Weed whacked, scared and in pain

LADY ON A GOOD DAY

Today, a guy was weed-whacking around our house, and Lady was cowering behind me. She hates power tools.

And this reminded me of an incident from several years ago. Lady was in the dog cage that's up against the side of our house.  Someone was weed-whacking around the cage, and he got too close to Lady.

After he left, I noticed a strip of bare skin just above her front paw. He'd whacked off a patch of fur, and her skin looked the pink color of my skin.

We also had to take Lady to the vet and learned that she'd attacked the fence with her teeth; one was broken off and had to be removed.

A few years later, Josh cranked his weed whacker, and Lady immediately jumped at him in full attack mode. She wouldn't have hurt him, of course, partly because I was holding her leash, but the sound brought back a memory of pain.

Today, the sound just made her hide behind me. She's an old dog now.

NOTE: Lady passed on Sept. 17, 2016.

EMAIL: tgilli52@gmail.com  TWITTER: EDITORatWORK

More entries from The Dog Blog

• Katie cried

• Growl and pull

• ... said the spider to ...

, • The Dog Diary (2015)

• The Dog Diary (2014)

• 13-plus years with my dog Lady

• OOH! OOH! The stereophonic huskies

• What Lady and Michael Jackson had in common

Blog entries by Tom Gillispie

• Resume for a writer and editor

• An editor's views on powerful writing

• Advice for be and would-be novelists

• Links to TG's stories online

• Favorite quotes

• What I do when I'm editing

Anecdotes by Tom Gillispie

• Good Samaritan

• The PRESS cap and my friend Mike

• Watching TV

• No luck with Billy Sims

• Wipeout at Death Valley

• Days with rainbows

• A desperate writer working in the dark

• Yer outta there!

EDITOR@WORK blog entries

• You really DO need an editor

• Reminders for would-be novelists

• What I do when I'm editing

• What I charge (it's a deal) and what I edit

• Slogging through the Internet

• J-school: More eyes on your stories

• J-school: Go out and learn

• Rookie mistakes for magazine writers

Blog entries from The Auto Racing Journal

• Angel in Black: Remembering Dale Earnhardt Sr.

(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)

• Then Junior Said to Jeff...

(the book of great NASCAR stories)

• My best day as a sports writer

• Jeff Gordon's milk toast to Dale Earnhardt

• Wayne Auton: A life in racing