Welcome back, Theo

If you call Mother, as some of you do, then you will have heard about the ordeal last week.

Remember this?

From the downhill driveway, the park is downhill. It's downhill all the way to Boots Adam Park. Theo's legs pump like an engineer's dream of efficiency when he escapes. He's the black-and-white locomotive. He can scoot with the fastest of greyhounds for at least the distance to the park.

Your Mother recounted the initiation of her painful search-and-cajole party. Too bad you missed that recount, Matt.

As I listened to her, the description reminded me of the Great Ice Storm of 2007. Carl's lights were back on within 24 hours after the Destruction Formerly Known as My Neighborhood. We were, however, without power for a few more days. I took Theo to see Carl in the cozy, well-lit duplex. When I returned home, Theo was on a leash. Or he was until I looked downward and realized the collar was just choking air. I looked up and, even in the darkness, I could see his legs pumping from just falling downwards with the gravity to the park. I lacked thermal wear. I lacked night vision binoculars. I lacked a machete to cut through the tons of debris on the ground. I lacked a pair of ice skates.

Adios. Have a nice life, Theo.

I manually opened the garage door, let Stella in the house, fumbled around in the darkness to find the flashlight, lit a couple of candles, took a well-deserved leak, and walked back into the kitchen. I still had to manually close the garage door.

When I opened the door from the kitchen to the garage, a black ball of fur still went pretty darned fast right past my feet, even though it was all uphill.

From BostonTerrierhub.com, we learn: "Protecting your Boston Terrier from heat and cold is extremely important for his health ... Bostons have short, thin coats, so they have little protection in wet, cold weather."

Aw, ain't that a shame? Welcome back, Theo.

It was the easiest search-and-cajole party ever initiated for him.