SAM and COCO.....FEBRUARY 19 2012......

They finally got to go rabbit hunting yesterday.  We had to wait until Sam had healed from her surgery, and yesterday and this coming Saturday are the last days of rabbit season until fall.

Steve arrived with his beagle, and Tim came, he takes one of our dogs.  So we have three guys and three dogs.  Jerry is downstairs putting on his hunting clothes, the dogs are at the window upstairs barking and howling, as they see the guys, the other dog, the guns, and they want OUT!!!

As soon as Jerry exited the garage, and started up around the house with the leashes, pandemonium broke lose.  Barking, howling, running back and forth from window to glass door, hitting the linoleum, crashing to the foor, jumping on the door, whining and fussing, barking and howling. 

Trust me, you don't want to be here.  I am hiding so they don't mow me down.  I manage to grab Sam by the collar so Jerry can open the door and get the leash on Coco, but he is wiggling, and trying to run outside,  it is like lassoing a tornado.  By this time Jerry is getting just a little riled up.

And the dogs, smart dogs that they are, realized they had pushed it to the limit, and finally sat down so they could be leashed.  They are shaking and quivering the entire time, leashes are on, they are practically dragging Jerry down through the yard.  Last thing I saw before collapsing was three guys in orange with three dogs on leashes heading for the woods.  I am exhausted.

All morning I could hear barking at different intervals, at times looking outside could see orange jackets on next hill.

A little after noon they returned.  The dogs were just barely walking, Jerry said that on the last run when they were called back Coco just sat down in front of Tim,  asking to have the leash put back on so he could go home.  Sam could hardly move.

They were 2 very tired, very happy dogs.  Rabbit hunting is their thing.  There were lots of gunshots, the guys all missed the rabbits. 

I wonder if I can find somewhere to go next Saturday.   Very very early next Saturday.  I don't know how many more days like yesterday I can survive. 

Jerry wiped off their muddy feet before he let them in the house, but they still had mud clear up past their elbows - do dogs have elbows? - and guess who got the clean up job.

They were in the laundry room slurping up water, so I took a bucket of warm sudsy water and washed their legs and feet, all the time they were drinking.  No easy task for me, after all they each have 4 legs and feet, and lots of mud.

I can't give them a regular bath, they are way too much for me.  Anyhoo I got the mud off, dried them off, and they crashed.  I do mean crashed.  Slept the rest of the day.  Got up long enough to eat supper, went back to sleep.  They weren't moving too well by that time.  Jerry put low dose aspirin in their dog food.  

When time to put them out before bedding them down for the night, I didn't think they were going to make it out and in.  They did.  Today they are moving pretty well.  By Saturday they will have forgotten how sore and tired they were and the whole process will be repeated.

And, so, what did you do yesterday.  Bet it wasn't as much fun as my yesterday. 

Have a good day and God Bless.