A funny story
May. 22nd, 2015 07:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anigoBut first a couple of back stories.
About, jeeze, I don't know, it seems like 100 years ago but maybe 5? About 5 or so years ago my father in law had a stroke. Actually he had two strokes. The first one was a doozie, but he recovered fairly well. The second one didn't bother him too much physically but it totally changed his personality. He was never a warm fuzzy kind of guy, but after the second stroke he turned into a verbally abusive sonofabitch. Just plain nasty. My MIL comes from the era and had an upbringing that supports the theory that "in sickness and in health and till death do us part" is law, and crap she puts up with a LOT.
We have a wood stove in our rec room. It keeps the house toasty from about mid November until, well, It's 8 degrees and rainy out and it's keeping me toasty now. To run this wood stove requires a decent amount of wood. Luckily my inlaws have about 40 acres of woodlot in the middle of nowhere. Yay, free wood. Unfortunately, however, you don't just push a button and the wood magically cuts itself down, splits itself, and transports itself the 100 or so kilometers to my home. (Actually, for the most part, Dickie does that, so yeah, maybe it does.)
Chapter 1
Last Thursday, over a week ago, Dickie and I and his mom and dad were at their woodlot felling trees and preparing firewood when from out of the blue this beautiful German Shepherd wandered by. So, to be clear, the woodlot is easily 10k from the nearest house. And this German Shepherd was beautiful. Well behaved and friendly. And THIN. We marveled at the fact that this dog would have wandered over 10k to get here and knowing that there are coyotes and other wild animals in the area, we weren't comfortable leaving her in the middle of nowhere, so my MIL took her home, despite the fact that my FIL didn't want anything to do with the dog. He cursed a blue streak at my MIL, but my MIL wouldn't give in, she couldn't leave it there. (She stopped to check at all of the houses along the way, with no luck) while Dickie and I stopped at all of the public buildings (the local co-op, the local restaurant, the local gas station) to see if anybody knew of a lost dog. It's a very small community. Everybody knows everybody. A couple of people had seen the dog running around, but nobody knew who it belonged to and nobody knew of anybody who owned a shepherd.
Chapter 2
We went home and Dickie posted on the Book of Face that he'd found a dog and that if anybody knew anything about it they should PM him. He also encouraged people to share the post. We needed to go back in a couple of times to correct the settings on the post so people could share it. Apparently while I'm very good at posting humourous comments of the Book of Face, when it comes to actually doing anything productive I need a few lessons. The post got shared quite a bit, but nobody had any clue who the dog belonged to. And honestly, that didn't hurt my feelings too badly. My MIL lives on a beautiful, huge piece of property in the middle of nowhere with no friends and a husband who berates her every waking moment. A sweet young shepherd for her to focus on in the short, or even long term wouldn't hurt my feelings.
Chapter 3
My MIL continues to house this beautiful German Shepherd at her home with her own dog and cat. Things seem to be going well for a while until a couple of days in, out of nowhere, the Shepherd attacks my MILs dog. My MIL reaches in to separate the two and receives a bite that requires stitches. The dog also steals a significant amount of groceries off of the counter. My MIL decides that keeping this dog isn't an option and wants to take it to the local shelter since nobody seems to have lost a dog nor are there any bites on Dickie's post. It looks like this might be an abandoned dog and it's not a dog that gets along with her animals so it might be time to let the authorities take over. My FIL, on the other hand, has grown attached to the dog and despite the fact my MIL now has stitches he refuses to give up the dog. Another day or two later, the dog again attacks my MIL's dog, and Dickie tells my FIL in no uncertain terms that the dog can't stay. My MIL plans on taking the dog to the shelter in the morning.
Chapter 4
That evening (last night) there is a message on our home phone. It's a girl named Danielle and could we call her back? Dickie calls her, gets her voice mail, and encourages her to call him back on his cell. She never returns her call.
