My friend was bitten by a dog this summer. For British readers: being bitten by a dog elsewhere in the world isn’t merely painful, scary and shocking. It brings with it a real possibility of rabies. For non-British reader – really, I’m not making this up, there’s no rabies in the UK. My friend is here in Madison, and it was a drive-by bite, so he never saw the dog’s immunization papers, and can’t get it put down. He’s had to go through the course of preventative rabies therapy, and is clearly experiencing a certain level of trauma, not really wanting to go out in his neighbourhood. I suspect that, like me, he’ll now have a lifelong fear of dogs. Which, of course, may serve him well.
My experience being bitten by a dog was far more satisfying. The Miner’s Strike was half way through, and friends had organized a benefit concert with The Pogues in Camden that I planned to attend. Beforehand I decided to go up the shops to get something for dinner. As I walked up the road I noticed a bloke in a torn dirty old man mac gesticulating wildly to me from a distant phone box. I slowly twigged he was not alone in the box – he was accompanied by a 5-year old girl I recognized from the a house a few doors away, and a good-looking rather well dressed chap around my age. He seemed completely nuts.
I’d been so distracted by his bizarre behaviour that I hadn’t noticed three quite large Alsations (German Shepherds — not actual shepherds, or for that matter people from Alsace, but dogs) roaming free — I’d use the word ‘gamboling’ if they weren’t so sinister — on the pavement not far ahead of me. I am allergic to dogs (and pretty much all mammals other, fortunately, than humans), and am no sort of a dog-lover but at this point in my life I wasn’t yet terrified of them. So, despite their loud barking and generally fierce demeanour, I just kept walking. They angrily let me pass, so I let out of a sigh of relief. And then felt a pair of jaws clamp round the back of my right leg and teeth sink into my flesh.
Running wasn’t actually an option, and seemed unwise anyway, so I took about 6 more steps before the bugger let go of me [1]. Then of course I realized what the dirty-old-man-mac man had been trying to warn me about.
When I reached the phone booth he pulled me in with the other victims. The little girl’s foot was bleeding although she was pretty cheerful (much less so when I saw her the next morning, I have to say), and the good looking well dressed chap was looking very pale. One of them had called the police but… although we were only a mile from Brixton police station, some of you will remember that the police were thin on the ground in London during the miners’ strike and, anyway, I can’t imagine that a dog emergency was ever taken very seriously.
And, indeed. Eventually a van drew up with a couple of extremely young coppers who had obvious contempt for us weedy men and surprisingly little sympathy for the lovely little girl. They swaggered toward the dogs without their truncheons and, hilariously, the dogs went for them, so they turned tail and ran back to their van. Now, much more cautiously, and having gathered their truncheons, they approached the dogs, threatening them, and found the owner in his house. He was completely unrepentant, just couldn’t see what the problem was, which explained a lot.
I got some food and seem to remember going back to my digs to cook it. And then, for whatever reason, decided to go to the benefit anyway. By the time I got there I was in delayed shock and feeling pretty terrible so my friend Elspeth (an impresario) took me into the kitchen where a small group of women, all Chilean refugees, whose organization was behind the benefit, fussed over me. Elspeth made me sweet tea, and the Chilean women simply could not believe that I hadn’t gone to A&E. “You must have rabies” one of them said, and none of us could convince them that the UK doesn’t actually have rabies – they thought this was the famous English sense of humour.
After improving a bit I went into the gig with another friend, Tara (It is through Elspeth that I initially met CB, who may remember Tara who was and still is Lesley’s partner). I had no particular interest in The Pogues, but they were terrific. Tara and I stood at the very back of the hall, and a nice chap wearing a black hat and dark glasses slipped in between us. We all chatted between the songs. He was easy going, friendly, and told us he was going out with the bass player. We spent almost the whole gig together – I left a few minutes early when I started feeling a bit weak. Tara and I did exchange a glance when he deliberately edged between us – there was just enough room for it not to seem awkward I suppose but the look wasn’t about that. We were acknowledging to each other what we were much too cool to acknowledge him, which was that we knew perfectly well that he was Elvis Costello. Nice chap.[2]
[1] I met a bear in Aspen once. It was just ambling along the sidewalk toward me. Cars were passing, and nobody stopped to warn me or anything, so I figured — well, bears must just be normal round here, like cats or something — and just kept walking. We passed each other politely. I later discovered that bears are objectively more terrifying than dogs.
[2] I can tell you about my encounters with Cat Stevens and Paul Weller sometime if you like (both delightfully nice chaps, at least toward me), but I’ll keep the dinner at Damon Albarn’s house to myself.
