Animoush: March 2019

So I was talking to somebody and mentioned transporting animals, saw their blank face and realized I have not really mentioned what I've been doing with said transporting.
It's not unlike a witness protection program (thanks, Megan!).

Great Pyr, no crate big enough.

Then she stood up .

Someone picks up the dogs or cats, meets me at a public spot like McDonald's, hands over the crates and paperwork, and then I drive them to the vet, the new foster, or another vehicle in a long day's journey. We give them new names and set them up with a new life and family who love them. And the rescue orgs actually even monitor how the placement is going.

Amazing. Shortest trip was 25 minutes, longest so far is 2.5 hours (Morgantown to Hagerstown, MD, where they traveled on to Boston).

The people who run these things are saints. Absolutely sainted people. And many have been doing it for over 30 years and most are in their brilliant and wise third age.

Thank god I'm not at the segment of the chain that actually collects the dogs from their surroundings. Our own dog Mica was in a hoarding situation and has some big anxiety because of it (I thought I ate fast).

Rendezvous van, 3 rows x 4 = 12... And that's just in the back.

I have learned a few things.

Never take the big dog out of the crate first to pee. You will not get him back in, and the little pugs and chihuahuas will hate you.
Wear warm clothing even if you're in the car most of the time. You do a lot of standing around while paperwork is filled out. Plus sometimes you need all the windows wide, wide open...
You may worry that the smell of cat pee will be ungodly, but their poop is far, far worse. See windows, above.

My usedta be pristine Subie.

Dogs like symmetry as much as the next animal.

Jasper peed on my left front bumper. A few minutes later he came back to pee on the right one.

And one I just realized: The uniform is not unlike the one I wear for bee-routing.

Bee routing

Animal transport

Hmmm.

So my latest round was a puppy who'd been found with motor oil covering her head.
I was about ready to track down the perps and pour motor oil on their heads when a coordinator remembered that she'd heard as a kid that people put motor oil on animals to treat mange.
This helped.
So one of the many kind folks in the chain cleaned the pup off, passed her on to a boyfriend of a transporter who was sick, and then I met him about 90 minutes away.
I found both dude and dog in the back of his car, cuddling up. She was covered in mange, her skin so raw it was bleeding in places. "She's such a sweetheart," said vounteered-guy. I thanked him and counted him as a new volunteer for life.

Instead of putting her in my crate I knew she had to sit right next to me.

She was in such pain that she leaned against the seat so her belly could get some air. She also had a fever. It was hard not to make all over her but I knew it would hurt if I touched her too much. So I just scritched her ears.
Finally she just started staring at me, like she had finally noticed what was going on.
Then she crawled across the bucket seat and laid her head in my lap, where she stayed the rest of the trip.
The next day, the Great Pyrenees rescue woman called to say that when she was posting the successful rescue to FB, someone else posted another picture of the same dog.
Only it wasn't the same dog.
It was her lookalike sibling.
I repeated the whole routine the very next day. I called them Punch and Judy.
I'll spare you the worst pictures but it was the most extreme case of mange I've ever seen.
Then I took them to the vet.

Judy airing her belly and leaning against the wall.

You know in the movies where the protagonist walks into a room and everyone's in hazmat suits except her?

Punch gets the once-twice-thrice over.

I was sitting on the floor, each dog's head in my lap, when two vets in masks and gowns walked in.

Oh, I stuttered, stupidly realizing what anyone else would have wondered immediately:
Are they contagious?
Several scrapings later (which caused the pups to howl) the verdict was in. It was the non-contagious kind.

I found out later when telling the story to Ann that I should have led with that.

Punch was agitated on the drive up.
I calmed him down and he got quiet. Got a little smug about that.
Moments later I discovered the source of the agitation when a giant poop smell wafted over the car.
In the vet parking lot I cleaned it up (Newbie! Didn't lay down the pee pads right! No paper towels in the car!).
The receptionist gave me cleaning supplies and even took the trash from me. Saints all along the animal railroad.

Three days later they were already better. When their skin was not as red and Judy's UTI was on the mend (hence the fever), it was bath time!

Would love to have this for my driver license picture....

Fluffy fluffy puppy!

Before (Punch).

After

One last thing:
At the vet's, when I hauled them back out to the car, one in a crate, the other in the assistant's arms, I saw that it was snowing.
And I hadn't eaten yet.The road back to Arthurdale is very curvy and the snow was coming down so hard I had to keep my lights on low beam.
I thought to myself, piteously, never have I desired nor deserved a glass of wine so much.
I turned on the radio to ease my mind but then flipped it off to listen to the silence and watch the snow. So quietly I wasn't even sure of it right away, the car filled with the soft, steady sounds of snoring, passed-out puppies.