Yesterday morning Jango was getting wild as she was playing with the kids and I felt it was time that she went out in the backyard to go potty, since she hadn’t been out since the night before. So Ethan opened the back door and let her out. A little bit later, I put Chewy out in the backyard to go potty, but I don’t recall Jango being right there. She is usually right there when I let Chewy out because she wants to play with him. I just figured she was laying down in the shade somewhere, and thought nothing else of it.
Throughout the day I would look out into the backyard, and I remember thinking that Jango wasn’t running her usual circle, but thought that maybe she was laying down in the shade since it was hot. And with all the weeds in the back I couldn’t SEE that she was laying down in the shade, but thought that she MUST be there. After the kids woke up from their naps I thought that maybe I would let Jango in for a bit since it was really hot by this point and besides, maybe she was thirsty. I opened the door and called for her, but she didn’t come. So I went out to look for her. I went to the side of the house because sometimes she likes to curl up in the gooseberry bed to take a nap, and I saw the side gate wide open and blowing in the breeze! As soon as I saw that, I knew Jango wasn’t anywhere in the yard. I then remembered that Kyle had used the side gate Sunday night to get the trash can out of the backyard and put it on the street since Mondays are trash days. And I had left the lawn mower in the backyard on Saturday and he went out to put it back in the garage. So basically the gate had been wide open since Sunday night, and Jango most likely got out as soon as we let her into the backyard. 🙁
I immediately called Kyle and told him that he hadn’t shut the gate after moving the trash can, and he asked me if Jango got out. I told him that she had and she had most likely been gone for hours. He left work to come home and help find her and I loaded the kids up in the van and started driving around the neighborhood. We drove around for awhile seeing no sign of Jango and I came back home to get the kids some dinner while Kyle continued the search. I called him up to tell him where we were and I suggested that he go to the mini-police station and ask if they had picked her up or something, and if that failed I suggested that he swing by the animal shelter on Lake Mountain Road. Less than 20 minutes later Kyle was home saying that a police officer picked her up this morning and took her to an animal shelter near his work. But they were going to close in half an hour so Kyle didn’t have time to go get her.
Today after work he went to go pick Jango up to bring her home. She was there, and we had to pay a fee to get her back, not to mention the fact that the police officer wrote us up because she was “running at large”, and she wasn’t wearing any tags. So there will be some fines for us to pay because of that, but she’s home and safe and that’s all that really matters right? 🙂