I was walking Emmy Lou on a beautiful sunny day a few weeks back and we came across this puppy.
This puppy had no collar or leash on, nor did he seem to have an ear tattoo. He also didn’t seem to know that cars could kill him, because he kept trying to beetle out on to the street. There was no one around. No one calling for him. And he was wandering in a really bombed out looking area – an area that didn’t really say “Hey hey! We have cute puppies!”
Huh. Uh…what do I do?
The little puppy immediately latched on to Emmy, which she tolerated only because he didn’t try and jump onto her face. After a couple of minutes, a lady walking her two dogs came by and I asked if she recognized the puppy. She didn’t – but she did have an extra leash at her house down the block. So we leashed up the wandering puppy and then kind of stared at each other, like two strangers who suddenly had a puppy situation.
She suggested she could take the puppy to the pound, which was only a few blocks away. But I thought it would be better to take some pictures of the puppy to put up on Craigslist first – and the SPCA is only a block or two from my house. So that’s when I called Katr to let her know we had a new dog I was bringing home a stray. She took it well. She called him Indiana.
We posted the ad on Craigslist and immediately got the array of responses you’d expect, such as:
“If you don’t find the owners, I’ll take the dog – he’s so cute!”
“This is my dog but I have no photos or identifying information FUCK YOU WHY ARE YOU STEALING MY DOG”
“Take him to the pound, you total dipshit.”
“Do not under any circumstances take him to the pound.”
“Maybe he’d be better off if you kept him. Thank you for taking him home. You are a good person.”
I was filled with self-doubt. Indiana stayed away from controversy, preferred to scratch his ears and flop around cutely.
After a few hours, I walked Indiana over to the SPCA to get him scanned for a microchip and to ask them what I should do with him. I knew taking him to Animal Control was probably what I SHOULD do, but he was so little! And floppy! The kind Australian at the SPCA confirmed his age and that he had no ID tattoo or chip – and while I was there, she called Animal Control to see if anyone had been looking for him. Nada. She told me I was a nice person to take care of him for the night, so I figured I had her blessing to not take him to the pound.
Back at the homestead, Emmy was fucking done with this puppy. So we tried to pawn him off on our upstairs neighbour for the night, to keep him out of Emmy’s fur and because our neighbour is planning on getting a puppy soon anyway. Our neighbour returned him after two hours for excessive whining and constant indoor whizzing. And that’s how I ended up sleeping in our guest nook with a puppy who really just wanted to lick my face all damn night.
Also, I tried to get him to pee outside. No dice.
In the morning, around 4:30 a.m., I got up to go to the bathroom. The puppy also got up, went into our bedroom and shat, then went into the kitchen and whizzed.
I decided to take the dogs for a walk. We were out for about 2.5 hours, in the dark, sniffing people’s yards. I’m glad no one called the cops.
By the time it was light out, I was exhausted and tired of having to do everything with one hand while I held on to the puppy. Fortunately, I had some backup for Day 2 and I knew I just had to make it ‘til lunchtime until C would come and take over the puppy fostering.
In the meantime, our friend Marie came over and the puppy took to her right away, so I had time to actually do some work.
Although I confess that most of my work time was spent taking pictures of the puppy.
C picked the puppy up as planned and then texted me all day and night about how the puppy whined and howled all night if they left him alone and then, when everyone was watching, whizzed in their kitchen. It seems that Indiana had a very limited repertoire.
The next day, I got a call from the SPCA – they had found the owner! Apparently, she and her husband work on movie sets and this little puppy – Trigger – was in the latest “Hallowe’en Buddies” film that had recently wrapped here in Vancouver. I assume his role was “cute puppy whizzing”. They took possession of the puppy on Monday – he escaped on Tuesday – the new owner was deathly ill and her husband was away, so after two days of combing the neighbourhood, she finally called the SPCA.
The SPCA gave her a serious chewing out, then gave me her number, so I got to be the good guy when I called to let her know her puppy was safe. She had totally lost her voice from being sick and also, the crying. And later that day, Trigger was reunited with his family. Happy ending!
I felt quite thrilled by the outcome of this story, mainly for these reasons:
1. I did something!
2. It was probably the wrong thing, according to some people.
3. It all worked out.
4. My wife clearly loves me.
5. I got to discover why we are NEVER GETTING A PUPPY.
