About a week ago I was on the top of Runyon Canyon connecting a woman to her lost chocolate Lab named Koop. Twelve minutes later I had my five dogs in the back of the car, chasing after a lost chihuahua mutt that took off across Mulholland Drive and into the hills. We kept pace from a distance for about two miles, up and down and around the multi-million dollar neighborhood till she came upon a dead end (a mansion's gilded gate) and burrowed under a dumpster. Tried everything to get that (scared shitless) rascal out of there, but finally the owner miraculously showed up (Runyon folk must have pointed her in the right direction) and pulled her out.
Yesterday I had a small pack up at Runyon and I was just saying to myself - I really need this to be an uneventful day today, what with the insomnia last night and the night before - when I twisted my ankle and went down palms first so as not to do an elbow or face plant. I cursed LOUD and skid a short distance on the concrete/gravel trail and the three dogs with me turned and came running to my rescue. They hovered and licked at me till I regained composure, then kept checking on me just to make sure.
40 minutes later after traversing the full trail I got a phone call that Charlie the Maltese was sick as a, well, a dog and could I take him to the vet. After getting the rescue dogs home and nearly running out of gas (and a nice big tally for a fill-up, thank you very little) I got the dog to the vet and back and saw eight other clients before my day was done.
Today I took a rambunctious crew to Runyon and got through the hike without too much silliness. I was convinced it was finally going to be a normal day...till I dropped off two of the dogs in their Coldwater Canyon upscale hood and then saw two Bull Terriers wandering the street like they were out on the town. Construction workers didn't want anything to do with them. I pulled over, five cars didn't, then another did and this tanned tall fella and I corralled these two nosey dogs (which wasn't hard in this case - I think they wanted to get in to the dog car with my pack and go anywhere) and called their owner. While waiting for the dogs' dad, the boy dog (who was not fixed) humped the girl dog and we noticed the boy's name was Mucker. Yeah, little futher mucker...
And then dad arrived in a convertible Rolls Royce!
And later I saw six other clients including the Maltese who was back to his (nine month) old self.
Why can't I get rid of this belly-ache and headache?