[nagdu] Haas anyone ever gotten lost in their own yard?

Tamara Smith-Kinney tamara.8024 at comcast.net
Mon Apr 6 19:28:27 UTC 2009


Sherri,

Yikes!  I'm glad someone came along.  When it gets to head bumps and real
blood, that's true scariness because the danger is suddenly very real.  I'm
glad you're okay!  It sounds like you handled yourself really well.  I'm
impressed.

Tami Smith-Kinney

-----Original Message-----
From: nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Sherri
Sent: Sunday, April 05, 2009 11:15 PM
To: NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users
Subject: Re: [nagdu] Haas anyone ever gotten lost in their own yard?

Lost! Let me tell you about lost!

Once at an NFB convention, I think it was Charlotte, I got lost in the 
parking garage. Yes, the parking garage had boxes set up in it for us to 
relieve our dogs. We found the boxes all right, but when I went in the 
direction I thought the elevator was and told my dog to find the elevator or

the door out, or whatever it was we were looking for, she went way off 
course. It was awful, because again, it was really late at night. No cars 
were arriving or leaving. There were echoes everywhere and I had only taken 
her to relieve herself there once. Anyway, in my case, it was really scary, 
because she walked me towards the places where the cars go through. I am 
pretty tall and ended up bumping my head on this overhead cement gate or 
something that must go up and down to let the cars in. Anyway, you guessed 
it, started bleeding everywhere. Head wounds bleed a lot! I had nothing to 
stop it with but my hand. I really really started to panic. This was years 
before everyone had cell phones. I thought, "okay, you have to get ahold of 
yourself and just calm down or your going to bleed to death out here!" Then,

miracle of miracles, a car pulled in. I had no choice. I raised my hand and 
called for help. When they saw me, I'm sure they freaked out, but we got to 
the elevator. Guess what, it was about 20 feet in the opposite direction 
from which I had been traveling. Well, needless to say, my head wound was 
attended to and I am fine today, and after that, we didn't have a problem 
getting in from relieving my dog, but it was certainly a scary situation.
Sherri
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tamara Smith-Kinney" <tamara.8024 at comcast.net>
To: "'NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users'" 
<nagdu at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Sunday, April 05, 2009 5:26 PM
Subject: Re: [nagdu] Haas anyone ever gotten lost in their own yard?


