After just three days at Whitetail Ridge Campground on West Point Lake near LaGrange, Georgia, we pulled up stakes and returned to Auburn. The campground was expected to fill completely for the long Veterans Day Weekend and no site that might have good satellite signal was available to us. Departure day was overcast and cool and I would miss having a nice campfire in our fire pit there on the lake shore. Nevertheless, a return to Chewacla State Park at Auburn was a welcome thought too as it has a certain comfortable, familiar feel to me.
Two campsites were available for us at Chewacla and we chose the one in McVay Loop, where we've never stayed. Our site has a sunny southern curbside should be warm enough on cool days. As Veterans Day on Friday approaches, the campground fills to near capacity and there are several lesbian couples around the loop. I point out the sexual orientation of these neighbors simply because they seemed anxious to let everyone know it. Still more memorable about these neighbors was their dogs -- and they had several -- all large and most loud.
I learned that a particular dog, Ginger, belonging to one of the lesbian couples, was vicious. Ginger is a big yellowish / light brown female short hair mix-breed animal who nearly always was tethered at the campsite. I never heard her bark or growl. My small pink pepper spray canister was close at hand but often I forgot to remove it from the leash and have my finger on the trigger. That would be regrettable.
Lexie and Ozzie's Sunday early afternoon walk was interrupted by Wayne's return from Walmart with groceries. Wayne told me he would take everything inside from the car and that I should continue walking the babies. During this time almost all the long weekend campers were gone but the four lesbian couples were still there. Walking past Ginger, I saw the yellow mongrel was in process of being transferred from her tie-out position into the truck. The babies and I were about 50 feet away when I heard one of the women yell out to the dog. I turned around to see the huge yellow mongrel running, crouched, directly toward Ozzie. In less than a flash Ozzie was in Ginger's mouth being violently shaken the same way Ozzie shakes his stuffed squeaky shark. In the next instant I was flat on the ground trying to pull the heathen off Ozzie, never even thinking about the pepper spray that's always on the leash. My effort must have been successful as Ozzie lay on his back, in the leaves, yelping when two of the women reached Ginger and held her. As I grabbed Ozzie off the ground another of the women took Lexie and I remember seeing one of those women sitting astride Ginger's front quarter while the other held her by the tail.
Getting Lexie and Ozzie back to our campsite, I sat down with them in their little playpen that was set up in our front yard. I could find no wounds on Ozzie; Lexie was terrified but uninjured. I saw my pants were torn and I had a 1" scrape just under my right knee. It was only then that Wayne stepped out of the coach to see us. Both Lexie and Ozzie had evacuated during the attack and in picking them up, unknowingly, we had smeared them (and ourselves) with excrement. We were a mess. All of the women were profusely apologetic and tried to help with the cleanup.
We watched Ozzie closely for signs of unusual behavior and would take him to the Auburn Vet Clinic's Emergency Room if needed, but he would return to his usual antics within 24 hours so we didn't have to do that. We know we dodged a bullet in that attack. Another few shakes from Ginger and Ozzie could have been killed and Lexie could have been next. We now take our large steel pointed walking stick when we go for walks.
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