The Dog and the Dynamite

Can't seem to find a picture of Beethoven,

so here is Tucker, his mentor (taught him to eat rocks) and partner in crime.

****This post is for Jinglebob, with apologies to those of you who have already heard it.

See about ten years ago the state made a real mess rebuilt the road from here to town and did town over too.

It was pretty ugly. Businesses went out of business because folks couldn't get to their doors over the holes and mud and destruction. We lived down in town then and came here to work each day. During that time, getting there was a lot more than half the hassle fun

The project took about half of our front pasture for fill under eminent domain, which required that they work right in front of the driveways. Some days between the flag men between here and home and the workers in our yards and roads it took an hour to travel in either direction...a mere mile.

At the time we had the huge monster of a dog described in the last post. He was a friendly sort and loved the excitement. After a while the workers came to like him too and fed him sammiches and played fetch with him.... but that was later.

One fine morning the boss and I headed home for breakfast after chores. The foreman of the job warned us as we went down the barn driveway that there would be a short delay due to them having to blow up more of our pasture. Okay, that would just about leave us time to run home and eat and get back to work. So we threaded our way through the mile of traffic cones and bull dozers and dozing flag folks, ate and headed back to work.

Alas, by then no traffic was being permitted up this side of the valley. 5S was closed. The Thruway was closed. Nothing was moving. People were fuming and thumping steering wheels in grid lock that would have fit in fine in Los Angeles. We joined the parking lot.....and we sat and sat and sat. Time moves differently in a car while waiting....we waited a very long time.

Finally, hours later, we were permitted to return to the farm.

And there we heard....the rest of the story.

Seems the construction fellas put their charges out, all along the cliff in the pasture, in order to blow up more of that good old slate and dirt that used to grow grass for our cows.

And seems that our 120-pound big black dog went out and sat down on one of the charges, calmly contemplating the view out over the river. He had hung around cows long enough to learn how to ruminate real well. He ruminated while perusing his domain.

And every time one of the workers went out to try to shift him, he raised his upper lip and rumbled.... just a little. (He was one of those "smiler" dogs who grins at you, showing lots of fang. It looks like snarling to some.)

Stalemate.

Very long stalemate.

Time is money so eventually the head guy, who was a bit of a dog person, went out and took the old boy by his collar and led him out of the way.

Boom! And all was well....well except for the pasture, which is now mostly located about a half a mile away under the new road.

We had a good laugh, over it, although we didn't get much done that day (neither did they) and I got a good column out of it.

When the old dog passed away the boss buried him out on what was left of the bank where he stopped progress......and several dozen construction workers...and an Interstate and a state road and a couple of busy farmers....dead in their tracks.

I always admired that dog....