A woman's view of hunting…with men
guns, dogs and birds
Saturday morning at the dam. Charlie and Orso checked out all of the new smells.
Somebody was definitely here before us.
Charlie hot on the trail of a strange scent.
Orso suddenly remembered that he doesn’t particularly like swimming.
Both dogs enjoyed the morning outing.
It’s been almost four weeks since my surgery and according to my doctor, I’m healing nicely. He said that I’m to continue doing what I’ve been doing. Keep walking to a minimum, elevation and ice in the afternoon. I still can’t make my normal ten hour work days, but I hang in there for eight hours. I figure that’s pretty good, longer than some.
Bonus – I haven’t fallen for two weeks since I had a twofer in two days. That’s what I’m worried about. I know me too well. Grace is not my middle name. I can find more unique ways to cause injury to my body than the average person.
The dogs are getting more comfortable around my crutches too and that is a big cause for concern. Both have decided that the gap between the crutch and my body offers a great pass through, kind of like walking under a ladder. The only bad luck is mine, they won’t get hurt, but I will. They don’t care, they’ve seen me fall down before and it’s a great source of entertainment for them. I’ve seen them laughing at me.
The doctor has given me a monster sized black walking boot to try to minimize my use of the crutches. It took me four days to be able to shed the crutches and just use the Frankenstein boot. It’s big and clunky but now I can walk and carry a cup of coffee at the same time. WooHoo!
Things are looking optimistic, I can maneuver around better, help Mitch more and have a lot more freedom. So what’s the problem? I know me well. Now that I have more mobility, I know that it’s just a matter of time before I do something stupid, reach for something too high, turn too fast or get tripped up by the dogs and then it’s CRASH! I’m not being a pessimist, I’m actually being a realist, I just know me too well.
If you don’t believe me, ask Mitch, he’s walking around watching my every move, car keys close at hand waiting for the trip to the emergency room.
What is up with these two? Orso and Charlie are at it again. Once again they lulled me into a false sense of security thinking that they could be trusted to have the run of the house while home alone. I was sure that since AJ was gone that these two hooligans would behave without AJ to instigate raiding the pantry. And once again I was wrong. I should be used to being wrong.
I know that with my foot surgery things have been thrown off. Their routine has changed drastically. But it’s not like they are getting no exercise. We have our best friend coming over every day and walking the dogs, giving them lots of work and exercise. So what happened?
I came home from work and was greeted by Mitch telling me to go check the kitchen and see the gift that the two had left for us. Knowing that was not a good omen, I hobbled into the kitchen to find a mangled jar of my favorite local honey on the counter. Evidently someone, my guess, Orso jumped up on the table and snatched the bottle of honey off the table and chewed the top off to enjoy my honey. There was more than half gone. I hope he gets sick, but not in the house. But he won’t, he’s a Labrador retriever.
At dinner though we discovered another surprise. Mitch went to butter his baked potato and looked at me and asked where the butter was. Not on the table. We went on a butter tub hunt throughout the house, kind of like an Easter egg hunt. We searched under tables and dressers, under the bed and in the corners. No luck. The tub of butter has disappeared. No slimy smears, no bits of plastic about. Nothing, no clue, just no butter. It was as though a master cat burglar had come into the house stole the butter and disappeared without a trace.
Now comes the fun part, watching the dogs closely to make sure they don’t get sick. Poop watch, checking for bits of plastic, is so much fun and something I thought we were beyond now that AJ is not here. Wrong again.
Yesterday I posted pictures of Charlie. Today is Orso’s turn. He’s my big sweetie weighing in at 98 pounds. He’s kind of a goof ball, but that’s what makes him so endearing.
Orso is playing King of the Bed taking on all challengers
This was taken in December on our very frigid hunting trip.
Kind of a clown, daring the squirrel to come down.
Photos taken on my Canon Rebel
Charlie wants Mitch’s attention
Charlie full on trying to not fall asleep on Mitch’s back
He didn’t succeed. Mitch has a very comfortable back.
Poor Charlie, he’s having a bit of a struggle getting used to this total disruption into his world. Most dogs prefer a routine. They like a schedule, getting fed at a certain time every day, taking their walks at the same time daily and knowing that you’ll be there for loves are their whole world. Charlie is the poster dog for routineness. So these latest events, my surgery, Mitch walking the dogs alone in the evenings and our close friend walking them in the mornings and not at the usual 4:30am pre-surgery routine has thrown Charlie for a real loop.
He’s become clingier, staying very close to me or if I’m not in bed, laying in my spot. He has started growling at all of us. Charlie has always been a bit psychotic, but now he’s going round the bend. He was lying in his bed by the bedroom door when Orso walked in from the living room. Charlie growled at Orso and wouldn’t let him in the bedroom. Orso sat in the living room looking very pathetic waiting for me to get out of bed and crutch over to the doorway, blocking Charlie so that he could come into the bedroom.