{ 19 comments }
Laban 08.25.25 at 1:30 pm
A British woman recently died of rabies after being scratched by a puppy in Morocco.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c98wyllp170o
Lots of strays around Marrakesh, but they didn’t seem to bother anyone when I was there.
Michael Cain 08.25.25 at 2:32 pm
I was bitten a couple of years ago as part of a group of volunteers taking care of some of the common space for the HOA. One tooth got through my jeans and left a deep scratch, most of the injury turned out to be bruising. (What’s the bite pressure of a large dog?) Because the HOA was involved, it got reported. The nice woman from animal control told me that the dog’s vaccinations weren’t up to date, but if it had rabies and was contiguous, it would die well before the incubation period for me was over, so I should defer treatment. She also told me the dog was also on the “bit someone who wasn’t bothering it in a public space” list and if there was ever another spot of trouble from it, it would be put down immediately.
I’m much angrier with the owner than with the dog. Based on observation since, the dog has never been trained, probably wasn’t well-socialized when it was young, and lives a miserable life confined to a townhouse and seldom walked. Another dog owner in the neighborhood has a vicious little uncontrolled terrier that, if it ever gets loose, seems likely to maul a toddler. Why do people get dogs if they lack the time and skill to raise them properly?
Adam 08.25.25 at 2:49 pm
That’s scary. I’m always saddened to hear when people have tragic encounters with dogs. I hope your friend heals up well.
I grew up with Rottweilers. And now have an elderly Husky/German Shepherd mix, she can’t see well anymore and is afraid to go down the stairs on her own so we have to carry all 60 pounds of her down every time she puts herself upstairs.
I have a healthy respect for dogs. Especially large ones. Dog bites can do serious damage.
I’ve only been bitten once, while foolishly trying to break up a dog fight. I knew better, never get in the middle of a dog fight, but in the heat of the moment I reached into the melee. I got the two dogs apart and then realized my right index finger had been torn open.
Now, I’m not normally the least bit squeamish. I worked in a veterinary clinic while in high school and have seen all manner of, well, everything. Never once had I any issues with watching medical procedures (even when done to me) or having blood taken. But that day, seeing the amount of blood pouring out of my finger and the wound, I definitely felt woozy and knew I’d need stitches to put my finger back together.
Fortunately in my case both dogs were up to date on rabies so I was spared that joy. But I did get a tetanus booster out of the deal which also hurts like heck for a while.
I remain a massive dog lover and negligent dog handlers/owners infuriate me. Dogs can be fast and do enormous damage before most people can react. Very few dog owners train their dogs well in general, let alone well enough to be off leash. And no dog should ever be out and about unattended, except in very specific working conditions (eg livestock guardian dogs).
Phil 08.25.25 at 4:27 pm
encounters with Cat Stevens and Paul Weller … dinner at Damon Albarn’s house
Interesting choice of phrasing. Was Mr Albarn aware that he had a dinner guest, we wonder.
About 30 years ago I was doing registration at a conference. It was a simple job – take name, hand over badge and programme – but there were a lot of people to get through, so we had a script (“Good morning, could I get your name please? Thanks, here’s your badge,”) and strict instructions to stick to it: no chatting to mates, no fawning over Terry Eagleton or Tariq Ali, just get name, give badge, move on.
Which was fine, until I looked down the queue and saw the unmistakable figure of Elvis Costello. I wasn’t quite sure what he was doing at a radical conference in Manchester, but hey, the writer of “Shipbuilding” and “Pills and Soap” clearly wasn’t right-wing… Exciting! At least, it was until it dawned on me that I was going to have to look Elvis Costello in the eye – Elvis Costello, who I saw on the Live Stiffs tour in 1977, whose music had been the soundtrack to my teens and twenties – and ask his name?/i>. I couldn’t see any way round it. How would he take it? Would I be able to keep my face straight? What if he said “Declan MacManus”?
To cut a long story short, it wasn’t Elvis Costello; it was a left-libertarian guy from Leeds who I actually knew a bit – and I promptly broke the rules by saying “Oh, hi, I think we’ve met” and introducing myself.
You can’t get the staff.
Phil 08.25.25 at 4:29 pm
encounters with Cat Stevens and Paul Weller … dinner at Damon Albarn’s house
Interesting choice of phrasing. Was Mr Albarn aware that he had a dinner guest, we wonder.
About 30 years ago I was doing registration at a conference. It was a simple job – take name, hand over badge and programme – but there were a lot of people to get through, so we had a script (“Good morning, could I get your name please? Thanks, here’s your badge,”) and strict instructions to stick to it: no chatting to mates, no fawning over Terry Eagleton or Tariq Ali, just get name, give badge, move on.
