the new republic

claire and winnie got into a fight. now she has this.
the night before jse and i left for philadelphia, i walked out to feed the dogs. the dogs were very excited to eat, as most dogs are, and winnie took off in the direction of the food. claire didn't like this and ran after winnie trying to subdue her. in the past, winnie has always calmed down when claire gets into her face but since the other dogs have moved in, the chemistry has changed.

winnie growled back. then they started fighting. the other dogs were watching intently (given one vulnerable dog, the surrounding dogs will also attack, says jse). i couldn't do much, since my agility has been severely handicapped due to my pregnancy. several times, winnie had claire on her back by the throat; i really thought i was about to watch my own dog get killed. i did what i could and finally jeremy, who was inside watching fox news, heard and came out to separate them.

claire was covered in blood. at first she wouldn't even let me touch her, and then after a while i examined her and found a gaping wound larger than a half dollar on her shoulder. jeremy came in and produced a black box, twice the size of one used for fishing tackle, and opened it to reveal an assortment of syringes, tools and vials of medication. she was too small for cattle tranquilizer, so he told me to hold her down so he could clean the wound. i tried, but was so traumatized i couldn't stop shaking and was of no use.

finally, jeremy's dad came over and held her down while jeremy scrubbed and sutured the wound, i have never heard a dog scream like that. i was in my room in the fetal position trying to distract myself by watching rachel zoe on youtube.

it was really terrible but i guess no matter how many human characteristics we assign to dogs, they're still dogs and are actually not human or human-like at all.

"do i really look like i could piss off another dog?" (the answer is yes, absolutely, most definitely)
i waited until now to post because the pictures were pretty gnarly and i like to keep this blog family-friendly.