Lost Dog!
The quickest way to meet your neighbors is to lose your dog. Even the shyest among us will shamelessly flag down every bicyclist and knock on the door of anyone who has even the remotest chance of catching sight of our beloved lost family member.
Yesterday Drake discovered the patio door was ajar about twenty minutes before we discovered the Brittany Spaniel had gone “walk-a-bout.” (or in Drake’s case – “RUN-a-bout”) Drake belongs to Other Half’s son. He was in our care, custody, and control at the time of The Great Escape. Losing your own dog is bad enough. Losing someone else’s dog is a Very Bad Thing.
We calculated that Drake had been gone for at least twenty minutes because that’s about the time we heard Border Collie and Blue Heeler jacking with one of the horses. When herding dogs get loose, they don’t go far, they harass livestock. You can HEAR when they get out! When bird dogs get loose, they’re GONE!)
And Gone he was. Other Half and I immediately mobilized. In separate vehicles we started slow-rolling the neighborhood. That’s when you really get to know your neighbors. We met lots of new people who were quite nice. Most were helpful. One was not. Other Half was in his Police Truck and was flagged down by a neighbor who wanted to report a suspicious vehicle in the area. It was a white SUV and it was acting very strange, obviously up to no good. (It was me.) He informed her that the Suspect was his Better Half and that I was looking for a lost dog. Had she seen Drake? No, she had not. (right about then, I’m sure he tuned her out. He was not exactly concerned with the suspicious SUV roaming the streets. At this point, even if she had seen a man in a robe and turban with a bomb strapped around his waist, unless he was carrying a white dog with red spots, Other Half would not have been interested.)
I flagged down a delightful elderly Mexican man who spoke little or no English. I speak little or no Spanish.
“Perro??!!” (dog) I asked him, with a wide sweep of my arms.
He smiled at me.
“Blanco Perro!! (white dog) Oops! I remembered that in Spanish, the adjective goes behind the noun. “Perro blanco!!???”
He smiles some more. I stop to consider that he probably doesn’t really care about my Spanish grammar. At this point, I remember that Drake has large reddish-brown spots., but I cannot remember the word for red or brown, or spots. He is still smiling. I begin looking around truck for reddish-brown things. Ahh hah! There is a stuffed dog with brown legs on my dash. I point at the leg.
“Rojo?” he asks.
“Yes! Red! Red!” (don’t ask me how he got red out of brown stuffed dog’s leg, but who cares!) I clap my hand across my head and ears to show him where the “rojo” spots are on the dog. He nods. Then he says “Grande?” (with big arms) “Poquito?” (with little arms)
I show him how tall Drake is. He nods. No, he has not seen Drake, but will keep an eye out. I point to house where Drake lives. He nods and grins. Then I say “Gracias” and he says “Thank you.”
See? No Language Barrier cannot be broken!. Everyone understands the Lost Dog Dilemma. Perhaps the United Nations could benefit from the Lost Dog approach.
Other Half made the dreaded phone call to Son. It was a short one. Son, Girlfriend, and Son’s Buddy were en route as soon as the phone went “click.” (Drake is a well-loved pooch.)
I called Dear Friend Mindy (who I never see enough, but I know that I can ALWAYS count on her in an Emergency –Good friends like that are precious!) and she immediately got the news out to Loping Ladies in our area. It gave me a great deal of comfort to know that Ladies all over Brazoria and surrounding counties would know about Drake within minutes. Thank God for the internet! In the case of a lost dog, every minute counts.
After about two hours, we re-grouped at the house. It was time to make some cardboard signs and start tacking them up at every intersection in the area. That’s when I heard Son shout. “There he is!!!!”
Drake came zooming back into the yard. Happy Dog! Go figure. The little Beast had clearly been rooting around in the brush in the wooded area across the road, having a High Ole Birddog Time. Undoubtedly he could hear us calling him, but the Call of the Wild was a lot stronger – until he saw His Human. Well, that changed things. His Human was home now. It was time for a Drake-Snuggle. It was time be brushed. It was time to fussed over. (“Look! Drake cut his paw! Awwwwwwww…”) It was a Good Time to be Drake.
