On Friday morning, as I was out in the front yard setting out my lawn sprinkler, I was surprised by two large and very rowdy pit bulls. They were just rambunctious and not aggressive which was lucky for me since I had nothing in my pockets nor on my person to protect myself. Still, I made my way into my garage and grabbed a broom and managed to get them to back out of the garage onto the driveway. That would have been the end of it except for the fact that there was a group of elementary school students two doors down, outside - waiting for the school bus. It took almost 5 minutes before the constable's office answered their phone only to tell me that I was not in their area. Transfer to the county sheriff - the dispatcher had the nerve to ask me if the dogs were dangerous. Gee, I dunno, what's it take to turn a rowdy pair of pit bulls into carnivorous child eaters? Possibly not much. They didn't seem real interested in sending a deputy to watch over the kids or chase the dogs off/capture them/whatever. After transferring to animal control, another neighbor and I ended up watching over the kids until the school bus came.

Anyway, point of this story is that if the dogs wanted a piece of me, I would have been in deep you-know-what. At lunch, I bought some pepper spray that I have velcro'd up under the side rail of the bed of my pickup. Now I've got at least something to use. It also ocurred to me that it might be useful after a fenderbender if the other party becomes violent.