I got the kids out the door, in the car, buckled in, I slammed the last door.... and it swung and caught my hand. Slamming the first knuckles of my right hand in the edge of the door.
This was followed by 10mins of pacing around, swearing, and crying. Then, I managed to get back in the car. Driving sucked. I could do it though, as long as I was careful, and easy. All I had to do was drop Demon off, and drive home. Nooooo problem.
Two blocks from my house I found this beauty.
She was just wandering around sniffing. There was no person in sight, and she didn't have a tag. Ok, so fine, up you go into the car. She was right at home.
Now what? i drove around the block, and the side streets. No one was out walking, or looking, or driving slowly. So I brought her home, and asked my neighbor. My neighbor said she lived on the street where I found her. So, back I went, knocked on doors, harassed people mowing their grass, stopped people walking, or driving slowly. No one recognized the dog. Ok, so, umm..... now what?
I took her to the police station, on the same street. They admired her, but said, legally, all they could do was call animal control. Well, damn, back in the car. Poor dog has hip dysplacia, she's loving this. But, she's sweet, snuggly, happy to climb in, ride around, and sniff everywhere we stop. I called the school, to inform them Austin would be late -again.
I hit the on star button (thank you free new car membership) and asked for the closest vet's office. I drove her down there so they could scan for a chip. Hallelujah!! She was microchipped! She was registered to.... the Humane Society. Well, hell. She didn't come all the way here form there. The vet's office gave me the phone number, and the chip number. I called the humane society, and spent half hour on the phone while they tried to track this dog down. No luck. She said she'd find someone with more experience, and call me back.
*sigh* My hand hurt. A lot.
What else was there to do? I drove Austin to school. He was very upset I was going to take him to school before we took this wonderful new dog home. Our wonderful new dog did NOT want to stay in the car. She wanted to get out and sniff. So I tied her to a bench, outside the catholic church, while I ran Austin in. (Please don't' scare the priest, please don't scare the priest) As I was leaving, I had given up hope and was going to drive her down to the humane society. Then they called! They had found her information! ....but they couldn't give it to me for privacy reasons. *sigh* Back in the car.
I asked if the address was not the street I found her on. She said yes. So, back we went. I was just going to take Helli down the street and knock on every stupid door until I found where this dog lived. Luckily, as I was trying to convince our new friend that I was sure she lived the OTHER way on the street, my phone rang! It was the owner! Yay!
So, I walked her there, he came down and met me. He was very happy to see her. I had found her almost right outside her house. (Doh, sorry for kidnapping your dog) He said the gate was accidentally left open, and as soon as they realized she was gone they started looking. I apologized profusely for stealing his dog. We talked further. Turns out, they didn't notice she was gone until a full hour and a half after I picked her up. He was really glad I had, he said she tends to just wander, and he's always afraid she'll get hit by a car. (*whew* no dognapping charges)
We finally got to come back home to our dogs, at 11. I was feeding them breakfast, finally, and Helli did something, I popped up and swung around too fast and slammed my head into the wall. ouch. (I have no idea what she was doing, either I momentarily blacked out and missed it, or the memory was smashed right out of my head)
I have decided, probably, that my hand isn't broken, and that I did a GOOD thing, by picking up miss Abby and returning her, instead of just letting her wander around the street. But my hand hurts, a lot. And now my head hurts - a lot. Are we done with today yet? I'd like to just call it time served and move on to tomorrow please.