The quickest way to meet your neighbors is to lose your dog. Even the shyest among us will shamelessly flag down every bicyclist and knock on the door of anyone who has even the remotest chance of catching sight of our beloved lost family member.
Yesterday Drake discovered the patio door was ajar about twenty minutes before we discovered the Brittany Spaniel had gone “walk-a-bout.” (or in Drake’s case – “RUN-a-bout”) Drake belongs to Other Half’s son. He was in our care, custody, and control at the time of The Great Escape. Losing your own dog is bad enough. Losing someone else’s dog is a Very Bad Thing.
We calculated that Drake had been gone for at least twenty minutes because that’s about the time we heard Border Collie and Blue Heeler jacking with one of the horses. When herding dogs get loose, they don’t go far, they harass livestock. You can HEAR when they get out! When bird dogs get loose, they’re GONE!)
And Gone he was. Other Half and I immediately mobilized. In separate vehicles we started slow-rolling the neighborhood. That’s when you really get to know your neighbors. We met lots of new people who were quite nice. Most were helpful. One was not. Other Half was in his Police Truck and was flagged down by a neighbor who wanted to report a suspicious vehicle in the area. It was a white SUV and it was acting very strange, obviously up to no good. (It was me.) He informed her that the Suspect was his Better Half and that I was looking for a lost dog. Had she seen Drake? No, she had not. (right about then, I’m sure he tuned her out. He was not exactly concerned with the suspicious SUV roaming the streets. At this point, even if she had seen a man in a robe and turban with a bomb strapped around his waist, unless he was carrying a white dog with red spots, Other Half would not have been interested.)
I flagged down a delightful elderly Mexican man who spoke little or no English. I speak little or no Spanish.
“Perro??!!” (dog) I asked him, with a wide sweep of my arms.
He smiled at me.
“Blanco Perro!! (white dog) Oops! I remembered that in Spanish, the adjective goes behind the noun. “Perro blanco!!???”
He smiles some more. I stop to consider that he probably doesn’t really care about my Spanish grammar. At this point, I remember that Drake has large reddish-brown spots., but I cannot remember the word for red or brown, or spots. He is still smiling. I begin looking around truck for reddish-brown things. Ahh hah! There is a stuffed dog with brown legs on my dash. I point at the leg.
“Rojo?” he asks.
“Yes! Red! Red!” (don’t ask me how he got red out of brown stuffed dog’s leg, but who cares!) I clap my hand across my head and ears to show him where the “rojo” spots are on the dog. He nods. Then he says “Grande?” (with big arms) “Poquito?” (with little arms)
I show him how tall Drake is. He nods. No, he has not seen Drake, but will keep an eye out. I point to house where Drake lives. He nods and grins. Then I say “Gracias” and he says “Thank you.”
See? No Language Barrier cannot be broken!. Everyone understands the Lost Dog Dilemma. Perhaps the United Nations could benefit from the Lost Dog approach.
Other Half made the dreaded phone call to Son. It was a short one. Son, Girlfriend, and Son’s Buddy were en route as soon as the phone went “click.” (Drake is a well-loved pooch.)
I called Dear Friend Mindy (who I never see enough, but I know that I can ALWAYS count on her in an Emergency –Good friends like that are precious!) and she immediately got the news out to Loping Ladies in our area. It gave me a great deal of comfort to know that Ladies all over Brazoria and surrounding counties would know about Drake within minutes. Thank God for the internet! In the case of a lost dog, every minute counts.
After about two hours, we re-grouped at the house. It was time to make some cardboard signs and start tacking them up at every intersection in the area. That’s when I heard Son shout. “There he is!!!!”
Drake came zooming back into the yard. Happy Dog! Go figure. The little Beast had clearly been rooting around in the brush in the wooded area across the road, having a High Ole Birddog Time. Undoubtedly he could hear us calling him, but the Call of the Wild was a lot stronger – until he saw His Human. Well, that changed things. His Human was home now. It was time for a Drake-Snuggle. It was time be brushed. It was time to fussed over. (“Look! Drake cut his paw! Awwwwwwww…”) It was a Good Time to be Drake.
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