[NOTE THAT MY EMAIL HAS BEEN DOWN THE LAST 24 HOURS. I’m a TERRIBLE correspondent, that’s TERRIBLE, so lack of return-electron reply is not surprising but if you’ve tried to contact me & it’s bounced or behaved strangely, that’s why. & yes, Blogdad is going to move me away from these bozos as soon as system is, you know, movable. But, meanwhile, MORE ARRRRRRGH.]
Genghis & I had an encounter last night. Not in a good way.
We were steaming down one of the little streets here after dark, although this time of year in Scotland we have about forty-five minutes daylight anyway, Scotland doesn’t have very many disadvantages* but sunlight in winter, lack of, is one of them.** So I had my head kind of down, keeping an eye on the uneven paving stones, because we were at full galumph, where my legs are stretching to exhaustive as well as exhausting extent every stride & I don’t have any stretch left for lifting my big clumsy All-Star-clad feet over obstacles.*** I was aware that there were two probably-women-by-shape-of-their-coats-it’s-dark coming toward us because I try to be Very Aware of anything or anybody the Mongol Horde might take an interest in. So as we approached I grappled him back to short lead. The two, now definitely identifiable as women, were ambling, & stopping occasionally to look behind them. I could now see that there was an off lead black Lab ambling after them. No matter. I had Genghis by the collar & we were giving it plenty of room.
& THEN IT SUDDENLY LOST ITS RAG & CAME HURTLING TOWARD US BARKING & SNARLING.
Just by the way, it’s interesting about Genghis. He is such a sap, & he’s seven years old & still dubs around the house like a puppy, including lying upside down in my lap (as much of him as will fit) & waving his legs in the air, which, when I’m zooming with a friend, has been known to set friend off in gales of wild laughter when a Dog Leg emerges from the lower horizon of the zoom frame. He is the least dominant of dogs, with me, at home. But if some mutt gets in his face when we’re out he stands forward—dragging me with my hand through his collar—& basically says, Try it, chump.†
In this case I yelled HEY!!!, in my most aggressive manner & the Lab dropped back—I suspect more from Genghis than me—& then as we were about to stand down the wretched thing turned on us & started all over again.
The women just stood there.
I was, as it happens, plugged in.†† So if they started twittering at me I wouldn’t have heard them. The point as far as I’m concerned is that THEY DIDN’T DO A SODDING DOODAH THING. They could have put the brute back on lead when they saw Genghis & me coming. They could have made a dive for the creature when it went for us. They could have done something BESIDES JUST STAND THERE when it had a second go.
I shouted, THAT IS NOT OKAY!!!!! & they just looked at me. They may have wrung their hands. They were likely the hang-wringing type. Genghis & I didn’t stick around to observe.
WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH PEOPLE??? It’s not like this is the first time this kind of thing has happened, nor will it be the last. This is just one of the concomitants to life with dog or dogs. & it isn’t one that gets in the dog books much either.
* * *
* Okay my idea of disadvantages. Your mileage may vary. For example the absence of a world-class opera company is probably not on your list. I’ve only been re-blogging how many days & I’ve managed to ref Verdi twice, I think? You figure it out.
** Daylight is really crazy here. You Americans, you have no idea. I remember on that first tourist tour^, we got as far north as the Lakes in England, & it was midsummer, & it was still twilight at 10 pm & we felt as if we were on another planet. Now add a couple hundred more miles north. We barely have night in midsummer here, &, in the dead of winter, we barely have day. & the speed it riots up or down nearly gives you whiplash—about twenty minutes a day. This does mean when we finally careen screaming around the curve of the 21st of December you start noticing those daily twenty minutes more really fast too. I don’t care how much vitamin D you take, your skin wants sunlight. & whatever colour your skin is, it gets its version of pasty if it is denied for too long. I don’t know how the Scandinavians do it.
But I remember when I first moved over here, my tiny unscientific mind was somehow not at all prepared for even the frelling south of England, where the climate is tame, to have much more dramatic sunlight than Maine. Maine’s climate is so much fiercer, including colder winters & hotter summers, shouldn’t we have lunatic daylight too? . . . but England has the Gulf Stream.^^ ::tiny unscientific brain attempting to recalibrate:: We also had northern sun & startling day length changes, even in Hampshire, because even in Hampshire we’re a lot farther north. The sound you now hear is tiny unscientific brain trying not to short out. CRINKLE CRINKLE ZAP. & then Scotland. I’m not entirely joking, it really does feel like I must be on some other planet. Where the climate, or the local star, or something, is engaging with you. Day length isn’t just background here. It’s a leading character in the stage play of your life. But then what was I just saying about the drawback to a fantasy-oriented imagination making it difficult for the mind it inhabits to differentiate reality from ha ha ha? I have probably too little problem imagining that the Daylight Fairies are trying to have a conversation with any human off piste enough to listen.
^ See new bio
^^ So far. If global warming trashes the Gulf Stream, as some of the doomsayers declare it will, I will need several GWHPs to keep me warm. SEVERAL?!?!? No no no no no no!!!!!!
*** Mr Ex-Pug said that he used to run with his previous generation of GWHPs. This is my idea of a death wish. Every dog I’ve ever spent time with has had its own unique talent for getting between your legs, but Genghis has developed this to a perilous new art form. His secret weapon is that he is mostly leg. Sighthounds are usually long bodied to go with the long legs. I don’t know about the breed generally but Genghis is short-bodied & ENORMOUSLY long legged with GIANT WHIRLING PAWS at the end of each of those legs. Of which there are at least nine.
† If I’m in a bad mood some day^ I will tell you about our confrontation with the Chow. Those are not dogs you want to have confrontations with.^^
^ Bad mood??? Moi? Laid back, easy going little moi?
^^ Yorkies do have their advantages. A Yorkie in a strop you can pick up.
†† Okay, as it usually happens. Long daylight^ walks, I’m usually listening to a book on Audible. Shorter nighttime walks, I’m usually listening to music. Last night, Il Trittico by Puccini. What was I just saying about opera?
^ sic