Last night I came into the bedroom to find Charlie lying in my spot all cozy and had no intention of moving. I told him to go and nudged him, he responded by growling at me. I looked down at him and thought, “Are you kidding me? Not me! Huh uh!” So I told him “off” in no uncertain terms and gave him another nudge, to which Charlie responded by getting up, giving me a deep open throated growl, jumped off the bed and when to sit in his dog bed looking very unrepentant. I’m pretty sure that he was thinking, “How dare she make me move. I was there first.” I think he was plotting to eat me in the night while I slept.
Charlie doesn’t handle change well and this is clearly apparent with his behavior. When we brought Orso home for the first time Charlie wanted to kill him and tried a few times. That took hiring an animal behaviorist to get back to a harmonious house. I’m not sure how to fix this new wrinkle. I’m at a total loss.
Short of tranquilizers, for him not me, I am not sure what to do.
Charlie is making sure nobody gets close to my foot. I just hope he doesn’t change positions.
My knee scooter was delivered yesterday, a device designed to help me stay mobile without putting any weight on my foot. I have tried to preplan for everything knowing I wouldn’t be able to walk for three months. I bought extra skirts to wear, figuring that trying to pull slacks on over this big honking bandage would be a bit of a challenge. I waited for the weather to warm up before having the surgery so my naked toes wouldn’t get cold in the snow. I bought a backpack to be able to haul everything so that my purse wouldn’t slip off my shoulder throwing me off balance and causing me to crash and burn. Or as Mitch describes it, that “Black Hole” I carry around.
I decided not to put in a garden this year because Mitch would be doing most of the work for three months. I know that the harvest won’t be until August or September, but I figure that he has enough to do without me unnecessarily adding to it. I have friends coming to walk the dogs in the morning while Mitch is at work so the heathens don’t get short changed.
My doctor had described the scooter as small, lightweight and collapsible so I figured that I would break it down and hook it to my backpack and drag it up the stairs with me while using my crutches. You see, coming and going in and out of our home involves stairs. Even though we live in a ranch style house, there are stairs going up to the garage to get in the car. There are stairs going down to the street to get the mail and daily paper. There are stairs to go out to the yard, just to enjoy a bit of fresh air. That’s because our house was built into the side of a hill. Stairs everywhere.
So much for preplanning, this is the Hemi of scooters. It’s very nice, don’t get me wrong, sturdy, padded knee pad, hand brakes left and right and pre-adjusted to my height. But small and lightweight it is not! This thing is huge. I am not going to be strapping it onto my back and hauling it around. Now I have figure out how to get it and me up the stairs to get it in the car, out of the car and up the two flights of stairs at work.
So much for trying to preplan.
I live with a serial killer. Although I’m not afraid for myself, others should be terrified. I’ve watched enough episodes of Criminal Minds to know how to profile this serial killer. Serial killers torture and kill small animals. That fits him to a tee. He is remorseless. He lives for the kill. He loves to stalk, capture and murder squirrels, rabbits and moles, killing them with a viciousness only a true murderer can master. This killer especially loves to hunt and kill lizards and snakes. Charlie will stand motionless for minutes listening and staring intently at one spot waiting for some slight noise or movement. As soon as the victim makes any sound or movement Charlie strikes with lightning speed and deadly accuracy, snatching the hapless reptile up, shaking the life out of the snake then slamming it to the ground for good measure. How he does that always surprises me, those lizards are fast. Who would think a dog would enjoy catching and killing snakes? Most snakes move pretty fast and disappear in the rocks. His speed of execution is poetry in motion. Deadly fluid poetry none the less.
Charlie will run down squirrels and rabbits, snatching them up on the fly, shaking and slamming the animal to the ground. He will do this repeatedly until the poor creature is dead or wishes he was. The mark of a true killer. Moles are a particularly favorite victim of his. I’m not sure if he hears the moles in the ground or smells them, but he will stand stock still for a moment, then start digging and without fail pull a mole out of the ground to torture and kill. Charlie feels that it’s his purpose in life to rid the world of moles, snakes and lizards. The moles I don’t care about, because of the damage done to our yard. We even have friends that want us to rent him out to them.
I can see the ads now, “Serial Killer for Rent” “Mole Assassin for Hire” or “You Got Varmints – We Got Charlie, The Serial Killer”.
We disturbed a very large bird from its’ perch on top of a power line.
I didn’t get a good look at before it flew off, but it was big.
Charlie was busy hunting in a dead cattail marsh.
The creeks are still very low. Pretty but we need more rain.
Orso coudn’t get enough running around.
It was a beautiful morning just after sunshine. The dogs didn’t
stop running the whole time. They had so much fun, they didn’t really
even mind getting a bath when we got home.
Now I have tired happy and clean babies.
A great start for an early Spring Sunday morning.
These photos were taken with my Canon using a 55-250mm lens.
A woman's view of hunting...with men 