Dog Bites Man

Strange what constitutes an occupational injury. Yesterday afternoon I inadvertently stuck my hand right where a dogfight was about to break out, and got it shredded by a wayward adolescent boxer. Lulu wasn't hurt, fortunately. I think my hand got the message intended for her. It bled all over the place, and you can tell where my priorities were—I drove myself to the hospital and didn't get a drop of blood in the car. They gave me a tetanus shot, filled me with antibiotics, and applied an impressive-looking bandage. No stitches—all puncture wounds—but it's painful, and I am finding it difficult to type. I will just have to be uncharacteristically pithy, rather than my usual prolix self. Although I do have a nice piece to post as soon as I can get it ready. It just might take longer than planned.

I will not be able to answer emails very readily, either, unfortunately.

Mike

Featured Comment by David: "As a former USAF dog handler, I've had the experience of being bitten a number of times. The bites were almost always much more painful in the hours and night following. I am amazed that you can type at all. That is dedication."

Mike replies: It was surprisingly painful. I'm typing almost entirely with my left hand! And I'm a slow typist with both hands. The pain is much better today, although my hand is very swollen.

Comments

[David]

use your mac's voice feature?

[Hugh Look]

Best wishes for a swift and full recovery, Mike.

[amcananey]

Perhaps you need to follow Ctein's example and give MacSpeech a try? You may be able to get a reviewer copy...

Best,
Adam

[Cateto/Jose]

I hope it is nothing serious, Mike.

Get well soon and enjoy music meanwhile: the play button can be pressed with any finger. ;-)

[Gary Haigh]

Get well soon Mike.

Gary

Oz

[Christopher]

Are you sure you wont be able to comment to comments?

Just kidding, hoping for a speedy recovery.

[mike]

I've had times of hand or wrist weakness in the past. But not much recently. If you type a lot, pay some careful attention to workstation ergonomics. Keyboard too high or low. My wrists are happiest when they're nearly straight while I type (SW engineering, I type a lot). One of the "split" ergo keyboards has been very good for me.

[Jason Orth]

Get well soon Mike.

But I wouldn't recommend MacSpeech. Ctein's been training it for at least two years ;-)

[Victor Aberdeen]

Your a hero! Have been there into the dog fight, but the other dog had already broken the leg of mine, sent the culprit off with a swift lesson. Then to the vet for a big bill.

Hope all the moving parts recover soon...

Victor

[James McDermott]

You need to practice (practise for your North American readers) my patented keyboard head-butting technique. Really, I don't make any more errors that way than using my pinkies.

William Shakespeare

[John MacKechnie]

You're a writer Mike. You've got to protect those hands. You don't think that Steinbeck would've stuck his hand between two snarling dogs do you? Always walk with an older neighbor. If a hungry canine approaches, you only have to run a little faster than ole Mrs. Rudkins.

[Bruce Appelbaum]

I can sympathize. Once got in the middle of a neighbor's out of control dog attacking my harmless 15 year old dog, ended up with a black eye and my back was out for a week. Get well, and keep off the hand.

[amcananey]

@Jason: You just made me laugh out loud! Very funny.

@Mike: If this is your pithy way of saying "A dog bit my hand and it hurts to type", then I don't think we have to worry about a drop-off in your production. Especially considering this is an expanded and revised version of the original post from just a few hours ago!

Best,
Adam

[Richard]

James - I don't want to be pedantic (meaning of course I do) but I think that in North America "practice" is (mostly) used for both verb and noun. In the UK "practise" is certainly the verb and "practice" the noun.

Sorry... mumble mumble....

[Tony Rowlett]

Ouch! Sorry, Mike. Hope it heals quick. Love your blog.

[Ben Rosengart]

Yikes! Get well soon.

[Scott L.]

Terrible news; hope it heals fast. Whenever I spot a boxer or a bulldog, my dog and I head the other way--too many bad experiences.

[Volker]

I know the feeling! I did that once when my 2 favourite dogs decided to try to kill each other!
I hope you get better soon!
Volker

[Jim Hart]

Mike...you know quite well that without a photograph, it didn't happen.

:-)

Hope you're feeling O.K.

Regards,

Jim

[Miserere]

So you're Lulu's attack dog now? ;-)

I've been bitten by dogs twice; it sucks, but life goes on. And the wounds heal a lot faster than if a woman breaks your heart.

[Paul]

My pitbull was attacked about month ago by two raging loose German Alsatians whilst walking on his leash a wearing his muzzle. Yes, my American Pitbull is an extremely loving, loyal and peaceful dog like 98% of all dogs. He´s great fun and adores all kids--and wears a muzzle, as Spanish laws insist that all powerful dogs above 25 kg wear one. So I also had to put my hand in the middle of the one sided fight to save Indy. No way of defending himself though you should of seen how he used his front paws to block the attack! I was lucky they only ripped my jacket and scratched my camera bag a little.

Get well soon! Paul

[Mike Johnston]

"As a former USAF dog handler, I've had the experience of being bitten a number of times. The bites were almost always much more painful in the hours and night following. I am amazed that you can type at all. That is dedication."

David,
I'm doing it almost entirely with my left hand!

Mike

[Paul]

By the way maybe you should write a post on that loyal patient and unpaid photo assistant which all photographer/dog lovers take out with us on our photo trips.
Paul

[David Bostedo]

"...practise for your North American readers..."

Looking at it from the USA, in practice, I think you need to practice your spelling a little more.

[Ludovic]

Nothing too original to say here - but I do want to wish you a swift recovery anyway.

Take care.