Chapter 5
That night I have an epiphany. Any messages that you get on the Book of Face from somebody who isn't your friend goes to your junk mail. This morning I check Dickie's junk mail, and lo and behold there are a dozen messages from a dozen different people, including Danielle, the owner of the dog. He sends her a message saying he's left her a message and that his mom has the dog and leaving her everybody's phone number. The dog jumped out of a truck 4 days before we found it, about 100 kms away.
Chapter 6
This afternoon somebody comes to my MILs home and picks up the dog. The reunion is complete.
It all sounds like a great story. But there are things that bug me. Dickie tried hard to find the owner of this dog. There were no postings on the standard places - lost dog network, the SPCA etc. On Danielle's Book of Face, she did post to her friends that the dog had been lost. The day after we found her, so a week ago, somebody pointed her to Dickie's posting, which was when she started messaging him. It took her a full week before she bothered to look up our phone number. (Dickie's name is on his Book of Face profile and he's the only person with that name in the country. Literally. And we're in the phone book, including our street address. It's not that hard.) Meanwhile, she's complaining on the Book of Face that Dickie refuses to return her messages. The conversation gets to a place where somebody actually suggests calling the police to get the dog back. (um, hello. If we would have saw your messages we would have contacted you in a heartbeat. Have you heard of the phone?) On top of that, when Dickie called her back last night, she never returned his call.
For those of you who are animal lovers. If you lost your dog... if I lost my dog, the first thing I would do is post the fact it was lost EVERYWHERE. If I had a clue where the dog was I wouldn't sit and text the person for a full week without hearing anything back and just get angry. I would dig deeper, phoning the person, and if that didn't work, I'd show up on their damn doorstep.
Anyway, like I said, the dog has been reunited, my MIL's hand will be as good as new shortly, god's in his heaven and all's right on the earth. But it still tarnishes the shine a bit.
And how was your week?
About, jeeze, I don't know, it seems like 100 years ago but maybe 5? About 5 or so years ago my father in law had a stroke. Actually he had two strokes. The first one was a doozie, but he recovered fairly well. The second one didn't bother him too much physically but it totally changed his personality. He was never a warm fuzzy kind of guy, but after the second stroke he turned into a verbally abusive sonofabitch. Just plain nasty. My MIL comes from the era and had an upbringing that supports the theory that "in sickness and in health and till death do us part" is law, and crap she puts up with a LOT.
We have a wood stove in our rec room. It keeps the house toasty from about mid November until, well, It's 8 degrees and rainy out and it's keeping me toasty now. To run this wood stove requires a decent amount of wood. Luckily my inlaws have about 40 acres of woodlot in the middle of nowhere. Yay, free wood. Unfortunately, however, you don't just push a button and the wood magically cuts itself down, splits itself, and transports itself the 100 or so kilometers to my home. (Actually, for the most part, Dickie does that, so yeah, maybe it does.)
Chapter 1
Last Thursday, over a week ago, Dickie and I and his mom and dad were at their woodlot felling trees and preparing firewood when from out of the blue this beautiful German Shepherd wandered by. So, to be clear, the woodlot is easily 10k from the nearest house. And this German Shepherd was beautiful. Well behaved and friendly. And THIN. We marveled at the fact that this dog would have wandered over 10k to get here and knowing that there are coyotes and other wild animals in the area, we weren't comfortable leaving her in the middle of nowhere, so my MIL took her home, despite the fact that my FIL didn't want anything to do with the dog. He cursed a blue streak at my MIL, but my MIL wouldn't give in, she couldn't leave it there. (She stopped to check at all of the houses along the way, with no luck) while Dickie and I stopped at all of the public buildings (the local co-op, the local restaurant, the local gas station) to see if anybody knew of a lost dog. It's a very small community. Everybody knows everybody. A couple of people had seen the dog running around, but nobody knew who it belonged to and nobody knew of anybody who owned a shepherd.
