Homeward Bound - Schlumpy Style

After a relatively peaceful night broken only by intermittant Pecos barks whenever a whiff of Schlumpy wafted in the room, I woke Schlumpy up to take him to the pound. Although I didn't notice it at the time, my ride to the pound was much quicker than normal due to the lack of cars on the road.

Only later, when Schlumpy and I actually arrived at the pound to find it closed, did we both realize it was a German holiday and that everything is closed today. I was disappointed because I wanted him to be reunited with his owner, like today, and the pound seemed like the vehicle that would facilitate the reunion. I was also a bit disappointed because I had already cleaned up three pee puddles in the hallway and I could think of better ways to spend my day.

Motivated by a selfish desire to get rid of the stinky beast, we made up a "Found Dog" poster and went back to the town where we found him after Justin got out of work. After driving around and asking pedestrians if they knew him (no one did) we got out of the car to search on foot.

We started our search where we found Schlumpy last night, a children's school right next to some private garden plots. Although at first Schlumpy led on in his usual unaware mode, within minutes he seemed to know exactly where he was and where he wanted to go. He pulled Justin along at an almost-run for about 10 minutes through some random fields that appeared to go no where, only stopping because there was a closed gate leading to some small fishing ponds that he was apparently eager to go to.

Consoled only by the fact that the dog's nose still seemed to work, we assumed this meant something. So we opened the gate, went in, and asked the first people we saw if they knew Schlumpy. Miraciously, they did! After a phone call to the owner, and a walk in which Schlumpy showed us where he likes to go fishing, his owner arrived.

His owner (an old German man) was very excited to see Schlumpy, and Schlumpy was very excited to see him. According to Justin, the owner had tears in his eyes at the reunion.

Supposedly, Schlumpy had been with his owner in their garden plot yesterday when he took off. When we found Schlumpy, he was apparently headed - albeit in a lost, wandering manner - to the fishing pond, eager to play. Whether Schlumpy was lost or running away, we don't know. All we know is that it was a happy ending for all.