Whitewater
09-10-2008, 11:53 PM
Luckily, we got him back. But DANG . . .
So I'm sitting here, cooking dinner, when I hear Fiance from the back yard. 'Hon?' he says. I yell from the office (which has windows that lead to the back yard) "What?"
And he says "I need your help, Fish [the cat] got out and now he's somewhere around here and I can't find him."
Lovely. Our house fronts a busy two lane road, and backs into an alley, where not moments before people had been driving. Fish is strictly an indoor cat because he has no front claws and because of his ear and he has absolutely no sense of how to stay alive in 'the wild'. Needless to say, I was worried. I have an imagination and boy oh boy, not only was I seeing visions of cat tartar all over the road but Fish and Fiance have been with each other for 12 years, since Fish was a bitty kitten, and they are devoted to each other. To lose Fish like that would have been more than Fiance could stand.
I was more worried when I threw some shoes and a jacket on, grabbed a pouch of Fish's favorite cat food, and went outside to meet Fiance. That man looked like death warmed over and was contributing to the problem because of course the cat was sensing his utter tenseness and quite naturally wanted to be far, far away from that sort of thing.
After a few moments, when I realized that searching for a grey and white cat in the dark would be utterly futile, I went back inside and grabbed our older poodle, Roxie. I had trained her to 'find' certain things and people as the first step towards possibly entering her in an AKC tracking contest. She knew what 'Find the Kitty!!!' meant (I trained her to hunt for the cat because Fish likes to hide and sometimes I need to know that he's still inside the house) and immediately led me out the backdoor, out the back gate, and down the alleyway.
Within seconds, she'd located Fish, who was making friends with the black and white stray cat we see around here occasionally. Thank goodness!!!
I called to Fiance "We found him" and after that we spent a few minutes convincing Fish to head back to our house, which he eventually did. Once Fish was back in the yard, Fiance scooped him up and we all went back inside, where Roxie got loads more of praise and some roasted pork as a reward. She was very proud of herself!
As if the new dog's chewing and mannerless habits weren't enough pet stress this week! But luckily all's well that ends well and nothing bad happened.
Still quite a fright!
Whitewater
So I'm sitting here, cooking dinner, when I hear Fiance from the back yard. 'Hon?' he says. I yell from the office (which has windows that lead to the back yard) "What?"
And he says "I need your help, Fish [the cat] got out and now he's somewhere around here and I can't find him."
Lovely. Our house fronts a busy two lane road, and backs into an alley, where not moments before people had been driving. Fish is strictly an indoor cat because he has no front claws and because of his ear and he has absolutely no sense of how to stay alive in 'the wild'. Needless to say, I was worried. I have an imagination and boy oh boy, not only was I seeing visions of cat tartar all over the road but Fish and Fiance have been with each other for 12 years, since Fish was a bitty kitten, and they are devoted to each other. To lose Fish like that would have been more than Fiance could stand.
I was more worried when I threw some shoes and a jacket on, grabbed a pouch of Fish's favorite cat food, and went outside to meet Fiance. That man looked like death warmed over and was contributing to the problem because of course the cat was sensing his utter tenseness and quite naturally wanted to be far, far away from that sort of thing.
After a few moments, when I realized that searching for a grey and white cat in the dark would be utterly futile, I went back inside and grabbed our older poodle, Roxie. I had trained her to 'find' certain things and people as the first step towards possibly entering her in an AKC tracking contest. She knew what 'Find the Kitty!!!' meant (I trained her to hunt for the cat because Fish likes to hide and sometimes I need to know that he's still inside the house) and immediately led me out the backdoor, out the back gate, and down the alleyway.
Within seconds, she'd located Fish, who was making friends with the black and white stray cat we see around here occasionally. Thank goodness!!!
I called to Fiance "We found him" and after that we spent a few minutes convincing Fish to head back to our house, which he eventually did. Once Fish was back in the yard, Fiance scooped him up and we all went back inside, where Roxie got loads more of praise and some roasted pork as a reward. She was very proud of herself!
As if the new dog's chewing and mannerless habits weren't enough pet stress this week! But luckily all's well that ends well and nothing bad happened.
Still quite a fright!
Whitewater