for the wood.
We have asked if they wanted the pallets returned for reuse, but like so many other things in today’s world, since already paid for, they apparently weren’t worth the trouble. We end up with perfectly good, single-use pallets out of brand-new wood, albeit with four odd blocks nailed to the tops.
I’ve been pulling the nails to remove the blocks and using the pallets as a floor in my wood shed and beneath stored hay in the hay shed. I also claimed boards off some pallets to build hay feeding boxes for the 4 stalls in the barn. All the while, the odd blocks that were removed have been piling up.
When Cyndie started looking into a boardwalk as a way to get up out of the mud on our trails, we landed on the idea of using the blocks. She wanted to add some words of inspiration and enlisted Anneliese to join her in creating the enhancements.
Yesterday we laid down the first test run. So far, so good. Only a couple more miles to go. I hope there will soon be a lot of new orders for that equipment at the day-job.
It is poetic justice that we’ve found a way to ultimately bring this pallet wood full-circle, placing it on a forest floor once again.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Relative Something 