The Tale of Two Dogs (Not even the tip of the iceberg!)

It’s been brought to my attention that I’ve neglected to announce that we got a second dog. Last August! Our Gaston was being such a nuisance and needed SO much attention, that we thought a female playmate would be a great idea. And so Josephine entered the scene.

Fast forward to last week, when they both escaped from the front patio here at our Spanish house. Thankfully, we live on the border of the development and the mountain beyond is mostly green space, so not many cars and not many people.

This was not the first time the gangsters slipped through the gate when someone wasn’t paying attention. They are big opportunists. But they have always come back. Whether after an hour, or two, or three, or even four. But this time, they did not come home. It got dark, they weren’t home. It was time for dinner, they weren’t home. It was time for bed, they weren’t home. We left the gates open, because we KNEW they KNEW the way home. They both have noses that had proven trustworthy before.

I had driven around the neighborhood with my whistle, to no avail. But it was late and we had to let fate take over. Either they had been mangled by wild boars, which we know are prolific on the mountain, or they had attacked someone (really?) and had been injured, or they had gone the wrong way and been hit by a car (but both of them?) or someone had locked them in, either knowingly or not, or we’d hear from the pound when someone took them in and scanned their microchips.

Truth be told, we are struggling with having these two. They are a handful for us and have brought many more issues than we could have imagined. So, in the back of my mind, I had wishes of them just to disappear. Of course, I didn’t want them to suffer, but life would go back to being manageable without them. Of course, I love them both so much, so this was really just a fleeting thought.

Well, we’re up the next morning. The gate is still open and there still are no dogs. I’m thinking I’m going to hell (even though I don’t believe in that stuff) from thinking evil thoughts about them.

So we ease into the morning and around 10:30, I get a post prepared for our local neighborhood Facebook group announcing that we’ve lost our dogs. And not five minutes after posting the announcement, here comes two very dirty, very tired, very happy-to-be-home dogs running at top speed down the lane. Not a word of apology! No explanations of where they were all night! Who knows?

So all was well in the world again. Except that Josephine was licking her paw. And licking and licking and licking. Then she was coughing, licking her mouth, making choking sounds, and licking some more. A few days previous, I had found a very long strand of processionary caterpillars in the street. These are prevalent in Mediterranean climates and nest in the pine trees here. I was scared to death that she had licked one, or sniffed one, or maybe eaten one! They are extremely toxic to dogs (and not good for humans either). But here it was, Saturday night, and I think my dog has encountered these nasty things. I’m in a strange country where I don’t speak the language, have no idea where an emergency vet would be open, and started to cry. Even though I wondered if we would keep Josie long term, it was hell to see her struggle with this. And so we put her to bed and figured either she’d be fine or might suffocate in her sleep from swelling from the possible exposure.

Well, the next morning, I heard her tail on the crate and knew everything was fine. She had stopped licking and was absolutely normal, except she was still very tired from their wild night out.

Now I need to share with you my little escapade with the parade of caterpillars I found on our street. When you find them, you should safely kill them if you can. So into the house I went and found a can of cheap hairspray that was left by the seller of the house. Oh, and a mask for me. I immediately sprayed the long line with the sticky hair care product and that stopped them in their tracks. It also immobilized their fine hairs from becoming airborne. So here I am in the middle of the street, bent at the waist, with my can of hairspray, spraying at these buggers like nobody’s business. It was clear that stickying them up was not going to work alone, so I returned to the house to get the fire starter. I had remembered reading that to truly get rid of them, they need to be burned.

So here I am, giving them a good dose of spray, then incinerating them with the flame. Well, the big brutes among them just kept squirming, so more hairspray, more fire. Spray. Fire. Spray. Fire. At some point, I forget which product I have in which hand and before I knew it, I had a flaming torch coming out of the hairspray can!!! Yikes! Not a chance, but I was wondering if someone was secretly sitting in their house howling with laughter watching the crazy lady in the street with her fire thrower!!!

Anyhoo, no eyebrows were burned in this incident and I escaped unscathed. No such luck for the pine processionaries!