Perhaps inspired by GrodsCommenter Hip’s excoriation of ill-mannered yoof in a recent thread, I found myself doling out some more improvised justice yesterday afternoon, this time to a couple of punk teens at the local park.

Truth be told, I wasn’t in a good mood to begin with. About two minutes in to the walk, my dog bounded off to say “hai!” to a young boxer on a lead. It was an entirely friendly meeting, complete with mutual bum-sniffing and wagging tails. But since the boxer’s crabby-looking owner had a face like a puckered arsehole freshly buggered with a lemon wedge, I called my dog to come back — which he duly ignored.

As I walked over to grab my dog, who was still having a great old time with his new mate, the boxer’s owner glared at me. “Why don’t you try putting him on a lead?” she snarled.

And instead of pointing out that this is precisely how dogs socialise in a designated off-lead park, and that anyone who is uncomfortable about it should consider walking their precious mutt where leads are mandatory, I answered her question with another question: “Why don’t you go and fuck yourself?”

Thus was the tone set for the rest of the walk.

Before too long, I noticed a ruckus approaching and turned to find two boys in their early teens riding BMXs recklessly with large branches balanced on their handlebars — god only knows why.

“Gits,” I thought as they zoomed past.

Some way further along the path — which winds its way between a creek and a densely wooded area — I came around a bend and saw my dog sniffing at one of the BMXs, which had been abandoned on the creek side of the path.  I was a good 20 metres behind my dog at this stage, and at first couldn’t see where the kids had got to.

As I neared the bike and my dog, I heard some scuffling and saw some movement from among the trees — and suddenly noticed that the little bastards were hurling sticks and stones at my unsuspecting, defenceless pooch.

So I picked up the bike and threw it in the creek.

The other night, I let my dog out for a wee before bedtime. This is nothing unusual.

As soon as I’d opened the door, he raced down to the back fence. This isn’t unusual either, as there are possums on the fence every night and he can’t even begin to think about lifting a leg until he’s chased these voyeuristic marsupials away.

For a dog that sniffs young girls’ arses in parks, he’s surprisingly modest.

Anyway, what was unusual was the sound he began making after he’d run behind the shed in pursuit of one of these creatures. It was a cross between a bark, a yelp, a howl, an ambulance siren running on a fast-dying battery, and the gurgling shriek of outrage you’d hear from MK if his mummy ever found and destroyed his stash of limited-edition gay Nazi leftist porn.

I ran down to the corner of the yard and saw my dog staggering backwards, still making that horrible noise, dragging in front of him the most outrageous lip piercing I’ve ever seen: a fully grown and particularly pissed-off brush-tailed possum.

He couldn’t shake his head to force the to possum let go because it had a claw hooked right through his fleshy, dangly Weimaraner lip, which was clearly causing him a lot of pain. And the possum obviously had no intention of letting go until this brute stopped making that hellish racket.

There was only one thing I could do: I booted humanely encouraged the possum away from my dog, after which the possum skidded along the grass for a bit thanked me kindly and made his way up the nearest tree.

You’d think Weimar Rogenous would have a) learned his lesson, or b) been grateful for my intervention. Or maybe even both. Instead, he stood under the tree barking up at his attacker — fairly begging for another shot at it — until E came down from the house and dragged him inside so we could examine his wounds and put Betadine on them.

Dogs. Who’d have them? 

Things go from bad to worse for Doc Nelson (although was it already worse for him?):

“Ack! Get away from me, you spawn of Satan!”

Even Silko the Alsatian harbours a few doubts about embattled Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson.

[…]

Silko’s beaming owner was unperturbed. “Don’t worry, she’s a baby, she won’t hurt anyone,” he said, as the young pup thrashed around at the end of her lead, playfully nipping the ends of Dr Nelson’s fingers.

After the obligatory cuddly, feel-good animal photo opportunity — which Silko gracefully lapped up — the dog bounded away down the main street, her owner shaking his head.

“We didn’t expect that this morning, did we?” he said as he walked away.

Didn’t expect what? Doc Nelson’s visit (an extension of his Listening Tour, perhaps?), or the dog’s reaction against him? Could the dog smell something evil, perhaps?

Last night I was walking my dog around the local park, where there’s a soccer club and several pitches. A young women’s team was playing a practice match on one of them.

As we walked around this pitch, my dog noticed a player taking a breather from training. She was on the outside of the pitch, leaning her forearms on the waist-high fence and watching the match. He bounded off towards her, as he does when he sees anyone at the park — and as he’s a gentle, friendly hound, I saw no cause for concern.

Neither did the girl, at first. She turned around and gave him a quick pat on the head, then turned back to the match. And that’s when the trouble started.

Suddenly he registered an interesting scent. He began sniffing at the air around the oblivious victim, then gradually — cautiously — turned his attention to her legs.

I sensed strife but was about 20 metres away. I walked as briskly as possible towards them and began calling out to him to come to me — to no avail.

I was about five metres away by the time he threw caution to the wind and zeroed in on the source of the scent. And it wasn’t your dainty “what a lovely rose”-type sniffing either — it was like a vacuum cleaner sucking biscuit crumbs from between couch cushions.

It’s hard to say what startled her more — my yelling or a large dog’s snout up her arse. She was remarkably good-humoured about the incident, but I’m not sure who was more embarrassed as I clipped the lead on my dog, apologised profusely and dragged the dirty bastard away.

A short time later, when I’d judged that we were far enough away, I unclipped my dog’s lead — and, you guessed it, back he ran for one last desperate, lunging crack at her.

She was far less amused the second time around.