As soon as Butterfinger returned home from a friend’s house with the dogs he yelled up the steps to me “come down here I need your help”, so of course I obliged and met him at the bottom of the steps. It was not until he asked me to grab the van keys that I realized what had just happened - Tucker and Guapo did not follow him in the house after he returned from a friend’s house, they had taken off running into the night. It was about 9:00 pm when we ripped the van out of the cul-de-sac and took off to find our beloved, and incredibly idiotic, dogs.

They have gotten out about three times prior to this last escapade, once ending up in doggy prison, and drawing on that past experience, Butterfinger knew exactly where to start looking for the escapees. As he is hanging his body out of the window, calling for Guapo and Tucker, I am trying not to break down. All I kept thinking about was how many cars there are, how close we live to the freeway, how freaked out people are by pit bulls, and what if they decided to take another route? It did not take long for us to find a kind neighbor outside washing his car to point us in the right direction of the daring pair running through the night.

With new optimism, and a positive lead that they had indeed taken off in the direction Butterfinger had thought, I sharply turned the van into the next driveway, threw it in reverse, and peeled off down the street, hot on their trail. Grimace powered through the blinding darkness, and we heightened our senses to try to track them down in the same manner as a drug sniffing dog would discover some blow residue on a suitcase.

We confirmed with another person that we were indeed on the right path to finding our canine friends, and as we approached the busy intersection where 7-11 is, we saw two young boys walking. The youngsters had just seen the dynamic duo and said they had taken off toward 7-11 and made a left, right towards the freeway. My heart sank. In my rush I gunned the gas too far and was way over the crosswalk at the traffic signal, and somehow it did not register on the signal device that there was an impatient woman driving a 7000 pound vehicle on a mission to find her lost dogs. We were losing precious time at the light, and Butterfinger jumped out and took off running in the direction that the kids had seen the dogs take off in.

In what felt like an hour later, I had moved back enough for the light to change, and I squealed my tires around as I made the left hand turn and slammed a quick right into the pitch black thrift store/mini strip mall parking lot. I flicked the high beams on and crept around for a minute or two when I heard the jingling chains and I knew they were there! I still could not see them so I kept inching around the lot, and then I saw a small white creature traveling at warp speed toward my car. In that same instant I spotted Guapo running toward the sound of my voice, stalking the smaller creature (a cat I am assuming).

In my excitement I jumped out of the car to grab him and yell for Tucker, and I neglected to put the car into park. So as I am wrangling Guapo in the van, Tucker is running up behind me, and the van is drifting away from me across the parking lot - thank god it was empty! When I had both dogs with me I hoisted my leg up into the van to apply the break, and as if I was in a movie, I hit the gas and the car jolted away from me for a second before I could adjust myself.  My leg was then slammed in the car door and I was slowly drug at about 2 mph down lot until I found the correct pedal.  I finally hit the brake, got the car in park, and practically threw both of the dogs over the front seat into the back for the ride home.

With the dogs safely inside the vehicle I went down the street in the direction that Butterfinger had ran and scooped him up; I have never seen such relief leave a person as I did when I told him I had found the dogs. They were pretty beat up from their trek, and I spent some time after our arrival home scrubbing blood from Grimace’s seats left behind my their open, bleeding pads; they must have been running pretty fast. After spending the night outside I am hopeful that they will think twice before taking off into the night and scaring us to death, but only time will tell. I just thank Buddha, God, Ahura Mazda, Aten, Mithras, or karma, whom/whatever, that they are home, stayed together like the brothers they are, and that they remembered the way to 7-11. Oh thank heaven.

September 13th, 2007 | Adventures with Dogs