The Foster Chronicles: Buffy, Week 3

Day 1

Remarkably, I refrain from texting or calling my babysitters 1,000 times during the day.

Buffy is doing well at Wa’s house, though she won’t go near the Scary Man (my brother-in-law, who Violet has always been terrified of, despite his being a totally righteous human being).

Buffy is a super-snuggly bunny with my sister. Won’t leave her side. My nieces and nephew are delighted to have Buffy around and, on their errand to Target, ask their mother to buy her a bed. She says no.

Day 2

Wa takes Buffy on a 3-mile run. Buffy is a runner.

My girlfriends and I are late getting back from Georgia, so my sister meets Redford’s sitter at my house and gets Redford and Buffy settled inside. I pick up Violet, who wags herself in circles, from my other friend’s house.

I talk to my sister on the phone. “If it were up to me, I wouldn’t have brought her back to you,” she says. “The Scary Man is unmoved by her cuteness.”

Day 3

On our neighborhood walk, Buffy poops! While on the leash! Right in the middle of the street…? Close enough. I’ll take it.

Buffy has not yet figured out the outside-bell system, but Redford and Violet are back in the swing. On one jaunt outdoors, they sprint off the deck to corner a white miniature poodle in the yard. I’m just wondering how it got in there when the pits get too rough with it and—schloop—it squeezes between the slats of the deck rail. Buffy, naturally, vaults the gate and gives chase. I call her back, and she comes. After spending years with dogs who have selective deafness, I do not understand this. But I appreciate the crap out of it.

After dark, the dogs notice a dude walking by the house and SOUND THE ALARM. All of them. My foster dog is not a mute.

Day 4

Redford gets so excited about the treat that Buffy is about to receive for getting in her crate that he crawls into it first. But she too is motivated to get the treat, so she wiggles her way in there. For a moment, there’s 137 pounds of pit bull in a kennel made to hold 60.

On our neighborhood walk, Buffy poops! While on the leash! In the grass by the side of the road! But she doesn’t get it all quite out and hops in circles with a turd halfway out her butt. I put a bag over my hand and grab it, but she gets poop on her butt cheeks and legs. She gets a sponge bath when we get home.

I post on CCB‘s foster parents’ page:

Unlike my dogs, Buffy plays real-live Fetch. Like, she brings the ball back to you and drops it, instead of trotting around the yard with it or shredding it to pieces. Totally potty-trained now. Still snuggly as all-get-out. She’s a wonder-dog really.

Day 5

Not totally potty-trained. Dammit.

Day 6

Buffy chews through her collar while I’m at work. It looks like maybe it got caught on the crate and she pulled away until she could get at it. I buy a new one, size Medium. Fifty to 55 pounds is Medium, right? Nope. My medium-sized dog has a large-sized neck.

Day 7

When I return from the gym, there’s resistance against the door and a sound I don’t understand. I push the door open further to find shattered glass and a half-dozen rawhide sticks all over the kitchen floor, drops of blood on some of the shards, and Buffy standing there looking antsy. I check her paws and mouth. Just one drop of blood on her snout. Can’t find the source. I put her outside with the other dogs and try to figure out what happened.

Her crate is overturned, but the doors are still locked. One of the latches is open, and the top of the door bent. The best I can guess is she opened the latch and squeezed out through the top of the door.

It’s clear that once she executed her escape, she went to the kitchen, knocked the cookie jar off the counter, and ate more than half a jar of biscuits and rawhides.

I know she’ll have a belly ache from all the snacks, but mainly I’m concerned that she’s swallowed shards of glass. I put her in her crate and commence fretting.