> Allison,
>
> Oh, heck yeah!  The back yard, the house, the dog park, some strange yard
> with a wrought iron fence around it I didn't even know how I got into
> believing I was on the sidewalk...  /lol/  I characterize myself as a
> non-panicker, but I have caught myself doing some pretty ridiculous,
> panicky things like what you describe before I get it under control and
> regain enough of my senses to get back on track.  I always have to giggle 
> at
> myself because I find it so scary to be lost when I can't see.  OMG!  The
> horror!  When two seconds ago, I couldn't see, either, and that was just
> fine.  I really do giggle out loud, which makes feel even stupider, which
> makes it seem even more ridiculous, so I giggle...  Apparently, that's the
> point at which most people would sensibly burst into tears from the
> frustration, if from nothing else.  But me, I giggle.
>
> I did once spend about an hour lost at the dog park, wondering why Mitzi
> wasn't doing "find the gate" on leash.  Only I finally realized that she 
> was
> finding every gate all the way around several times over, only I thought I
> was facing a different direction and in another part of the park, so I
> didn't recognize the gate she was showing  me....  /lol/
>
> The funniest part is that I always feel real embarrassed when I'm lost and
> being stupid because I'm all in a dither.  OMG!  What if one of my friends
> is just watching me doing all this and being nutty and giggling at myself
> for being stupid and muttering to my dog...  How could I ever live it 
> down?
>
> Well, that time at the park, guess what?  One of my friends was watching 
> the
> entire time.  "I figured you wanted to figure it out for yourself," he 
> told
> me later.  "Took you long enough," he added wryly.  Was my face ever red
> over that one!
>
> I'm glad you could laugh at yourself the next day.  It's so scary at the
> time!  But then you look back from the victory of having made it out of 
> the
> abyss and back to familiar ground and realize that the real problem was 
> your
> own imagination....
>
> Also, as others have mentioned, some formal practice at leash guiding can
> come in real handy.  I heard of that one after I had started using it out 
> of
> necessity, then I did some formal work on it -- which means we now have 
> two
> styles of leash guiding.  Also, a jingle guide and a squeak guide...  Just
> don't ask.  My poodle is a complicated little lady, and my own sense of
> adventure tends to far outweight my actual sense, so we've come up with
> some, er, inventively adaptive techniques for exploring the great outdoors
> together.
>
> Tami Smith-Kinney
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
> Of Allison Nastoff
> Sent: Sunday, April 05, 2009 7:08 AM
> To: nagdu at nfbnet.org
> Subject: [nagdu] Haas anyone ever gotten lost in their own yard?
>
> Hi List,
> I had a rather frightening experience last night.  I was
> wondering if a similar experience has ever happened to any of
> you, or am I the most directionally challenged person in the
> history of humankind (grin).
> Usually, I can brag that Gilbert is a perfectly behaved dog.  He
> always obeys me, and when I take him out to relieve, I take him
> to his designated spot just off the porch in the grass, he does
> his business efficiently, and we go back into the house without
> incident.  But every once in a while, and it seems to be when
> snow has just melted, and there are all kinds of new currious
> scents, he will get so preoccupied with sniffing that he leads me
> far past his relieving area, and I get lost.  It has only
> happened twice, but last night was the most frightening because
> it was midnight and I was completely alone.  On top of that, I
> forgot to put my cell phone in my coat pocket, and I didn't even
> bring his harness so he could work me home if I got lost.  Living
> in the same house for 18 of my 19 years, you would think I should
> know the way around my own yard right?
> Anyway, I live in a rural suburban area with no sidewalks and a
> two acre yard.  I took Gilbert into the grass, and he peed like
> he was supposed to, but then he started walking and sniffing.  At
> first, I thought he was just sniffing out the perfect spot to
> poop, but after awhile when we started getting farther and
> farther from the house, I realized he was sniffing out of
> naughtiness, not looking for a place to poop.  I gave him a
> correction and tried to tell him firmly, "let's go home.  The
> trainer did recommend that I have Gilbert on a long leash when he
> relieves, but I prefer short leash because on long leash, it is
> harder to tell when he is squatting to poop, and harder to find
> it when he is done.
> I turned in what I thought was the direction of my house, and
> used an old trick I figured out when I used to get myself off the
> school bus and walk up the driveway.  I slapped my right leg with
> my hand, and the sound echoes off the house, thus leading me in
> the right direction.  What I didn't realize until last night
> though is that this echoe can also bounce off trees, so before I
> knew it, I was walking into a clump of trees.
> A huge weakness of mine is that I am a panicker, so when I
> realized that I had walked into a clump of trees, of course I
> panicked.  I ran in circles trying to pick up an echoe, and when
> I did hear one and follow it, I only went deeper into the trees.
> I tried shouting for help but no one heard me.  I tried waving my
> arms, but there was nobody outside, and even if there had been, I
> now realize they probaly wouldn't have been able to see me from
> where I was anyway.  I don't know how long I wandered in panick,
> but finally rational thinking did set in.  I realized that I
> could either camp out there all night, or calm down and retrace
> my steps.  I knew I was capable of the latter.  I told Gilbert to
> sit, took deep breaths, and realized that I could hear cars.  If
> I followed the sound of the distant cars, I would end up back at
> my driveway.  I turned around, ducked through the tree branches
> and followed the cars.  When I slapped my leg again, I heard the
> familiar echoe, and this time the echoe led me the right way.  I
> have never been so overjoyed to feel blacktop under my feet!
> Last night during the ordeal, I was on the verge of tears, but
> since all ended well, I can now reflect back and laugh.  If I
> made it home alive in the worst possible circumstances, getting
> lost on my college campus will be a piece of cake now.  And I
> also learned why cell phones were invented (grin).
> Allison and Gilbert
>
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