Its Been a Great Road, but the Journey Ends Here for Now

Well, sometimes the pieces fall where you don't want them to, regardless of your best intentions. So it is with the latest situation. I talked to the CRD, I talked to a couple of neighbours, and as completely bullocks as it is (even the CRD would like to side with me), one person with a hate-out can, and has, ruined it for everyone involved.

At my current residence, I can no longer foster, and I can no longer board dogs either. The regulation states "Four dogs per parcel," and with two upstairs, and now two downstairs, we're full as far as bylaw is concerned.

If there wasn't a complaint (or more, a series of stupid complaints from one lady with a hate-out), they would have never done anything about it. They even know countless places that are over-limit. As the lady on the phone explained "We don't go looking for people that break bylaws, but when reported, unfortunately, regardless of particular circumstance, we must follow protocol."

On a brighter note, it was reassuring to be reminded we were doing something good. Our immediate neighbour with Sunny is very sad, as is the neighbour on the left, who finally got a handle on his dog barking at the fence when other dogs approached. With any of our dogs, he doesn't do a thing now!

None of the fosters we've had have ever had a problem with the landlords, or in interactions with neighbours, which is a testament to how awesome TG, Island Dogz, and my own lucky pulls have been. Not only have they grown into themselves here, but they've had a positive impact on the cul-de-sac. Whenever we were out, we had people ask us who was with us, who was looking for homes, and a few kids on the cul-de-sac were always coming up to pet the dogs. And the dogs were always very good about dealing with anybody and everybody -even the shy guys!

It is very sad to see that such a positive thing can be brought down by one nay-sayer, but it seems that nasty neighbour has won. (If only I could report her out of control children! We think this all started with Andy, our landlord, politely asking her to keep the kids off the cul-de-sac when people would be getting home from work, as he nearly ran into one of them when they came out of a bush on a bike!)

Life. Good people (and dogs) getting the short end of the stick. But, I believe Karma will pay them a visit. I'm tempted to print off the pictures of the dogs that have been saved by coming here and distribute around the cul-de-sac, but that might get knickers in an even bigger knot.

On a much brighter note, we've got the go-ahead to keep Aster. So, I'm officially a foster-failure! We named her Lemon before we got the unfortunate news about the # of dog situation. And I think Lemon both suits her, and the situation that is around her.

For someone who thought it would take a very long time to foster-fail, this was quite unexpected. And it took her nearly two weeks of being here until it hit me in the face that she was supposed to stay forever. Plus, the situation on top of it. Memo: if shit hits the fan and you still can't part with them, they're supposed to stay! Oh, and if you really want to say no, even when shit hits the fan, and you just can't, they're also meant to stay.

I think in the end Beckett chose his sister, and I just gave the final approval. Now they play like loonies all day. Lemon has even gotten Beckett playing tuggie -something he's NEVER done before-. I caught them with my flip-flop this morning dancing around the livingroom. I might not even have to exercise them at this rate! Just kidding. With all this time on my hands, I'm sure we're going to be walking even more than usual.

Jerrad was kind of funny: "Hey, we'll have time to DO THINGS! . . . oh wait, we don't have money to do things." Oh ain't that the truth! At the very least, we'll have a month or two to work with Lemon, conquer the list of things that are hard to get accomplished with a bunch of dogs around, and we might even be able to you know, do stuff that doesn't involve dogs? ---I need to figure out cheap things that don't involve dogs. My non-dog entertainment involves a lot of driving out to Port Rentfrew and stuff like that.

So, a little video of my two TG Alumni. Beckett, one of the sheriff dogs, adopted May 2008, and Lemon, a little momma dog who couldn't look after her pups and was ditched, foster-failed Thanksgiving Weekend, 2011.

My Fur-Kids

**** Update. Two potentially great prospects with regards to the future of fostering.

1) We're looking at a little rancher on 12 private acres that's for rent, and if I ever needed to, I could get a boarding liscence for a minimal fee a year to have up to 20 dogs on property.

2) One of the other foster mums from Island Dogz has had a similiar issue. Although she lives in Nanaimo, she was able to contact Animal Control and be granted permission to have foster dogs as they weren't hers, she wasn't responsible medically, and Animal Control is about keeping animals out of shelters.

So there might be hope around the horizon!

For now, I'll keep my spirits high. With Lemon around its hard to be in a bad mood anyway. She makes you laugh too much!

If you wouldn't mind keeping your fingers crossed for us, it would be much appreciated!
Best wishes,
Emily