Which was fine, until I looked down the queue and saw the unmistakable figure of Elvis Costello. I wasn’t quite sure what he was doing at a radical conference in Manchester, but hey, the writer of “Shipbuilding” and “Pills and Soap” clearly wasn’t right-wing… Exciting! At least, it was until it dawned on me that I was going to have to look Elvis Costello in the eye – Elvis Costello, who I saw on the Live Stiffs tour in 1977, whose music had been the soundtrack to my teens and twenties – and ask his name. I couldn’t see any way round it. How would he take it? Would I be able to keep my face straight? What if he said “Declan MacManus”?
To cut a long story short, it wasn’t Elvis Costello; it was a left-libertarian guy from Leeds who I actually knew a bit – and I promptly broke the rules by saying “Oh, hi, I think we’ve met” and introducing myself.
You can’t get the staff.
oldster 08.25.25 at 7:35 pm
I enjoyed a long accidental taxi-ride with a biggish pop-star of the ’60s once, years ago, and he too was easy-going and friendly. We chatted for some three hours and got along well, perhaps in part because I too was too cool to acknowledge him. I wonder whether a few years of being an object of screaming adoration make your ego less fragile? Well, clearly not always, but perhaps sometimes?
Sorry about the dog-bite. That is strange behavior on the part of the Alsatian. I could imagine it letting you pass; I could imagine it savaging you and biting you repeatedly; I could imagine the other two dogs clamping onto your other leg and bringing you down for the kill. People do get mauled by dogs, and dogs in packs are especially dangerous. But this dog’s behavior — a single bite, then backing off, with no assistance from its mates –that seems anomalous.
Well, I’m glad it was no worse. And I certainly don’t blame you for refusing to trust dogs ever again. The person I know who had the most extensive dealings with dogs as a child — her family raised dozens of them — is also the one who is most skittish about them now as an adult.
Priest 08.25.25 at 9:36 pm
Wikipedia tells me that the UK has been declared rabies-free, but that there has been a death this century from “rabies-like European bat lyssavirus 2”.
J-D 08.25.25 at 9:38 pm
Australia also does not have rabies, although ABLV (Australian bat lyssavirus) is closely related.
Matt 08.25.25 at 9:47 pm
I’ve been bitten by dogs several times, though never seriously enough to need more than a clean and a bandage. In my experience it’s more common to be bitten by a dog at someone’s house than if they are roming free, although no doubt that may change from place to place.
I delivered newspapers in the morning for, I think, about three years, starting when I was 12. The papers had to be delivered by 6:30am, so except in the peak of summer it was dark when I’d deliver them. I very quickly learned which houses had dogs, and if they were nice or not. Also, I got very good at hearing the sounds of a dog walking on the sidewak or street, and the sounds that a dog collar makes (especially if there is a tag, but even just the metal on the collar itself for many of them at the time) when a dog walks. I had a couple of cases of being cornered by an aggressive dog, but the only times I was bitten was inside a person’s house, when I’d come to collect the money for the newspapers. The most common then was some small dog that would sneak up from behind and bite. It was just one reason why I was typically happier to wait outside to be paid.
(All that said, most of the time I’d rather encouter a dog than a person in any place where I don’t really want to encounter either.)
Lynne 08.25.25 at 9:47 pm
Harry! I enjoyed your last post and was enjoying this one until I got to this incredible line: ” I had no particular interest in The Pogues”” !!!!???
Have you changed your mind at all since then?
Very sorry to hear about the dog bite and so glad you didn’t have to go through the rabies treatment, which I understand is pretty unpleasant.
TheBob 08.25.25 at 10:48 pm
I was bitten by a dog in Thailand, where rabies is common among street dogs. It ran up to me, bit me on the calf, drawing blood, and ran away. I got the series of rabies shots — 5 shots spaced out over a month. No big deal. The medical system there is ready for this. I got a card to carry, with the date for each shot marked. On that date, I’d go into a hospital or clinic, show the card, get my shot, pay my fee (a few dollars at most), and go on touristing.
The experience didn’t put me off dogs. That one was just plain mean, but he was an anomaly as far as I’m concerned.
Alan White 08.26.25 at 2:53 am
Okay I want to hear about Cat Stevens. His music helped define my college experience.
