The Fetch Incident

What happens when one dog runs face-first into another dog at full speed?



Dozer, post-collision

The story, as I was told it, went like this: Poor Star was just sitting in the yard, minding her own business, when the frisbee toy came sailing down and landed softly beside her. She leaned over to pick it up, and SURPRISE! she got a mouthful of Dozer's face instead.

Dozer lives to fetch. He is a retriever in a pit bull body. Unfortunately, out in the yard, he becomes a mindless fetch zombie, and is well known for his indiscriminate, unstoppable battering-ram fetch style. The fact that he's 90 lbs does not make this a safe exercise for anything in his way. Frisbee throwers are instructed to make sure his path is clear of any object larger than a golf ball.

Over the years, fetch has resulted in broken teeth, ACL tear, bloody paws (carpet burn effect), bloody cuts, missing fur, and a kinked tail.

Considering these effects, I have forbidden the game. My husband, on the other hand, is a sucker. He plays fetch with Dozer when I'm not home to stop him.

Which is why the first question out of my mouth when I came home on this particular day was, "Ohmigod, why does my dog look like he's been in a bar fight?!?"

Star still loves her best buddy Dozer, even though he crashed into her with such force that she did two complete backward somersaults. I appreciate the tolerance that Star has. I'm not sure how a lesser dog would have reacted, but Star apparently brushed the whole incident off as just-another-thing-that-happened-to-me-today.