On to Sunday morning, around 11:00. We’re eating breakfast in the kitchen.

Lee (glancing out the front window): Why are there two wolves in our front yard?

Me and the girls: What?!

Lee went outside to see what was happening (we still didn’t see anything). We shut the door and hoped he’d be fine.

We saw him go down the driveway and then come back up followed by two giant huskies. We had no idea whose they were.  He came back inside and the dogs moved up to sitting on our front porch.  Lee went back out again to check their collars for identification because they truly were nice domesticated dogs. But no luck – collars, but no tags.

It was very wet and rainy and the dogs were very muddy and clearly lost.  We still remember one time our dog got out in the neighborhood and someone came around with him, going door to door in an effort to find his owner, so we felt we should do the same. But we weren’t confident about walking in the rain with these two giant animals on leashes (especially me since I’m not a huge fan of big dogs). So we decided to put our dogs upstairs with Jenny and let these guys into our backyard while Reagan and I went door to door searching for their owners – with pictures of the dogs on my phone. And to save a little time in the rain (although I’ll admit I sat in the car while Reagan went up to each door), we only stopped at homes with fenced in yards because we assumed the dogs would need a big fenced yard.

We went up and down to streets with no success, but we did notice a home not far from us on the street behind us had a tall fence and an open gate, so we thought we might have found the right house even though the owners weren’t home. And neither were their neighbors. And strangely enough, there was another chicken in their front yard. Not the same one we saw Saturday night, but a different one.  Maybe these people were just having trouble with their fence and keeping their animals contained?

Reagan and I went home and told Lee about our findings. We also checked with another neighbor to see if they knew anyone in the neighborhood with huskies. Another negative answer, but they said what we were saying at this point – maybe we should walk the dogs back over towards that house and see if they went into the backyard. We’d hit the point where this seemed unfair to our dogs who were going crazy knowing there were stranger dogs in the backyard, and we felt like we’d made a good effort to find their home. So Reagan and her friend started herding the dogs back behind the house towards that other house. I got in my car to drive around to there instead of cutting through backyards. And because, you know, rain.

What did I find when I got around to that house? Chaos! What looked like two wolves chasing a chicken that was trying to fly away from them! Reagan and her friend flapping their arms and freaking out because the dogs were chasing the chicken – chased it into the backyard with the open gate, in fact. While the dogs were chasing the chicken, I noticed the neighbors were now home and staring out their front door. The girls went over to ask them if these were their neighbors’ dogs.  Nope.  Oops.  But they didn’t think the chicken belonged to their neighbors either.  While this was going on, the larger of the two dogs walked up to my car with the chicken in its mouth.  So that was that.  I really didn’t know what else to do – I didn’t want to bring the dogs with the dead chicken back home, so I told the girls to get in the car, and we drove off and left it all behind! We tried. We really did.

I do feel bad we weren’t able to find the home of these dogs, but I’m hopeful that they made it home later. Another neighbor came around with them later, trying to find their owners like we did, and I hope they were successful.

Reagan and her friend, who constantly fight even though they’re best friends, finished off the ordeal arguing about whether or not wolves and chickens are enemies. Reagan’s friend felt pretty certain they were based on what they witnessed with the huskies and the chicken. Reagan’s point was that maybe they weren’t enemies because she said it was pretty clear. Wolves do love chickens. To eat. Also, she and Lee really want a husky now.

I’m afraid the day may be lost.

I’m loading the washing machine this morning and thinking, ‘oh, man, that smell is not a wholesome smell.’  I curse my family, then I keep loading.

Oh man, I swear that smell is not even a human smell.  And I’ve only loaded shirts.

Oh, man.

Oh, no.

Wilson crapped on the clothes; it would be just like him.

I pull all the clothes out; I shake all the clothes out.

Nothing.

I look closely, shirt by shirt.

Nothing.

It’s not Wilson.  It’s not even the clothes.

I turn back to the washing machine.  The dread is overpowering, but less so than the smell.

I have a flash of brilliance: get the noseplug.  I credit dozens of poop surprises a la Brinky for this defensive reflex.

And…there are turds in the washing machine.

Cat turds.

The thoughts are coming too quickly, piling on; I try to parse them, with mixed results.

First thought:  Really?

Second thought:  Really.

Third thought:  Which one did it?

Fourth thought:  I should throw both of them in and run it on ‘comforters and bedding’ with ‘extra rinse’ until I get a confession.

Fifth thought:  If they can do this, I wonder if they can be potty-trained?

Final thought:  Really?

I don’t know where the day goes from here.  I’ll be running the washer–empty, except for lots and lots of bleach–for the rest of the morning.  Running the washer and trying to forget.

 

I’m thinking it was this cat:

So how did you start your day?

He let Brinky ninja kick him.

Sit on his back and do whatever he’s doing here.

And love on him.

And then just sit on his head.

It was a fun time that made Brinky a very happy boy. You can tell he’s happy if you look closely for the smile behind that pacifier.

Last night at dinner was an example:

He was actually just taking food from Lee for the purpose of putting it straight into Zondro’s mouth.

Hey dog, do you want some hamburger?

Except that one time when he let Zondro lick all over a french fry and then pulled it back out of his mouth and ate it. It was pretty gross. But I swear that doesn’t happen very often.

Linking up with Liz and KLZ for #iPPP:

 

I was kind of disappointed that Lulu jumped out of Brinky’s crib before I managed to get the picture. But also glad that she got out of his crib. These pictures are so funny.

I’m still laughing at this. Brinky loves his dog a little too much.

Brinky loves all of our animals.

Brinky has moved on to all out kissing Zondro, his favorite toy

Watching the Women’s World Cup game.