A Runaway Puppy!

One of the more memorable moments that happened this week was that I found a four or five month old puppy that had broken into Riverside. It all started at about 9 am when Patrick, one of the residents, interrupted a meeting which Helen, my boss, and I were having. He had sworn that he had just seen a rat with a pink sweater run down the hallways. Helen thanked him for his input but soon forgot about his declaration when he left. Helen had a lot of administration work to do so I got to lead the morning walking group with Isabel and Hilda, two of the nicest residents in the facility. We were coming the the end of our second hallway when this so called rat came running down the hallway on a collision course with Hilda.
After some quick thinking, on my part, I was able to divert the small creature away from Hilda and attempt to catch it. It was then that I saw it was a puppy. It skirted past me and ran into the kitchen. I finally cornered her and picked her up. She was so petrified that she began to pee everywhere. Here I was with this puppy, holding her as far away as possible, as she peed and made a mess. I put her in one of our back rooms and got her some water. We were at a loss of what to do because it certainly was not a dog of one of the tenants and she had no collar.
I felt terrible for the poor creature. She was so scared and I did not want to call SPCA because a dog pound is not a place to be if you are a puppy. Thankfully at about 1 pm a woman came to Riverside looking for a dog in a pink sweater. Supposedly Isabel had taken a scooter ride downtown and saw this lady frantically looking for her puppy. When I brought the dog out to her, she burst into tears of gratitude. The dogs name was Teeka and what had happened was that she had just gotten a new collar, but the collar was still a bit big for Teeka so when she was tied up outside she slipped out of it and went for a stroll. Seeing the dog reunited with her owner made my week. The bond between dog and owner is incredible and it brought a whole new meaning to ‘man’s best friend’.

Teeka is a cross between a pug and boxer.