Well here it is just a few days passed the official First Day of Summer.
We have been REALLY LUCKY with exceptionally mild temperature. (So what was this about Global Warming?? Never mind...)
But if you live here in the "Valley" you know...it's gonna get HOT! It starts out mild then the furnace doors opened and we get blasted. Thank goodness for cool delta breezes at night. When they come. It’s the hot days that are the toughest. It does make it uncomfortable to work and zaps your energy. But the worst part is the DOAs.
I’m obviously not that bothered by dead things, it’s part of the job. The heat though, makes things a little dicey. The smell hits you first, obviously. Then you have to assess how your going to get it on your truck. Size and messiness matter. In hot weather, well it can get downright ugly.
Like the day I spilled soup on me....dog soup.
So where was this HBC DOA traffic Hazard? Definitely not in the road, or the side of the road. So I called the CP. She told me she would walk out to the road from her office at an auto repair place and meet me there. Ummm can't you just tell me?
Well I meet her and she points down the road embankment. Apparently she can see it from her business window and it's bothering her. Not exactly a traffic hazard.
So I grab a shovel and a couple of extra large garbage bags, and of coarse a pocket full of latex gloves. I head down the embankment, which is not too steep and get closer.
Well it definitely looked smaller from the top. It turns out to be a lab or a chow at this point it's hard to tell.
Without going into too much detail, I manage to get it into the garbage bags, double bagged and drag it up the embankment. I then had to figure out a way to get it over the railing and to my truck. I picked it up and carried it the rest of the way to my truck.
Try to imagine carrying about 45 pounds of a solid jello lump in a garbage bag. Ya. I know. I get it loaded into the tailgate box and then...
It hits me.
I don't want to look down, but my eyes are drawn by the smell emanating from my shirt front.
And it's one of those smells that no matter how fast you turn your head away the smell stays with you.
There is a ominous dark wet spot on the front of my shirt. My mind is screaming "GAAAAAAAAAA!!!!" .
But I'll borrow 472's favorite saying, "I'm a dedicated professional".
I calmly walked around my truck and got in. I'm trying not to breath too much which isn't working out very well. That whole gotta have air to live thing.
Luckily I was not far from home. So I put a radio call into our awesome dispatcher and advised her that I was done at the call, but needed to "take a break" and head home real quick. She of coarse said yes, but then she called me on the phone. Being a mom, (and she mother hen's us in a GOOD way!) she could tell something was wrong.
I started out fairly calm as I'm talking on the cell, trying to drive and unbutton my uniform shirt all at the same time. (This actually happened before the cellphone laws were in place so it was ok to be on the phone).
Dispatcher: "What's wrong? Are you Ok?"
Me: "I'm fine.Umm I just need to stop by home and change my shirt......I got DOG SOUP all over me!"
Dispatcher: (silence......)....um...(is that a snicker?)...ok, just making sure your ok. Call me when your back."
I know she was laughing when she got off the phone.
If I wasn't so horrified to find that it had soaked through to my undershirt, I would have been laughing too. Ok, well, maybe if it was happening to someone else.
I got home and jumped out of my truck, practically stripping off my shirts before getting into the house. My darling husband is looking at me very puzzled as I burst through the door. Of coarse his facial expression changes slightly as a slight breeze carries my dilemma to him.
He takes it in stride though. He takes my now stripped off offending clothes out to the garage and puts them immediately into the washer while I am in the bathroom cleaning any further smell from me. My husband is so wonderful. He puts up with skunk smell, and Dog Soup smell and all the other treasures I come home with.
I got a new undershirt and uniform shirt and start feeling and smelling much better.
I was road worthy again. I called my dispatcher and let her know everthing thing was alright and under control.
