A woman's view of hunting…with men
guns, dogs and birds
Haunting
Your eyes haunt my soul
Your lips tantalize my skin
Your touch makes me quiver
Your words break my heart.
My tears blind me
My lips grow cold
My skin stiffens
My brain tells me to run.
The treachery and lies
Spill from your lips
The truth is in your gaze
Eyes cold and hard.
These are some photos that I took on our walk this morning just after sunrise. I would have taken more, but in my haste to grab the camera and dogs, I didn’t check the battery and guess what, the battery died after just a few pictures. I was so bummed.
Sunrise clouds
Some areas of the lake that are not frozen, silly geese
Don’t they know it’s too cold to go swimming?
Clouds pretty in pink
Poor lonely dock, there will be no dock diving for awhile
You can see the reflection of the sunrise on the ice of the frozen lake
Photos taken by Susan Kelly
What is it about snow that makes a seven year old dog think he is a one year old puppy again? We had about two inches of snow the other night, but the streets had been cleared making it easy to walk the dogs. I took the dogs on a walk and both acted like perfect gentlemen as we left the house and walked down the street. All three of us were on the lookout for deer or other wild animals in the dark. Charlie and Orso, because they want to chase something anything, me, because I don’t walk to get my arms ripped out of their sockets or knocked off my feet and slammed to the pavement left to freeze in the dark. I know, pretty selfish on my part, but I’m the one with the house key.
Everything was nice and peaceful, a great walk all the way to the dam. On the way back I spotted three deer standing in a yard up on the hill, but lucky for me the wind was blowing the other direction so the dogs didn’t pick up their scent. We walked past them, with the dogs oblivious and the deer stood very still waiting for us to get beyond them. Both dogs sniffed and peed on just about everything they could all the way back.
Just as we got back to our driveway, which hadn’t been shoveled yet, Orso decided that he was twelve months old again and spun around in a circle and jumped at Charlie for a full on tag team match, leaving me on the ground with my feet sticking out in front of me. Luckily I went down on my rear end and not on my face or we would have had dog stew for dinner. Orso turned around looking a bit contrite, not too contrite but a little and when he realized I wasn’t dead he turned back to Charlie for a snow romp. I let go of the leash too late to save myself but in time to not get dragged into a chest bumping dog wrestling match.
It took me ten minutes to get them back under control and into the house. It seems Charlie can still act like a puppy too when the mood strikes him.
Dawn
Morning mists rising from the lake
Soft sounds a bird calling
Dew on the grass
Leaves the trail of trespassers.
The night sky turns red
As dawn breaks
A sliver of light
On the horizon.
Dappled light breaking
Through the trees
Casting shadows
On the forest floor.
Merry Christmas from Orso, Charlie and me. Mitch too.
Sunday playing in the snow. We got about 3 inches of snow, not bad and the dogs love it.
Charlie clearly enjoying the snow
A frozen lake
Orso on the hunt for frozen goose poop. So gross.
Charlie always hunting.
The other day I shot my mouth off and said how much I love the hustle and bustle of the holidays, but that was before we went to Toys R Us. That store is only for the strong at heart, not amateurs like Mitch and me. The store was packed and the game of the day was avoiding being run down by mad shoppers pushing carts insanely about in search of the perfect toy. We were there to shop for our four granddaughters four years old down to one year old. I stood there looking very glassy eyed at all the options, while Mitch totally overloaded wandered off with a blank look on his face.
I walked down aisles and aisles of dolls, books and toys based on age looking very shell shocked. Did they already have this doll or was this toy too young or too old? I was in way over my head. I looked around for help from Mitch and he was gone. Off I went to try and find him, thinking maybe he had a stroke of brilliance and was getting the perfect gifts. I finally found him in the Star Wars section playing with light sabers and full size storm troopers. My nine year old boy had come out to play just when I needed adult help.
I reminded him that we were there for girl gifts and he wasn’t helping. I forced him to break away from the boy side of the store and tried to make our way back to the girl side fighting shoppers and their carts. Once again Mitch’s attention was drawn to a display of stick ball bats. I didn’t even know they made stick ball bats. He suggested that we buy one for each little girl and it could be “survival of the fittest”. I reminded him again that we were dealing with little girls and that the bats were taller than the girls.
After an hour of wandering up and down aisles, we finally came away with hopefully gifts that will get oohed and awed. I had no idea that Christmas shopping could be a full contact sport. Boy do I need a drink.
One of the downsides to Orso is that he drools, not a little oh no, he drools like a Saint Bernard. Sometimes I am not so sure that the breeder who sold him to kid that we rescued Orso from didn’t sell him a bill of goods. Chocolate lab my eye, this dog has all of the saliva glands of a Mastiff or other wet mouth breed. I am constantly doing walk throughs in the every room of the house looking for his drool shrapnel hits. He drools all the time. He also loves to get close and touch me leaving very large slobber marks on my sleeve or pant leg. So gross.
This morning on our walk in nine degree weather, I noticed something hanging from Orso’s mouth. At first I thought he had picked up a stick and was carrying it home to chew on later. It was hard to make out what it was exactly in the dark so I kept walking the dogs and watching. When we got back home and standing under porch light I got a good look at the five inch long frozen drool hanging from his mouth like an icicle on a house.
Any day now he is going magically change into a Mastiff I just know it.
I must be getting old. I’ve never been a super big fan of the cold, preferring to stay inside bundled up with about a hundred layers. I make the effort to take the dogs on their walks like a dedicated pet owner, but if there was a way to get them to hold it until say, March I wouldn’t complain. Of course that isn’t possible so I put on multiple layers and go tromping outside. But it is definitely not fun, since the temperatures have been bitterly cold the last few days with highs in the teens.
The up side is that both of the dogs are getting old too. Orso is now seven and Charlie is a senior citizen at nine. Neither one of them is too enamored with hanging outside too long. Charlie has short hair and gets cold quick and Orso is just a big sissy. This morning our first outing consisted of running outside after breakfast for a quick trot around the yard to do their business and a mad dash to get back inside where it was warm and carrots were waiting as treats. The second outing was later than usual around ten am, with us holding out hope for a heat wave, (didn’t happen), but at least the snow was very light by then. The temperature had warmed up to a sultry eighteen degrees Fahrenheit.
I had on a tee shirt, a flannel shirt, micro fleece jacket and a lined parka and that was just on the upper half of my body. The lower half I had on sweat pants and insulated wind pants, which work very well for keeping my legs warm and the wind out, I just swish when I walk. I even wore silk glove liners and down leather mittens. I am the bigger sissy here and I’m not afraid to admit it. I think it took longer to get dressed than it took for the walk. We did not dally on the walk, it was walk, get to the task at hand and get back home.
The third outing after they ate dinner was pretty much a repeat of the second outing, with me looking like a chunky monkey dressed in a gazillion layers with a drippy nose from the cold. Why couldn’t they have been litter trained like a cat? More importantly why don’t we live some place warmer?
While I’m home recovering from surgery, I thought it would be the perfect time to take my Christmas Card photos of Charlie and Orso and get the cards ordered. Well I forgot the most important part of the whole task. You have to have dogs that will sit still and pose for me. Those two can be quite difficult when they want to be. It’s doesn’t help not having good range of motion on my part, but I think they were being cantankerous on purpose. Stinkers! Anyway below are some of the faces the brats made for me.
Charlie is definitely not happy to be part of picture.
Charlie with the crazy eye look he gives us all the time.
Orso – what more can I say?
Orso trying to get me his best face, what a goof.
Photos taken with my Canon Rebel
A woman's view of hunting...with men 