Friday, May 30, 2014

We Have a Visiter

Just when you think you can't fit anymore, you manage to fit another. Someone very near and dear to my heart is staying with us. She's needing a little TLC due to an ear infection and so I brought her home with me last night.
Can you guess who it is?
Let me give you a hint:
she's small, Black and has a lot of "'tude."
If you guessed Jetta, then you are right. And let me tell you, she's her usual Jetta self. I've already managed to lose her twice and she hasn't even been here for 24 hours.
Last night was her first Great Escape. If you have been reading this blog for a while now you may remember a post titled "The Great Escape" quite a few years back. It was about Jetta "jetting" out an open door and me losing her for a while. Jetta never did master the skill of recall. More accurately, she refused to master the skill.
Last night I put everyone out in the back for last relief time of the night. Our fence is slightly questionable, so Otis either has to be watched or put on a line because he's figured out how to get out. I foolishly thought that Jetta wouldn't be able to get out because...well, she's old. I didn't expect her to climb up the stump and up and over the fence. But, apparently she did.
Once we realised she was gone, Mr. K and I went out looking for her. One of the neighbour's friends was waiting for a cab to go home and so helped us locate the meandering Jetta. The difference between the 13.5 year old Jetta and the 6 year old Jetta is that the older one didn't run away when we approached and snapped a leash on her. She happily trotted back to the house with us and promptly went up to bed. She slept well through the night and didn't get up until I did this morning when Hermione woke me up to be let out of her crate.
This morning is when I lost Jetta the second time.
I began my routine of bringing everyone out for their first morning relief time. Hermione and Otis go first since they have smaller bladders and may go inside if I don't get them out right away. We walked over to the little park at the end of our street and Otis peed right away. I knew there was another dog or person around because Otis was super excited, but I wasn't sure where the other being was. As we walked along, I got closer and an older man whom I see nearly every morning called out that it was just him and his smaller dog. He also has a full sized Beagle that he seems concerned may accidentally hurt the little dogs. Hermione got excited and raced to the end of her extenda leash which had been frayed because of the cat chewing on it. The frayed bit snapped and the leash came coiling back in, minus Bean. The guy was really nice and offered me his extenda leash, but I assured him that I only ever put the leash on Hermione for consideration of other people. She hardly ever wore a leash when we were in Scotland. She mastered the skill of recall with no problems. I finished my round of the park and returned with a leashed Otis and an unleashed Hermione, who beat me back to the front door.
The next two big dogs went out without incident and then the search for Jetta began. I called her and wandered through the bottom floor of our townhouse, but couldn't find her. I began to worry that she had gone out the front door when I was taking everyone else out. I really began to panic because it was about the time that people would be going to work and I didn't want her to get hit by a car.
Finally, I went up to check if she had stayed in the bedroom, but she hadn't. Mr. K came downstairs with me and heard her collar jingling in the basement. He went down and retrieved her from her exploration.
What a bum.
We went out to "park" and she trotted along beside me as if she hadn't been hiding away for the last ten minutes. She sniffed and quite enjoyed herself. When we got back to the house from our round around the park, she tried to continue our walk down the street, but I hustled her back inside. She's pretty spry for an senior citizen.
So, that is how our first day with our visiter started. It's a bit of a learning curve. You get so used to what your dogs do, how they react, what their habits are and when you bring a new (also old) one into the mix, everything goes a bit crazy. It's nothing we can't handle though and really, once she was home safely, we had a good chuckle.
It's good to know that my little firecracker hasn't changed one bit.

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