Chapter 2
We went home and Dickie posted on the Book of Face that he'd found a dog and that if anybody knew anything about it they should PM him. He also encouraged people to share the post. We needed to go back in a couple of times to correct the settings on the post so people could share it. Apparently while I'm very good at posting humourous comments of the Book of Face, when it comes to actually doing anything productive I need a few lessons. The post got shared quite a bit, but nobody had any clue who the dog belonged to. And honestly, that didn't hurt my feelings too badly. My MIL lives on a beautiful, huge piece of property in the middle of nowhere with no friends and a husband who berates her every waking moment. A sweet young shepherd for her to focus on in the short, or even long term wouldn't hurt my feelings.
Chapter 3
My MIL continues to house this beautiful German Shepherd at her home with her own dog and cat. Things seem to be going well for a while until a couple of days in, out of nowhere, the Shepherd attacks my MILs dog. My MIL reaches in to separate the two and receives a bite that requires stitches. The dog also steals a significant amount of groceries off of the counter. My MIL decides that keeping this dog isn't an option and wants to take it to the local shelter since nobody seems to have lost a dog nor are there any bites on Dickie's post. It looks like this might be an abandoned dog and it's not a dog that gets along with her animals so it might be time to let the authorities take over. My FIL, on the other hand, has grown attached to the dog and despite the fact my MIL now has stitches he refuses to give up the dog. Another day or two later, the dog again attacks my MIL's dog, and Dickie tells my FIL in no uncertain terms that the dog can't stay. My MIL plans on taking the dog to the shelter in the morning.
Chapter 4
That evening (last night) there is a message on our home phone. It's a girl named Danielle and could we call her back? Dickie calls her, gets her voice mail, and encourages her to call him back on his cell. She never returns her call.
Chapter 5
That night I have an epiphany. Any messages that you get on the Book of Face from somebody who isn't your friend goes to your junk mail. This morning I check Dickie's junk mail, and lo and behold there are a dozen messages from a dozen different people, including Danielle, the owner of the dog. He sends her a message saying he's left her a message and that his mom has the dog and leaving her everybody's phone number. The dog jumped out of a truck 4 days before we found it, about 100 kms away.
Chapter 6
This afternoon somebody comes to my MILs home and picks up the dog. The reunion is complete.
It all sounds like a great story. But there are things that bug me. Dickie tried hard to find the owner of this dog. There were no postings on the standard places - lost dog network, the SPCA etc. On Danielle's Book of Face, she did post to her friends that the dog had been lost. The day after we found her, so a week ago, somebody pointed her to Dickie's posting, which was when she started messaging him. It took her a full week before she bothered to look up our phone number. (Dickie's name is on his Book of Face profile and he's the only person with that name in the country. Literally. And we're in the phone book, including our street address. It's not that hard.) Meanwhile, she's complaining on the Book of Face that Dickie refuses to return her messages. The conversation gets to a place where somebody actually suggests calling the police to get the dog back. (um, hello. If we would have saw your messages we would have contacted you in a heartbeat. Have you heard of the phone?) On top of that, when Dickie called her back last night, she never returned his call.
For those of you who are animal lovers. If you lost your dog... if I lost my dog, the first thing I would do is post the fact it was lost EVERYWHERE. If I had a clue where the dog was I wouldn't sit and text the person for a full week without hearing anything back and just get angry. I would dig deeper, phoning the person, and if that didn't work, I'd show up on their damn doorstep.
Anyway, like I said, the dog has been reunited, my MIL's hand will be as good as new shortly, god's in his heaven and all's right on the earth. But it still tarnishes the shine a bit.
And how was your week?
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Date: 2015-05-28 07:48 pm (UTC)Poor doggie, I'm surprised he didn't injure himself jumping out of a truck. They didn't say if it was moving??
The girl sounds so flaky, maybe it wasn't even her dog and she just wanted a dog that was cute.
Weird.