[Richard Parkin]

Carry a stick. Place stick between dogs that are facing up [and command them not to fight if appropriate]. This has the effect of increasing the flight/fight distance and makes an attack less likely. Also attacking dog will likely bite the stick rather than your dog. If the dog is attacking you, offer it the stick to bite. Don't try to hit the dog with the stick as it will be quicker than you!

Sadly, the above advice is nearly useless to a photographer walking dogs on a leash as he/she will have a camera in their free hand!

[Stan B.]

Ya did good, Mike- ya did good...

[Tony Roberts]

My very own Lulu sympathizes with your encounter with the aggressive youngster. Hope your wounds heal quickly but keep an eye on them. My own experience is that they can infect easily and heal slowly. For pain, Tylenol worked best unless the doc gave you something better like Hydrocodone.

[Robert Burnham]

If you ever need to get a dog out of a fight or an escalating confrontation with another animal, do NOT reach for the dog's collar.

Instead, grab the dog by the hind legs and pull. That removes the animal from the action, and it keeps your anatomy out of the action, too.

[Bryce Lee]

So in this encounter, was LuLu injured?
Had a dog fight encounter once. Next door neighbour's eight year old St. Bernard, named Sassafras, was attacked by the Heinz (mostly
Dobermann) belonging to a neighbour two doors down. Still have no idea why the fight began.
The neighbour's Dobie was forever out of its pen, without leash and always when it was out, attacking anything that moved including other dogs, people or cars. Was using a small sharp hatchet at the time to chop kindling. Hearing the noise looked over the fence at Sassy was getting the worse of the fight. I yelled. The Dobie then ran jumped the fence between the two gardens and attacked me. Hatchet in hand soon had one very dead Dobbie at my feet, the head severed from the body.

There was much commotion after ward, Sassy went off to the vet, the owner of the Dobie was quite unhappy and wanted me arrested. I still had the bloody hatchet in my hand and made the comment "maybe I killed the wrong dog?" The owner lept at me if while the police were there, the hatchet knicked his arm, just enough, and he still came at me...the police went to grab the hatchet but it was too late, got the owner of the deceasaed dog in the upper arm quite well...blood all over the place. I was charged using a deadly weapon, the owner went off to the hospital where he stayed for six days. Seems he also had a severe violent streak was well. The bottom line, he ended up with the short end of the stick, charged with keeping a vicious animal and was bound over to keep the peace. The hatchet was kept as police evidence. I was advised to stay away from both the vilent neighbour and my next door neighbour's dog. We in Canada don't sue at the drop of a dog's head unlike a certain other country. Bottom line no charges against me, Sassy lived another 7 years, the neighbour down the street sold his house and moved away.
I too was told tnby many friends, his moving away was the best thing for him and his wife, they were frequently causing problems, between themselves and balance of the street.

[Bron]

A few years back, when I was getting serious about bicycling, I was ambling down a country road and sensed, then saw out of the corner of my eye ... two large, dark objects hurtling silently at me. No thought, I roared, literally ROARED ... and the two large Dobermans stopped, and looked at me like "what the heck?" Only then did I see that they were in a very sturdy enclosure. Several miles later, when the heart rate settled, I thought that was good info. Works on quadropeds, and sometimes on bipeds. That way, you don't have to use your Leica as a stick.

[Mani Sitaraman]

Best wishes for a quick recovery Mike. May the pain subside soon. Multitudes value those hands here in internetland.

@Paul: re " German Alsatians " I haven't heard that term for them since my days growing up in India. When I moved to the U.S. no one had heard the term before, and I learned that they were universally known as "German Shepherds". Is this a U.K.-U.S. thing?

[James McDermott]

Ouch! I think rather I need to practise(!) not headbutting my keyboard so forcibly, and then practise thinking carefully about going into print after a fine but rather liquid lunch. Thank you, Richard and David; I shall of course be scanning your future posts very carefully.

[Mike Johnston]

"Thank you, Richard and David; I shall of course be scanning your future posts very carefully."

You're a very funny guy....[g]

Mike

[David Salmanowitz]

Be glad you got bit in USA--I got nipped last year here in Thailand, was nothing really, just a tiny scratch. The month of rabies vaccines were what did me in, every shot was good for a few days of asstd. pain. Though dogs are supposed to be vaccinated not all are--dog belonged to owner of noodle shop. I could have asked did it have its shots--and they could have said yes, when it might have not. Across street was a Vietnamese restaurant and they said that dog is mean and nasty. You would think the dog would behave himself! Anyway, here is to your swift recovery Mike.

[Paul]

Mani, you´re right in Spanish the Alsatian is known as "Pastor Aleman" which you´re quite correctly called German Shepherd dog which is the most commonly used named. Lovely breed of dog I knew one by the name of Elsa who was an ex canine life guard. I was only eight years old and used to pretend I was dead in my friends swimming pool. She would jump in and pull me out by my swimming trunks, amazing! Every neighborhood seems to have an aggressive dog, always the owners fault due to lack of exercise which seems to cause stress in dogs. I mean what do you want a dog for if you don´t like taking long walks it´s part of an owners responsibility. My Pitbull and wife´s chihuahua go out for 3 individual 1 hour walks everyday even now when I´ve been on crutches for the last six months due to two foot operations. Its tough on my arms, wrists and shoulders but my dogs need it.
Paul

[Henk Coetzee]

Hope you get well soon! I recently got my hand between a cat and a Jack Russell - Don't try this at home.

[Andreas]

Mike, take care and get well soon!

My doctor told me a story where a friend of hers were bitten in an exact same situation. But his hand is unrecoverably destroyed.

[Tom]

You should try using some voice recognition software to "type" your posts. It can be surprisingly entertaining.

[Kevin Lloyd]

Let me wish you the speediest of recoveries Mike. No need to respond ;-)
Kevin.