DAY TWO - WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2009

The next morning when I arrived, Claudia was already in the parking lot, and the dog was standing in the street, looking at her. We both started talking to him gently and tried to coax him back into the parking lot. After a couple minutes, he did come back into the parking lot, and we threw some hotdog pieces in his direction. It was clear he still wasn’t going to come near us, so we left him some more dog food and fresh water and then we both went to work.

I sent an email to Animal Control about the dog and explained the situation in detail and asked that they please look into the situation and see about getting the dog off the streets before he got killed. Surprisingly, (shock, shock...) I never received so much as a response or reply to it. I found this very disturbing since they have a link on their website to report animal control issues. If they're not going to respond to these kinds of requests by email or even confirm they got the message, then they shouldn't have a link on their website allowing individuals to report issues in that manner. What if it had been a real emergency? Seems they would have simply ignored the matter. Claudia had already indicated that she had made several requests to Animal Control over the last three weeks and nobody had responded to get the dog, obviously.

We came back later that afternoon, and this time, the dog was not in the parking lot. We looked around and found him across the street. He walked into the yard of a house, went out of our sight for about thirty seconds, and then came back out onto the sidewalk where we could see him. After a couple minutes, he headed back to the parking lot where we were. At this time, we placed some more dog food out for him and gave him more fresh water.

As he approached us, we threw some hotdog pieces in his direction. He ate those and then went and laid down in the shady area of the parking lot. We threw out some more hotdog pieces, and he approached us and ate those also. At this time, Claudia was sitting in her car, and I started placing hotdog pieces around the perimeter of the car. The dog slowly ate all the hotdog pieces I had laid out for him, and he came to within about ten feet of us while doing so. When he had eaten all of the hotdog pieces, he then went and laid down in the shady area of the parking lot again. We watched him for a short time, and then left to head home.

During the drive home, we discussed the fact that it was so hot out and the dog had no shelter and very litte shade, along with the fact that he had no qualms about crossing the street. We both agreed that we needed to get him off the street as soon as possible, and Claudia suggested contacting the Humane Society to see if we could get some assistance. We both agreed that we would also celebrate if someone from the Humane Society was able to catch the dog and get him off the street. That's all we wanted--to get him off the street. You know what they say: Be careful what you wish for. We would find out exactly what that meant!

We also discussed what we would do with the dog if we were able to get him off the street. Claudia said she knew some people in the desert who were looking for a big dog, that she could contact them and see if they wanted him once we got him off the street. I told her we could take him to my house until he was socialable and could be adopted out. It seemed like the perfect solution at that time!