An English setter pup on a hunting trip stepped on a shotgun and shot his master in the ankle. Fortunately, the only serious injury suffered was to his dignity:
[Michael] Murray admits there is a certain amount of notoriety that goes along with getting shot by your dog.
“That’s the hard part, talking to people, because you feel like such a fool,” he said.
The day after the shooting, he and friends walked into a restaurant in the nearby town of Lemmon, S.D., population about 1,600.
“Everybody in town knew about it. As soon as I walked into the restaurant, they said, ‘You’re the one.’ ”
I’m reminded of a story that Jay Johnstone tells in his book Temporary Insanity. One day pitcher Dave Stewart was arrested in his car with a transvestite hooker who went by the name Lucille. Johnstone writes that the hard part for Stewart was facing his teammates after such an embarrassing incident. His teammates handled it with an appropriate level of tact and decorum: The next time Stewart entered the clubhouse, they serenaded him with a chorus of You Picked A Fine Time To Leave Me, Lucille. I suppose Michael Murray can take comfort that at least so far he hasn’t had any musical accompaniment.