An Eventful Two Weeks!

Sunday January 19,2019

We have friends who live in the area and wanted to meet with them. Connie and Jim, our Washington State pals who cohost with us at the Bonneville Fish Hatchery, and Ellen and Dick who live down the street from us in Reno. Both couples own homes nearby in which to over winter. We met with both couples and had great visits with each. We’ll be seeing more of them in the near future.

Here we are at the Palm Creek Golf and RV Resort in Casa Grande, AZ more or less minding our own business and wham!- life happens………. Let me explain:

We’d been in Casa Grande for a week and needed to restock our pantry. Off we went to Walmart shortly after dawn which in Arizona comes late. No daylight savings here ya know- and on Mountain Time to boot. The sun is bright and very low on the horizon behind us. We are stopped at a red light in a left turn pocket when this fella on the cross street begins his turn towards us and into the sun. He drives very slowly and deliberately as he angles his car…….. right into the front of ours! Bang!…… Crap……. No one is hurt but both vehicles show damage, like our hood won’t close. The other driver has in his possession an expired drivers license, no vehicle registration and no proof of insurance. Luckily a Casa Grande Fire engine company witnesses the accident, stops, makes sure everyone is OK and directs traffic.

Shortly thereafter a Casa Grande Police Officer arrives, determines the other fella’s at fault, then takes the report- which takes over a week to post and for me to retrieve for insurance purposes…. jeez! Anyhow our car is in the shop being repaired and we are driving a rental. The good news is the other fella has a current driver’s license, liability insurance and current registration so all is well there-and he got a ticket for reckless driving. Our insurance company is in contact with his so all is well and our car should be repaired and out of the shop next week. By the way, that low speed impact is probably going to cost the other fella’s insurance company over 3000 smackers. It’s almost unbelievable how much it costs to repair these newer autos anymore. This accident wouldn’t even have put a scratch in the bumper of my ’62 Chevy Impala……………

The morning after the accident Jil is walking Megan when she notices a Boxer dog closely following her. It makes her nevous so she shoos it away. A couple of hours later we both see the Boxer running loose inside the park. The front desk is notified and the Boxer is put into a pet run for safe keeping. The dog is in the pet area for hours so I go down to see how he’s doing. Turns out he is doing OK and someone has left a bowl of water for him to drink. But boy, is he skinny! The fact that he is so skinny, has no ID and still has his manhood is a good indication that he doesn’t belong to anyone in the park. I spend some time with him and give him a couple of cups of kibble- which he inhales. He lays down at my feet as if to say “thanks mister”. He’s really a gentle guy……..

This where things get strange. The office staff decide to post a notice on their Facebook page of the dog’s plight but doesn’t notify animal control. Jil calls the office again to voice her concern about the dog’s welfare- the sun will set in a couple of hours, he has no shelter and the nights temperatures have been near freezing. Oh yes, Jil is assured everything is good. Animal control will be here in a half an hour. We go down an hour and a half later and he is still in the pet area. Concerned for his welfare we load him up in our car and take him to the Casa Grande Animal Shelter.

OK, you’re smarter than the average bear- you saw this coming, didn’t you? Yep, we adopted him! After a 72 hour waiting period and about the same length of time for Ollie to lose his manhood, he is home. We still can’t believe no one came forward to claim him. Megan had a couple of grumpy spells at first then accepted him. Ollie never had a problem with Megan. It’s very apparent that Ollie likes his new digs. He likes to ride in the car, go for walks and to Megan’s chagrin even started playing while off leash in the pet park. And he’s the first to arrive when the dinner bell rings! He’d been with us for four days before we felt we could leave both the mutzos alone in the RV for over an hour- no problemo! Then we took the furry ones on a car ride, left them both in the car for about a half hour as we shopped and still no problemo!

The only issues Ollie has had is he is not leash trained. We are working on that and he has steadily improved. The big one is he is leash aggressive towards other dogs. Working on that one too. He should be OK after some intense learning sessions. Strange thing though, he was not aggressive and more like complacent when I took him to the Vet for a free checkup. The waiting room was standing room only with dogs and their owners and all he did was look at the other dogs, then lay down at my feet- and we waited for an hour before we were seen.

Now I know you are saying to yourself, self those folks sure didn’t do much in their first two weeks in Casa Grande. Well we did get around to a little sightseeing. More on that in the next post………..