It was hard to believe under skies like this, that Walter would make an appearance outside. It took him a while as these photos are in order they were taken. 65°, warm and windy when I opened the door to let hounds outside for the first time. It was darker than this at the time, a little before 6:00am.
Winters down here in "the tropics" are a little different than cities and towns in other parts of the state. We are actually further south than Louisville and much further south than St Louis. So the big storm predicted for Wednesday will blow by north of us and we will have high's in the 70's tomorrow and Thursday. The hounds love it and so does the dog. They spent most of their day outside on Monday. Henry and Watson had great walks with Samson Watson having quite the test to show me how good he is.
The Sunday afternoon was a nice 58° and all of us were in a deep siesta, when I woke to hear the doorbell ring and two hounds and a dog were sprinting down the hallway to the front living room windows to see who was visiting. That included a lot of barking as usual. As I leaned over to look through the lower glass of the door, it was a girl holding a menu for Girl Scout Cookies.
Hard to believe it was a week ago tonight where a lot of things changed around here. It's going to take a pretty long time to forget it. The two previous owners of Samson and I have analyzed, talked and asked many questions. All of us have second guessed what we did, then why we did it. Thanks to Lynn and another reader that commented, all three of us had a better understanding on what happened with Samson. In hindsight, there were some red flags after we read about "rage syndrome". There is a lot of moving pieces to that puzzle, all with a sad ending.
That's the question Walter is asking, "is it spring yet'. All signs are there. 69° just a couple of days ago before he had an inch of rain, flooding the backyard again. Temps are to be warm again the next few days. Plus he spent some time this past week sleeping in the hot sun on the patio deck. He is just curious. He did go outside first thing Thursday morning after hit has rained all night. He even slide outside between rains later in the day. He was feeling pretty good after he had a fresh bowl of water without any hound drool floating around in it. He hates that and refuse to drink until he gets a clean bowl.
Combined with great weather, warm enough to spend time outside, and my hand healing with no problems so far ... things are good. Sad but good. I realized Sunday morning I must have been in shock Saturday night and possibly the reason that the officer said I was the calmest person of his three dog bite calls that night. Since that time I have sorted and analyzed what happened. Why did I call animal control so fast after I walked back inside from the garage? I have second guessed myself on making the call until I remember how he acted towards me and the two control officers. There was a reason they shot him with a tranquilizer.
That 1% I spoke of 10 days ago happened Saturday night. Unprovoked. It was halftime of the IU game and I had gotten up walking this direction, planning to make a right turn down the hallway to the bathroom. Just as I stepped on that wood I heard a loud ATTACK bark growl and when I turned left to see what was going on, Samson lunged at me. The worse attack mode I have ever seen a dog in. You can see the kitchen table moved to the right. That must have happened as I struggled to get out of his grip ... and trying to get away from him. I was backing up through the kitchen fighting him off hoping to get to the garage and shut the door.
The temps increased from 29° early in the morning to 47° by early afternoon. That mean a lot of backyard hound play and walks for all three of them. I tried but Walter has zero interest in going out to walk, although without a leash he will walk with me to the mailbox. He waits on the driveway while I walk across the street to get my mail. Nothing but photos after this. IU game at 5pm but I will be out on the patio enjoying this weather as long as I can.