Mike Huben 08.26.25 at 12:03 pm
37 years ago, I was traveling in Ecuador and we stopped in a mountain pass to show our papers at a military outpost (Ecuador was still at war with Peru then.). I went outside the car for a stroll, and holy shit! They had a young mountain lion as a mascot, on a wire the way you’d keep a large dog. I saw one of the very young soldiers walk by and PAT THE MOUNTAIN LION! I thought, “Gee, I need to pat that mountain lion too.” So I positioned myself where it would pass me, and as it went by, YES, I patted the mountain lion! Then it turned around, and its paws went around my leg and its jaws went entirely around my knee. I knew that the soldiers would shoot me before they shot their mascot. Now, I’m a cat person, and I recognized that it was playing. The first rule of playing with cats is DON’T PLAY BACK, because they will play harder. So I relaxed, saying “ow” under my breath, and after a few seconds, it let go and walked away. My skin was not broken, though it was dimpled by the canines.
Last year, walking near my home in Ecuador, an old dog walking with his owner bit me on the ankle from behind. The man did what’s considered responsible here in Ecuador: he went home and returned with $20 to pay for my damaged pants. My injury was superficial, fortunately.
30 years ago, Ecuador had one of the highest rabies rates in the world. The past 10 years or so, there haven’t been any dog-transmitted cases. This is due to very good public health measures getting dogs vaccinated. But in the jungle down low, vampire bat transmitted cases are present, and thus rabies cases in cows are not too uncommon.
Thomas P 08.26.25 at 12:26 pm
“He was completely unrepentant, just couldn’t see what the problem was, which explained a lot.”
Don’t be afraid of dogs, be afraid of bad dog owners. I volunteered six years at a dog shelter and only got bitten once by dog that used full force. Fortunately, it was just a Jack Russel and I wore heavy pants so it was just a bad bruise.
For the most part, dogs are nicer than humans.
Chris Bertram 08.26.25 at 4:12 pm
I remember Elspeth of course, but I have no memory of Tara and Lesley I’m sorry to say. But my memory for people and names is quite poor.
David in Tokyo 08.27.25 at 7:13 am
“In my experience it’s more common to be bitten by a dog at someone’s house than if they are roming free,”
Ha. My one dog bite was at my violin teacher’s house when I was a kid. I was early to lesson, so played in the yard with their dog. A lovely dog. But. I threw a stick for the dog, who brought it back, and then didn’t want t0 give it up. So I was holding the stick in my hand, and the dog moved it’s grip on the stick. Onto my thumb.
I really liked the dog, and was really worried that it’d be a big negative deal for the dog if I told anyone, so I asked to use the bathroom, rifled their medicine cabinet for a bandaid, and went on with the day.
I didn’t die of rabies.
Teach was assistant principle first violin in the Boston Symphony. Father was majorly pissed at him: he was the best violinist/musician we knew*, and should have been a big name in the music world of the day. But he was happy with his secure job, house in the suburbs with his wife and kid. And didn’t want to push things. (Everyone in the BSO except the first chairs had to play the Boston Pops, which was an ugly time-consuming gig.) He was Polish (or some other flavor of easternish Europe, but grew up in France. And was culturally French (as far as any American could tell). But apparently life in France as a non-French person wasn’t fun, and he emigrated to the US. Despite having problems for not being “really French” in France, when his kid, who was born in the US, turned 18, the French tried to draft him.
*: It was a bummer taking lessons from him. Here, hold the bow like this, he’d say and have me me watch his bowing hand. I’ve never seen anything as beautiful. (Seriously, it was just perfect, an intergrated organic part of the bow.) But when I hold a violin bow, it looks like a big hairy spider doing push-ups.
oldster 08.27.25 at 1:01 pm
“…it was a drive-by bite, so he never saw the dog’s immunization papers….”
I would have at least demanded to see its driving license.
Harry 08.28.25 at 3:41 am
The cat stevens story is the least interesting really. In grad school (usc, 86-91) I was well respected by the leaders of the Muslim student association (I was leader of the two main political movements they were interested in on campus, divestment and, then, against the gulf war). One day the president of the MSA ran into the food hall where he apparently knew I’d be and excitedly told me that he had an Englishman visiting and that he (the Englishman) was eager to meet me. So I went among and… well, it was Yusuf/Cat Stevens. I’m not a fan fan, but a huge admirer (exactly as with weller, albarn and Costello actually — I have also met Richard Thompson and Al Stewart, of whom I am a proper fan, and was totally unable to speak to them). We chatted about Southern California, England, the weather, etc. I really don’t think that the president of the MSA understood what a star cat stevens was or even, maybe, that he was a star at all.
Alan White 08.29.25 at 5:11 am
Thanks Harry–that’s pretty cool!
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