I was lying on my side on the sidewalk somewhere (who knows where) in Northern New Jersey just outside of the gate of the only less than perfectly kept house in the subdivision. Lying still and on my side, I was able to reach out and grab the plastic bag that held advertising circular on the walkway leading to the house up to my chest. Then moving as slowly as possible, pulling the bag to me, I then managed to reach down and rip a piece of newspaper without making any discernable noise. I put the piece of paper into my mouth and began to chomp loudly.
“Yum,” I said in an exaggerated voice. “Mmmm!” I ripped off another piece and held it out in front of me, as if to say, "You want some?" I ate another piece of paper. Nothing.
Two hours ago I had leaped out of my car in such a hurry that I left it running with the radio on and the door open and I wondered how long I could lie here on the sidewalk eating newspaper before I ran out of gas. What would I do then?
Just then the owner of the house came around the corner, coming back home, and stood over me.
“I’m not comfortable with you doing this here,” he said.
“Neither am I,” I replied.
No, I wasn’t comfortable. I had been up all night, circling around and around some neighborhood. I had put up fliers on just about every post and sign. I had enlisted a troop of high suburban teenagers who needed an assignment, but, perhaps not surprisingly, they lacked the determination and stick-to-ness that one needs in these situations.
At 7 AM I had gotten a call on my cell phone that there had been a Ricky sighting at a specific address, which I was able to find, miraculously, in these days right before GPS became a common device.
It was a cop on duty who placed the call.
“There he is,” the cop said, pointing to the steps of the less than perfect house. “That’s him right?”
“Yes. Thank you,” I said. I was anxious to move in and stay close to Ricky.
“Your sign said something about a reward,” he said.
“You have to catch him to get the reward,” I replied. With that, he took off. Cop on duty, damn it, wanted a reward.
When I put up the signs that said, “Wanted: Lost Dog. Reward,” I had not specifically added any text about the exact requirements for the reward. I think the capture or information leading to the capture of the dog would be fair enough, sort of standard verbiage, but the cop left prior to his capture, so I figured he was not entitled to anything. Plus, he was on duty. And, furthermore, he was a shithead, whether or not that has any legal ramifications or not. I did appreciate the call, of course.
I spent the next hour and a half circling the house, back yard, front yard, sidewalk, chasing Ricky Riccardo around the house, careful not to get so close that he would take off. Traffic was picking up now, as people went off to work and workers in pick ups moved in to kill any weeds who might have survived the nightly Roundup spray. Ricky and I no longer had the neighborhood to ourselves and thestatus quo (me driving around seeing him every 4 or 5 hours, he running randomly around the subdivision) would not hold.
When he sat down on the doorstep, I plopped down on the sidewalk. I couldn’t move toward him: he would bolt. And I couldn’t leave: he might bolt. After hours circling the house, the stand off on the doorstep lasted half an hour, time enough for the wife inside the house to call her husband, who came back from work and walked about the corner, when we had our exchange about our comfort zones vis-à-vis his messy sidewalk and my runaway dog.
“You need to stop this,” he said.
“I would love to stop this,” I replied, “and you see that dog there? He’s a runaway and I’m trying to catch him. If you could call your wife and asked her to open the door, I bet he would run in and we could catch him.”
He said, “Humpf!” and turned and walked straight down the walkway, causing Ricky to bolt around to the back yard. The homeowner went into his house and slammed the door and I followed Ricky into his back yard.
In the prior 12 hours circling the neighborhood I had met many concerned citizens. While they all seemed to hate weeds with a passion bordering on pathological, they did seem to like dogs. The people in this house that Ricky picked to make camp at, they neither seemed to be loyal Roundup customers or enthusiastic dog owners, the only ones in the neighborhood who seemed to hate dogs. Ricky, it seems, could really pick 'em.
“Please state the nature of the emergency,” the operator must have said.
“I have some kind of person lying on my sidewalk eating newspaper,” he would have replied, while I had moved onto the hiding behind the only tree in his backyard and Ricky had moved to the side porch.
When the police officer arrived I was happy to see it was not the same one who hit me up for a reward. With a “let me handle this” attitude that one likes to see in others when you haven't slept for 24 hours, he went into the homeowner’s house and came back out with a plan.
“When I open the door to the side porch, the dog will not be able to go into the back yard. You will stand here and block his escape back to the street. I don’t want him to bite me, so you grab him."
“Got it. Fair enough.” I was completely ready to get bit.
Show time: I had only one chance to get him. If he slipped past me again, it was either his death or another 12 hours circling and who knows what else.
He ran. I dove, landed on him. His teeth landed squarely in my bare forearm. Clutching the wiggling little guy tightly to my chest as he repeatedly took chunks out of my arm I ran down the walkway, back to the street, and fell face forward through the open door of my car, let him go and slammed the door. Mission accomplished.
Brushing off some blood with the rest of the curricular, I went back to thank the good officer for a job well done.
At that point, I had been in the dog business for about 2 months. Business was humming along so nicely I bought a van. First night out in my new van, I made a stop in New Jersey, defying my protocols and regulations. Ricky got passed me.
If you bring hundreds of dogs from New York City to Upstate New York, some interesting and perhaps amusing things will happen. You’ve got about 300 miles, as many as 25 dogs in and out of the van, a real piece of crap Ford van (it sucks), 25 customers, and, most importantly, my dumb ass. Something will, over the course of a year, go wrong.
Interesting and amusing means something went wrong.