WEEKLY WRAP-UP
A New Canine Friend, A Fuzzy Moth, and a Mural Come To Life
My week in photos — Week 18 — July 14–July 20, 2022
Meet Spear, or Cujo, as one staff member prefers to call him. Not exactly the image of viciousness that Stephen King had in mind when he wrote his horror novel, I’m sure.
In fact, he is quite the opposite of Cujo!
Speer arrived here one day on his own and was playing with one of our resident dogs on the property. Of course, at the end of the day, the staff here was trying to send him home, but he went and hid in the back of the property and refused to leave, howling and barking when anyone tried to make him.
They let him stay for the night, not sure exactly where he had come from. He had a really nice collar and we could see that he was well cared for, so we all figured that he had a home somewhere in the area.
The next day they opened the gate and let him out. He ran off for a while, but a few short hours later, he was back. Again, he didn’t want to leave that evening.
The staff didn’t want to hang posters around (that really isn’t done here) or put a notice on the radio to tell about the lost dog because quite often just any person will show up and say that it is theirs, even if it isn’t. They don’t have pet registration here in Uganda, and certainly, there are no animal shelters or anything like that either. So it would be hard to figure out exactly who owns him.
He stayed for another day, quite happily.
Finally, the mystery was solved when the owners showed up the following day. They told us his name, Spear, and said that he was living at a place with lots of dogs, and the other dogs would pick on him relentlessly. They could see that he wasn’t happy there and that this clearly was a better spot for him. The owner of this property is thankfully happy to keep him; however, she had to deny the old owner's request for 200 000 shillings (roughly $60USD). He figured that she should be buying the dog from him.
She said that he should be paying her for feeding him!
In the end, no money was exchanged and Speer (or Cujo) is happy to stay. Despite being called both names, he has not changed his demeanor much to the dismay of the staff member that decided that Cujo was a better monicker. When I asked him why he named him that, he said that the dog is a coward and needs to toughen up!
Sorry fella, that’s not how it works!
We have had fun getting to know Spear. He really loves our mural and is always lying in front of it. All day long, we have to tiptoe around him as we paint so that we don’t step on him. He really is a sweetheart.
One day while painting a small coffee table, Chris was visited by a bright yellow fuzzy moth. We sure have had our share of moth sightings in Uganda! He wasn’t quite as fabulous as the one in the article below, but he sure stood out on the brown background.
Chris was painting the coffee table while he was waiting for me to finish the tile mosaic project so that we could move on to the painting part of the mural. He made a sort of tropical flower, with a bit of a tattoo art style. It turned out great and adds a burst of color to the table, for sure.
We had a visit on the property from a large Ibis at some point in the week. He was quietly picking bugs and insects out of the lawn. Usually, they stay up in the trees and don’t come down to ground level, so it was nice to get a good look at his shining feathers as he poked around.
He was enjoying himself, and we were enjoying him, but one of our other dogs on the property put an end to that when he spotted him, then barked and chased it away. It flew off but not before letting out a few long honks of displeasure at Skye, the dog. I laughed later when I found him lying under this table, quite happy and smug with himself.
Other than that, our life really has been mostly focused on our mural project this week. I did finish the grout and we started the process of planning out the landscape above it. The owner wanted an abstract (my favorite!) of the landscape that surrounds Fort Portal, the city we are staying in. Based on the reactions from a few of the locals that have stopped by, I think we are doing a good job of representing that.
Here are a few closeups of the tile portion of the project so you can better understand the overall concept.
I’ll leave you with this photo of Chris hanging out with Skye, and a stunning red newly bloomed dahlia from the garden. You can see by Chris' pose that we are very comfortable here!
Thanks for joining me on my weekly wrap-up! I write one of these every week and publish them to the Weeds & Wildflowers publication. There are a few writers who take part in this weekly challenge (see names below), maybe you want to as well!
Thank you, as always, to Dennett for publishing my stories.
Hope everyone has a great week!
xo Jill
Thanks so much for joining me in my week in photos. Dennett started this challenge in her publication Weeds & Wildflowers during the beginnings of the pandemic, and it has since grown to include many authors. Check out the amazing writing and photography of Anne | Erika | Jane | Eileen | Juan | David | Mia | Susan | LensAfield | Kim | Barbara | Diana | Barb | Sandra | Shruthi | Ellie | Pene | Olive | Gustavo | Penny | Scott | Sasha | Tracy | Lisa | June | K. Barrett | Ivy and of course our host Dennett.
If you want to read about my past weeks, I have put all of my weeks in photos into their own list:
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