Surviving Gus

Gus is our dog.. our gorgeous Shetland sheepdog..whom we love dearly but almost killed me this week. Doesn't he look sweet....

Thursday morning we woke up to no power due the lovely weather and wind storms the night before. Like most people in Indiana we did not lose power during the night per say... we lost power about 15 minutes before Bran gets up each day.. so around 4:45am no power. We dealt with it no big deal. By the time we got home the power was back on. Our backyard is fenced in. The fence is crappy and started falling apart last summer. we rent, so we have notified our landlord who says he will fix it but it hasn't happened. My biggest fear was that eventually a big enough hole will appear in the fence and Gus will get out. So, there wasn't one Thursday morning nor on Thursday afternoon when Brandon got home and checked. Sometimes after that it fell apart without our knowledge. Gus lives on a schedule.. he gets fed at 7am and 5pm. This can vary about 30 minutes but he is a creature of habit to his schedule. He knows after he eats he goes outside. He can go out other times of the day but always after he eats. So Thursday evening I fed him. I rarely go outside with him.. usually I do other things. That day I filled the water bowl reservoir for the animals, went to the bathroom and changed into pjs. It's been about 10 minutes so it is time for him to come inside. Gus 97% of times comes to me as soon as I call for him. Our yard is not big so it takes him about 2 minutes tops to run up to the porch, up the steps, and inside. After calling for a minute and no Gus.. I investigate... there is a huge freaking hole in our fence and Gus has left the yard. I literally ran through the house and out the front door to see if he was out there in my pjs... It was only 5:15pm.. so it was daylight. I may live in a little town but I'm surprised people didn't see me. Bran was getting a hair cut around the corner so I frantically called him as I am pulling on clothes. I got out Gus is gone, hole in the fucking fence, where are you? Bran hung up since he was right outside the house and the search began. We started out by foot going through our neighborhood and moved to driving around the extended neighborhood. I literally was in tears when the train went through the neighborhood.. since Gus loves to bark at the trains. Eventually I found him 2 1/2 blocks from our home wandering around. Not running around crazy like.. kind of strolling down by the church. He thought it was a game when I found him and started dancing away from me. We use the harness leash system. He can maneuver out of a collar and the harness loops around his chest. If he pulls on the lease he doesn't get choked. He also has been wearing an inflatable cone/collar contraption to keep him from biting at a hot spot we are treating. I'm sure if anyone actually saw him they wouldn't have gotten near enough to read his tags since he looked pretty weird. That night we hooked up a stake and lead in our yard, so he can have the freedom of being out but can't go far. That was surviving Gus on Thursday. On Friday.. I got home from work and set down my work bag and put groceries in the kitchen. I forgot that I had chocolate cookies in my work bag. I went to the bathroom (again my down fall!) and noticed Gus had gotten out of his cone/collar thing (which he can do sometimes.) I thought nothing of it. I attempted to find the cookies later to give them to Bran only to realize that Gus had stolen them out of my bag and eaten all 5 very large double chocolate cookies. He ate enough chocolate to either kill him or make him extremely ill. We had the joy of inducing vomit... if you hadn't done that to a dog before but ever need to.. we can give tips. We have done it 3 times in the last year. Gus loves chocolate. He finds it everywhere.. the local park, our home, where ever. I swear he is either trying to kill me or himself. Thank goodness we have gone 48 hours with no other incidents.