Miscellaneous Leftovers

I note that coyote attacks are once more an issue of front page importance in the Eagan newspaper. "Urban Coyotes" screams the paper, followed by a horrifying story about a ten year old Pembroke Welsh Corgi ("beloved family pet" - you never see "ignored" or "abused" coupled with "family pet" so why bother?) who was mauled by two hungry coyotes. The owner attempted to scare them away by beating on the window of the house, and eventually succeeded in driving them away when her son "opened the door".

My dog is in no such danger as I keep her penned up in a high-security puppy prison in the back yard between my shed and the neighbor's pine trees. If there's any doubt it's high security and pretty much coyote proof, one only has to examine the chain along the bottom to reinforce the edge, the two-deep layer of cinder blocks along two sides (shed on a third) which are held in place by rebar and shims, the three inches of sand coming over the top of the lower bar to help hold it in place, the 2/3 area red brick floor and the double layer of wood on the door held in place by nine screws. I could claim this was to protect my dog from coyotes, but mostly it's to keep her from getting out because she likes to chew threw things and hates her kennel (and I hate crap all over my yard, which seems to be the only real goal). I also bring it up because after a few months with no appreciable loss of ice/snow in the kennel, this weekend it pretty much melted away, leaving me with two solid inches of dog crap I had to 1.) clean up as much as possible with a pocketful of plastic baggies and a shovel, 2.) take a power washer to to break off the rest of the stuff that was frozen to the ground, and 3.) cover with 150# of new sand so that the "dog patty" that took up the back 1/3 of the kennel didn't find its way paw by paw into the house. I'd be annoyed about the sand, but it occurred to me that I pay about the same amount for "sand" each month just so my wife's cat can take a dump, so it's really not that much money twice a year (and it's only half as much as a month's worth of food).

However, Sandy is "beloved", as is evidenced by Eryn's new game of chasing her around, slapping her repeatedly on the ass and screaming "gotcha! gotcha! gotcha!", which I'm pretty sure she learned from watching Pooteewheet and me.