Kip has this very protective reaction when strange men emerge from nowhere and run at us - and the jingling bells, red costumes, and reindeer horns and hats probably didn't help settle his nerves. He growled ferociously and plunged directly into the oncoming mass of Santas, snarling and snapping and generally menacing everyone.
Santas leapt into the street, flung themselves over hedges, turned and ran the other direction. Still, Kip pinned a couple of them against a brick wall. He has this marvellously effective deep growly woofing thing he does - I call it his Rottweiler bark - and he...was kind of doing that.
Me: Kip! No!
Kip: GRRRRRRRRRRRWOOF!
Santa 1: Lady! Call off your dog!
Me: I'm so sorry! He's protective and I think you all surprised him a little. (Wrangling Kip into something resembling submission).
Santa 2: Not nearly as much as he surprised us!
Me: Kip, sit!
Kip: (sits)
Me: He's usually very sweet, but he doesn't like people to be suddenly running at us. Even Santas.
Santa 1: (brushing himself off) Huh. Well, he looks a lot smaller now that he's sitting down. Kind of cute, actually.
Me: Yes, he's what the insurance companies call an attractive nuisance. Are you all right?
Santa 2: Sure, no harm done.
Me: Are you sure? I'm really sorry. I just didn't expect there to be a bunch of jogging Santas.
Santa 1: Well, let that be a lesson to you.
The Santas wished us a Merry Christmas with pretty convincing equanimity and we continued on our way. After about twenty minutes, I noticed that Kip was trailing behind a little. I turned to see what was holding him up. It was a little dog, a cute little scruffy-looking Chihuahua mix of some sort, with a feathery little bass clef for a tail. He looked dirty, and seemed to be smeared with jam. He and Kip were getting along pretty well, so I enticed him close with a treat from my pocket. He grabbed the treat but then danced out of reach. He wasn't wearing a collar.
I waited until someone came outside with a trash bag full of wrapping paper.
Me: Hey, I'm sorry to bother you, but do you recognize this dog?
Guy: Sure, I see him running around all the time. But he's got an owner - you can tell, because he looks so groomed.
Me: (looking at the smears of jam, the scruffy coat, the muddy paws) Groomed? But he's covered with something. Jam, or jelly.
Guy: Yeah. So he must belong to somebody nearby. Just keep walking, he'll go home.
I confess I was not persuaded by that logic. Kip and I started walking, and the jam dog followed us. And followed us, and followed us.
We were a threesome until we came to the local elementary school, where a second little scruffy dog came tearing across the playground and joined my canine entourage. Like the first, he had no collar, seemed friendly enough, and was inclined to follow us as we walked. He was a poodle-terrier mix, a real cutie, smaller than Kip but bigger than the jam dog.
We started making a six-block circuit in hopes of running into someone who was obviously looking for a dog. Midway through our third pass, we picked up a Shetland Sheepdog, who had a collar but no tags. The situation was becoming desperate.
A police car slowed near us - hope surged! Maybe they were helping someone find their lost dog? Or maybe they were just going to admonish me for the off-leash dogs I seemed to be walking? But no. "Those are a bunch of really cute dogs!" the cop said as he rolled by. Well, dang.
We walked up and down the block a few times, the leashless dogs frolicking with Kip and evidently having a lovely time. I asked the few people I saw on the street if they recognized the dogs, and everyone acknowledged that they had seen them before but didn't know exactly where they came from.
FINALLY, as we came down the street for the fifteenth (or maybe even the sixteenth) time, we spotted a lady wandering around with a leash, calling for "Prince," who turned out to be scruffy little cute dog #2. She also referred us to the correct address for the Sheltie, whose name was Jabberwocky, and who was happy to be reunited with his people.
A few blocks later, several kids emerged from an alley and recognized the scruffy jam dog. His name is evidently Peanut, and to my relief, he belonged to one of the kids, who collected him and took him home.
We had spent almost forty minutes circling the same several blocks, so we were pretty much done - plus, Kip had expended a good amount of energy defending me from the Santas. Our way home took us down 34th Street, which is the street with all the lights and inflatable snowglobes and hubcap trees and whatnot. We stopped near my favorite yard - the robot nativity scene - and I was just noticing that they have added a realistic-looking animatronic Santa when several things happened all at once:
1) A man emerged from behind one of the robots with a large electric panel and flipped a switch,
2) The lights came on,
3) The animatronic Santa started dancing and singing "Jingle Bells,"
4) Kip did the Rottweiler bark again as he flew over the small fence and latched onto the animatronic Santa, growling and savagely shaking its rubbery arm, a silvery blur of rage.
The man was really very nice about the whole thing.
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| All tuckered out after today's adventures. See? Just a sweet little dog after all. |
2 comments:
Well you had a real boring time today,didn't you?
Yep, same old same old. Attacked by horde of Santas and animatronic singing robots, became the pied piper of Hampden, whatever.
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