Harry Thompson's Day Off

We left Harry and Honey home on Easter Sunday while we traveled up to the Sacramento area to see my son and his family.

Harry is Jewish, and he doesn't really care about missing out on Easter since it doesn't include matzo balls. He also takes his guard dog responsibilities fairly seriously and patrols constantly from the time we leave until we return home, only taking short breaks for naps once in a while.

Honey is agnostic and doesn't ever worry about things above her pay grade. She is perfectly content napping in one of her favorite spots, barking at dogs that pass by the window, and just being "chill" until we come back.

We left at noon and didn't arrive home again until after 8 PM. That was a fairly long time to leave them home alone, but I was pretty sure they were fine. I start getting anxiety feelings about the time we need to return home. I always worry that something has gone wrong. (I start to obsess over things like: what if they knocked over the water bowls? What if they got out of the yard? What if a prowler came and Harry ate him? What if they bark constantly the whole time we are gone?)

People tell me I worry too much about things that never happen. I do worry that something might go wrong because it's my nature. I don't like leaving my dogs home alone. Sometimes we will take Harry and Honey with us, but since there were going to be 20+ people for Easter dinner, including 7 children and two resident dogs, I felt it would be a bit much to show up with our dogs.

When we got home, everything looked normal. Harry was a little more hyper than usual, but I figured that was because he missed us. I saw that we had several phone messages and I checked them. One call had come from my next-door neighbor, Mary, and she asked that I call her as soon as we got home.

When I called her, Mary told me that Harry had spent all afternoon outside by himself in the neighborhood. He came to her gate and barked for Dutch and Sansom, her two dogs, to come out and play. Mary let her dogs out and the three of them ran wild in the front yard for a while, then Harry moved on to the next house down the street where there was a barbecue in full swing. The people having the party are Dean and Rene. They greeted Harry like an old friend and he hobnobbed with them and their guests for the rest of the afternoon. Harry was delighted to entertain the children and keep the area clean if food fell on the ground. He's good like that.

Dean said that Harry "zapped" a squirrel in the yard to the amazement of all of the party attendees. It was over in a second and the squirrel party crasher never had a chance.

Harry went back to Mary's and again tried to get Dutch and Sansom to come out and play, but it was getting late so Mary brought Harry home and put him in the back in our yard.

I apologized profusely but Mary said it was no problem at all. Harry had a great day visiting with friends, and keeping down the rodent population. (When I have seen Mary's dogs outside of their yard without an owner, I have always returned them home immediately. I think Mary is more liberal than I am.)

I still have no idea how Harry got out of the backyard. We have a 7 foot iron fence and he didn't jump over it. When I tried to talk to him about danger and responsibility, he just yawned.

He had a great day, but all the barbecue gave him the runs. Serves him right.