I Lost My Dog...Twice in One Day.

I went to Rose and Adrian's place to pick green beech yesterday. It was warm and stormy. Working away the thunder started and I upped it a notch, aware Pip in the car would be scared and panicky. I had placed twenty bunches in big buckets in the van so they could drink while I picked more. Finished finally I tied the ladder and pole on the roof and loaded and looked for Pip.

Gone.

I called I whistled. No Pip. She had been in the back of the van. The cab was barricaded from the back but she had got through before and the windows in the front were wide open to allow air in. She was gone, presumably run off in high alarm because of the prodigious thunder which was loud enough to scare me too.

I called in at the post office and the vet, told them in case someone found her and reported. I rushed home hoping she had found her way there, but knowing when dogs go troppo in thunderstorms they lose all orientation and just run.

I opened the side door to take out the foliage and out jumped Pip. She had crawled in behind the buckets and had been hiding. I can't describe my feeling of relief, so great it was.

I went to the farm, climbed a tricolour beech and sawed the top out of it with a handsaw. Pip was happy in the van and jumped out as I organized the ladder and tools. The sun shone, the sky was clear, I left te door to the van open so she could jump back in if she wished, normally she does after a while exploring, the van is her refuge.

I was up the tree and the clouds quickly rolled in and the thunder started again, very loud. I finished cutting the top off the tree and came down to trim and bunch. I checked the van to see that Pip was safe. She was not there. I called and whistled. No Pip. I continued my work, bunching. No Pip.

I had to catch the fruit shop before it closed and order pizza for tea and shop. I  did this and went back to the farm to look for her. No Pip. I rang Lib, said I couldn't find her. I called on the neighbours, looked everywhere, whistled called. No Pip. I figured she done a runner in total panic at the thunder.

I thought I'd call on the local vets on my way home to report her missing in the hope that she had not been killed on the road by traffic and someone may have taken her to the vet, which is what I would do if I found a panicky dog in a thunderstorm. At the Emerald clinic the receptionist was on the phone and I had to wait. I could hear a dog whimpering in tghe back room. It was a most familiar sound.

"I have lost my dog." I said when the lady got off the phone. "What kind of dog?" she said. "A Jack Russell."

"We have one that a lady brought in a couple of hours ago. Come with me."

Sure enough it was Pip. I can't tell you how relieved I was. Boy o boy has Pip been spoilt this last 30 hours since I found her. She's a beautiful creature and we thought we had lost her.