The other day we decided to take Avi for a little walk around the larger park surrounding the dog run. There is a large soccer field up a little incline, through a lovely meadow of tall grass and bunches of bamboo. Once up at the field, Avi raced around, full of joy, and occassionally stopped to roll in the grass. Normally I don't allow her to do this, but it seemed like she was just rolling in grass clippings, like dogs sometimes do to feel good. After a few minutes, however, I realized that the field was full of large clumps of what appeared to be unidentifyable animal dung! Before I could catch her, though, Avi whizzed by me and across the field, completely ignoring my commands, and found a particularly large, dense, gooey, green pile of whatever this stuff was, and went for the roll of her life! She came up completely coated in green slime, with chunks of it adhered to her back, and large, chartreuse smears across her shoulders, flanks, and face. Straggling bits of the offending mulch were caught in her collar, and while the pup could not have been happier, I could not have been more disgusted. She was wrapped in an old beach towel and carted home for immediate washing, shampooing, rinsing, more scrubbing, more rinsing.
We now think that the gooey, fetid pile o' green was a a composty chunk of grass clippings that the industrial lawn mower spat out. It had a strangely chemical smell (far more alarming than animal poop, since it was all over our dog's skin!), and was toxic-slime green. Avi seems to be okay, and has not sprouted any additional limbs or developed super powers as of yet, but I'll be sure to keep an eye on her ...
