Milling Milo

Yesterday, Mom and I decided to see if we could find a parking space downtown and eat at the nearest restaurant.  After we ordered at Hannah Flannagan’s, we noticed a dog running toward us and a couple of men on the corner trying to coax the dog back to the. He was on a missing and crossed (in the crosswalk) toward us. Instead of heading toward the outside seating area where we were the dog took a left and crossed the other street (in the crosswalk). Just as he made it to the corner, he turned around and headed back toward us (not in the crosswalk).  The men were still watching the dog darting around in traffic, so, we decided to try an lure the dog. He had successfully crossed the road several times being missed, somehow.

The brown dog headed toward everyone who called for him, but stayed away from everyone's hand by just that much. After a few more minutes, the darting dog aimed for the glass door to Hannah’s, where Mom was able to grab at his collar and keep him from going anywhere. And I mean everywhere. He stayed right at that door barely moving back to let people exit.  The men from the opposite corner from where we were, came over and said that the dog wasn’t theirs, but one of them had seen the dog wandering around 6-blocks away.

Finally, we were able to get a phone book and get a call into the police (NO, I’m not calling 911, it isn’t an emergency). Within a few minutes, a city cop came up and ‘took charge’ he called animal control and we stood there, Mom with her fingers wrapped around the dog’s collar, which had no tags, me and the cop. A waitress came out with a glass of ice (?) water for the dog and we were able to inch the puppy away from the door so that business could go on as usual. Well as usual as it could go with a dog being kept prisoner a couple of feet from the entrance. One of the guys from the other corner came back over with a leash (that would maybe keep a chihuahua from darting away, forget about this knee-high bruiser). Leash man said, this is a nice looking dog, I know someone who is looking for a good dog…(WHAT? You can’t just TAKE the dog). Well the cop and the leash guy had hit it off and seemed to have everything under control, so Mom and I went to the table to eat what had been delivered who knows how long ago.

We finished our meal and went back over to the other corner, where leash-man worked, where they had taken up residence waiting for the county animal control. Just shooting the breeze, I think we just wanted to make sure this pup didn’t get given away before trying to find its owner. Suddenly, a young man (in the new style of the day with his pants not keeping his derriere warm) said, “Hey, is that dog’s name Milo?” Mom and I said, don’t know. “Milo”. Milo’s head spun around and voile, the dog was named. The new member of our group got on the phone trying to find the owner of the dog, whom he knew. After a few calls, Mom and I, bid out good-byes.

We have no idea how this story ends.  The End

PS. I like to think that:  Animal Control finally came in and picked up the dog. The Cop got the name and telephone number of the owner of the dog. The Leash-guy went home without a dog napped dog. The Friend of the owner went about his business and does not feel guilty about the next line. The Cop and Animal Control contacted the owner,  fined her for no tags on the dog, no leash on the dog and failure to contain a dog, charged her for rabies shots (since there were no tags, first thing they do is give shots) and kennelling the dog until she came to pick it up. The End.