Archive for June 15th, 2007

Jun 15 2007

Three Dog Night

Published by under Dogs,Rita

If you count Rita. And I always do, even though she was just an innocent bystander in this latest adventure.

A friend of a friend had rescued two dogs from a bad situation (I didn’t ask for the details; it’s against my happy bunny policy of remaining as ignorant of ickiness as possible) and needed help transporting them to their new home. All I’d have to do is rent a car, drive three hours out of the city, meet FoF and buddy in a McDonald’s parking lot, load dogs into car and drive back to the city to deliver them to their new and improved home.

In retrospect, it doesn’t seem like the brightest idea to meet two stranger-ish guys with two big dogs* at night in a parking lot, especially a McDonald’s one, but two weeks after losing Jed, it seemed like good karma and a good deed. Rita decided to stay home and hang out with Charlie instead – a wise choice. But then, she is smart and beautiful.

FoF provided me with a painstaking list of suggestions and advice along with directions to the Designated McDonald’s, such as “Make sure your cell phone is fully charged” and “Do NOT SPEED, especially on the way back. You don’t want two big dogs freaking out the police”. You’d think I was transporting plutonium across international borders.

Come to think of it, though, rental car places often seem to regard dog hair with the horror usually reserved for hazardous waste. I once rented one which ended up with a liberal coating of Rita fur on the back seat. On returning the car, the agent gazed at the be-furred seats with bemusement and said their vacuum cleaner couldn’t handle the job, but if I’d pay him $100, he’d give it a try. I took it to a carwash instead, where they cleaned it inside and out for about $20. So I paid to do the rental car agency’s job. After that, I made sure to cover up all exposed rental car seating. And now you know, too.

In the end, Operation Dog Transport went without a hitch, despite the discovery that the dogs were in fact quite huge and quite stinky. But they were also quite sweet-natured, and it was a good dog deed indeed.

*Dogs originally advertised as 85 pounds, but turned out to be more like 120+. Don’t we all lie about our weight? Just a little?

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