Adventure

There's no real news on the adoption front, so I figured I'd entertain you with a story about my dog, Wallace. Thursday night he woke me up at 5AM with his barking. He doesn't usually bark at night, so I immediately jumped to worse case scenario and was convinced that someone was breaking in. I looked out the back window and saw him in the back corner of our yard barking at the neighbor's pine tree. I figured he had treed a big bird or squirrel or something (I'm not thinking particularly clearly at 5AM). I went back to bed. When I woke up about 3 hours later, I saw Wallace still sitting under the tree with his head up, and wagging his tail. Whatever animal it was, I felt a little sorry for it as my dog is persistent apparently unto death.

I let him into the house to play with Audrey. A few minutes later, he was frantic at the door. As Audrey says, "Wallace was freaking out." I didn't have my contacts in, but I figured I'd let him have some fun and re-tree the squirrel. Had I had my contacts in, however, I would have noticed the enormous opossum meandering out of the tree and on to our fence. As it was, I didn't notice the ugly thing until it was actually on my fence and it was too late.

My daughter and I were screaming at Wallace to come in, but he was like, "Forget you! I've waited 3 and 1/2 hours for this thing!" Our fence is 6-8 feet high, but Wallace was jumping with all his might to get the opossum, and his effort finally paid off. He grabbed it, shook it, and killed it. Then he happily jaunts back over to me, and instead of patting him on the head like he was anticipating, I shut the door in his face. There was NO WAY he was coming into my house after that - that was the most disgusting thing I've ever witnessed.

I made the appropriate phone calls to Todd's voicemail and to my vet. While I was convinced my dog was going to die, the vet assured me Wallace would be fine because he's had all his shots. The vet said to look his face over really carefully because if he had scratches on it, those would require antibiotics. Other than that I just have to monitor for parasites, but because the animal was alive, and not dead, the chance of him contracting parasites is slim. She did recommend that I keep him away from the animal because dogs sometimes like to go back to a kill and play with it (GROSS!). I could have probably just taken care of the opossum, but I was going to wait another 9 hours to let it decompose until Todd got home. I therefore put Wallace in our coop area with his water and food. I tried to look his face over, but every time I got down to examine him, he would try to kiss me, and that was horrifying to me, so I gave up. Todd could look at him when he got home!

I decided to call, Beep, my grandfather (don't ask why he's called Beep, no one knows). FYI, Beep's real name is Audrey and my grandmother's name is Elizabeth, although, I probably told you that already. Beep knows all about this sort of stuff. The first words out of his mouth were: "Are you sure it's dead?" I COMPLETELY forgot that opossums play dead! Beep said they're also pretty fierce, so don't go out to see if it was really dead or not. I said, "That actually won't be a problem. Audrey and I are quarantined in our house for the day." I'm not sure why we couldn't go out the front yard, but for whatever reason, in my mind all outside activity was forbidden! Sure enough, as I am talking to Beep, that stupid opossum gets up and is walking around my yard!! I started yelling at it to get it to get out of my herbs and raspberries. Audrey took a stick on the porch and banged on the windows and the sides of the wall to scare it away. Wallace, of course was going nuts in the coop. I felt for him, as he was tricked. As I finished my phone call with Beep, I realized that I had lost track of the opossum and couldn't see it anymore.

Todd called back and when I told him about the situation, his first words were, "Way to go Wallace!" Basically, "My dog's the man!" All the while I'm thinking, "My dog is the grossest thing EVER." When I told him that I couldn't find the opossum again, he said, "Let Wallace out, he'll find it." I said, "Are you crazy?! Then I have to relive this entire scenario AGAIN, and it's only 9:30AM, and I am done for the day! I am emotionally drained from this entire experience!" I did, however, let Wallace out when I left to go mentor my student from Kid's Hope. I figured that I wouldn't have to watch, and I wouldn't look outside when I got back. If Todd was so proud of his dog, he could go out and see if the opossum was still out there when he got home!

This kind of stuff is supposed to happen in the country, not in suburbia! When I saw the opossum walking around, I told Beep that I did wish I had my gun still, so I could shoot it. Beep reminded me that I was, in fact in the suburbs and couldn't just go shooting things. His suggestion: To take a long handled shovel and beat it to death! How is that better?!

The next night, I heard a few dogs barking in the same general area of the accursed pine tree that harbors disgusting animals unbiasedly. I immediately let Wallace in. No way was he going to have that kind of excitement ever again.