Last week, my friend C. and I took our dogs out for a walk in the woods. We had almost looped back to the car when we began to hear gunshots, and we thought it wise to keep the dogs close to the trail. Dog, the Velcro beast, had been underfoot the whole time, but suddenly he was nowhere to be found. I whistled and called and promised treats, and presently he bounded out of the underbrush, carrying something.

“What IS that?” I asked.

C. was closer to him than I. “It’s a big stick,” she said. “No, wait a minute, it’s not a stick. Yes, it must be…OH MY GOD THAT IS NOT A STICK.”

It was then I saw the hoof.

I screamed. I screamed. I screamed. You know those Scooby Doo episodes where Shaggy and Scooby see a ghost and scream to the camera, turn to one another and scream, and then turn back to the camera and scream? It was like that. I knew it wasn’t solving anything but I also knew as long as I continued to scream I could put off the moment when I had to WREST AN ENTIRE DEER LEG FROM MY DOG’S MOUTH.

Luckily, Dog showed some sensitivity to my emotional state, dropped the deer leg, and ran to me wagging his tail, with a look on his face as if to say, “What? What’d I do? Here, let me kiss you and make it better.” And every time his lips approached mine it set me off again.

It was by far the most disgusting thing he’s ever picked up, and there is some pretty stiff competition for that honor.