Friday, July 22, 2011

Chasing Dogs

It's a quarter of ten and I just rolled into Mountain Grove where i'll spend the day and night. It was a 28 mile morning of rolling hills on the side of a major highway but the shoulder was both paved and about 5 feet wide so the traffic and I got along well. It's already hot but a big part of that is the humidity. Seems like a waste to stop so early, but the next hotel is another 30 miles down the road so this is home for the night.

Forgot to tell you about my dog encounter yesterday morning.

As I crested a hill, which means I had been climbing uphill, which means I couldn't run even if I had wanted to,... I noticed him sitting right on the edge of the road watching me and waiting. Very patiently. Very quietly.

I crossed to the other side of the road, but he still got up and trotted towards me. I yelled "stay" and "back" like I usually do but he ignored me completely. Thing was, though, he never barked, never growled, and never bared his teeth. He just trotted right behind my right side, right behind my heel.

I weaver back and forth across the road to try and shake him but he wasn't going anywhere, he marked every move I made — sometimes behind my left side sometimes behind my right.

After 3-4 minutes of this he must decided that I was no fun and that I wasn't going to play along and let him chase me so he sped up and ran just in front of me for another 3-4 minutes. Maybe he was hoping I would chase him? I don't think so.

In the end, we rode together for about a mile (?) before he finally turned around and headed home. Interesting.

Tomorrow morning I head to Seymour, another 30 miles closer to Springfield.

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