A fine mess you've gotten yourself into

SORRY, NO TANGLED-UP SHOTS.

No dog is better at getting tangled up than Lady; they can't be.

Shortly after we got Lady in late 2002, my wife Holly bought a long line so Lady could be put outside. I hooked her to a tree, and when I returned Lady was wrapped around the tree. She'd gone around and around and was so tangled up that I had to spend a few minutes freeing her.

Often, she'll wrap herself around the horseshoe pole, then go around the nearby butterfly bush and get herself in a fine mess.

Today, I went out to get her. When I called her, she got within 15 feet and stopped; it sounded like she was dragging something, so I went out to investigate. She'd wrapped her line around all four legs of a lawn chair and was pulling it along.

I went over to get her. When she was freed, she made a beeline to the kitchen door. No entanglements there.

NOTE: Lady passed on Sept. 17, 2016; that was just two weeks short of her unofficial 16th birthday. We got her Oct. 1, 2002.

Contact: I can be reached at tgilli52@gmail.com or nc3022@yahoo.com. Also, my Twitter handle is EDITORatWORK.

Other 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

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

More 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!