Canadian Goose – Santee, CA

On Karma and Ruthi’s morning walk, they saw a Canadian Goose hunkered down near the tires of a truck in one of the sites. Ruthi was guessing that it might be a family pet. Heck, there is a family with a pet pig, Watson, in the park; so, why not a goose? As Ruthi and Karma tried to get by the goose and continue on their walk, the goose began coming at them in attack mode. Karma of course being so brave, she immediately hid behind Ruthi.

Ruthi didn’t have anything to shake at the goose to distract or scare it. So, the goose is coming at her and Karma is cowering behind her. Ruthi started talking to the goose while the goose honked and honked at her. It sounded like maybe the goose had something caught in the throat. The goose did not get to them but had a boundary that Ruthi understood not to cross.

Ruthi talked to the office and they said that the goose had been in the park a few days. Ruthi and Karma did see the goose a couple more times with no confrontations. Usually the goose hung out by the rear tires of vehicles in various sites.

Pile of Wood – Santee, CA

When campers leave their sites after a wonderful week-end at Santee Lakes, they leave behind items, some more useful than others. We had been out late and fed Karma after sunset. While Ruthi and Karma were walking, Karma suddenly went into aggression mode. She saw something ahead on the roadway that needed to be attended to.

Ruthi couldn’t see whatever it was. She swept her light left and right and it did not reflect off the eyes of any animal. Coyotes and raccoons roam the park night and day. Ruthi was concerned that Karma’s reaction was warranted and she couldn’t determine what it might be. They continued slowly towards the grass area for Karma to do her “business” and they could return home.

As they approached a particular site, Karma became more frantic and then Ruthi saw what was setting Karma off. There at the end of the site was a pile of fire wood that in the dark had a shadow similar to a large raccoon. Karma carefully approached the wood and eventually sniffed around and around. Finally, she determined it was safe to pass and no longer was frightened.

Karma’s Surgery – Santee, CA

We had discovered bumps on Karma’s body. Some were the normal fatty masses that dogs get as they age. With Karma at 10 years old that is not unusual. But a couple of the spots were hard and kind of crusty. So, while she was getting her teeth cleaned and was already under anesthesia, we had the vet remove them and send them off to a lab for analysis.

The results indicated that while one of the spots was benign the other was a low level of cancer that did not appear to have metastasized anywhere. The vet felt they has gotten all of the “spot.” She suggested that at Karma’s next teeth cleaning in the fall, we might want to have her chest x-rayed as a follow up.

So her is Karma with her air bag instead of an Elizabethan collar to keep her from attacking stitches on her right shoulder and just below her left eye.

Home Depot Parking Lot – El Cajon, CA

Boots went out to get the truck from its parking place and pick up Ruthi at Home Depot’s exit. When she pulled out of the space she heard loud clanging on her right (passenger side). She stopped the truck and got out to see what had happened. The front bumper and grill on the car next to the truck had fallen off and crashed to the ground. Initially, Boots assumed that she must have hit the car getting out of the parking space.

She called Ruthi to let her know that there was a delay and she would need to walk out to the truck. Meanwhile, Boots asked people approaching the area if the car was theirs. She even went into Home Depot and had them do a PA announcement. When Ruthi got there they began to seriously examine the car and related damage. Since the truck was blocking traffic in the lane, Boots moved the truck to another slot.

We waited and waited for the owner to show up and no one did. We took numerous photos (for evidence, you know). Upon further examination of all the parts and pieces of the car; it became apparent that the truck did not cause the damage. It clearly showed that the damage was old and the pieces had debris where there used to be connectors between the pieces.

So, now the dilemma – what do we do: 1) leave a note or 2) just drive off. Luckily, a Home Depot security guard arrived on the scene and helped us make the decision to just leave. He agreed with us that the damage was old and not caused by anything our truck did today. He even suggested that sometimes these cars are set up to fall apart as a scam for money. PHEW!