[NAGDU] Joys of Having a Retriever

[Tracy Carcione]

Eeoooo!  Oh, those retrievers!
Echo once brought me a dead squirrel in the backyard.  I could tell by her
prancing she had some treasure, and I called her and took hold of it to take
it out of her mouth.  She didn't hang on to it, so it was easy to take away.
Then I realized what I had hold of had fur and claws, and I threw it down in
disgust.  Then I took Echo in, and had to come back out with a bag and paper
towels and find where I'd thrown the thing down.  Yuk!
Tracy


-----Original Message-----
From: NAGDU [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Alysha via NAGDU
Sent: Saturday, March 26, 2016 7:50 PM
To: 'NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users'
Cc: Alysha
Subject: [NAGDU] Joys of Having a Retriever

Hi all,

OK, so I have to share an incident that happened to me and Xylon last week.
When I first brought Xylon home, he had a tendency to pick up lots of things
when I let him sniff around to park. I was always taking mulch, rocks,
sticks, etc. out of his mouth. He's gotten a lot better lately, so I've let
down my guard a little. I took him out for his lunchtime park the other day,
and he acted perfectly normal. But on the elevator on the way back up to my
office, he started smacking his lips like he was chewing on something. I
reached down to check his mouth, but it seemed like it was closed. I,
somewhat rhetorically, asked him what he was eating. Well, there was another
man in the elevator with me, and he answered me. "Oh, a dead bird." He
sounded so dead-pan that I didn't believe him! I kind of laughed and got off
at my floor. But on my way off the elevator, my foot brushed something on
the floor. I turned back to the guy and asked if Xylon had really been
eating something. He said yes, he had a dead bird. The man hadn't noticed
until I said something. Well, now panic was setting in. Was I going to have
to touch this bird? How could I get it off the elevator before the elevator
disappeared? The man suggested that I could pick it up with paper towels.
Looking back, I probably should have just used a poop bag, but I wasn't
thinking that clearly. So I ran to the bathroom to get the paper towels, but
by the time I got back, the elevator was long gone. Horrified by the thought
of people getting on this elevator to find a random dead bird inside, I
frantically pushed the call button. Unfortunately, every elevator in the
building except the right one opened! I eventually gave up and decided to
find the number for the custodial staff to see if they could take care of
it. When I got back to my lab and told a coworker what happened, she decided
to go look. We went back to the elevators, and the correct elevator showed
up on the first try, but there was no sign of the bird. Someone must have
picked it up, or maybe it wasn't dead after all. I guess I'll have to be
more vigilant at park times from now on!

 

Alysha

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