Using Charlie's leash again

I should have written this post last week but it's still a good story. In case you don't know, Charlie is our dog. The reason I couldn't use Charlie's leash for a long time was that it smelled like skunk. No, Charlie hadn't been sprayed. He just lent his leash to a dog that had been sprayed.

One evening last month, after our daughter had gone to bed and the rest of us were just sitting around watching TV, we heard voices outside. We often hear people talking as they walk by our house - especially in the summer. But these voices were louder than usual and quite animated. A few minutes later, our doorbell rang. That rarely happens, especially at night. We all jumped, including Charlie, who started barking, and my daughter who ran down the stairs to see what was going on. I answered the door and found two women on our porch. They asked if a dog they were pointing to was our dog. He was a beautiful, big Husky. But I could smell that he'd been sprayed by a skunk. He looked upset but not mean. The women said he was in the middle of our busy road and they'd almost hit him. When they got out to see what the problem was, he came into our yard as if he was familiar with it. I'd never seem him before, though, and I know almost all of the neighbor dogs from my walks with Charlie. The dog was very well behaved but you could see the smell was bothering him. He stayed still as I checked for a collar (there was none). As I talked with the women about what we might do, a young fellow walked up asking about the dog, too. He, too, had almost hit him and had tried to check for a collar, too. But every time the young man had tried to get the dog to come with him, the Husky would run off.

This nice young man had called the police who told him the dog should be taken to the animal control officer at the pound and he was trying to do that. But, again, every time he tried to get the dog in his car, the dog would run off. He asked if I could help. The dog seemed to like me (I assume he could smell Charlie on me - even through the skunk smell) and stayed around me (whew, what a smell). The only thing I could think of was to get Charlie's leash and use that to get the dog into the car. He was a big dog and the leash barely fit. Then it dawned on me - Who wants that smell in their car? Well, it turned out that the nice young man was willing to drive the Husky to the pound. So, he brought his car into our yard and I got the dog into his back seat. I almost hated to do it but I certainly didn't want the dog in our van. I warned him how tight the leash was and he said he would take it off as soon as the dog was safely in the pound. His last words as he left were that he'd drop the leash off after he was done with it. I thought I would need to be buying another leash. It would smell anyway. Who would want that thing?

The next morning as we left for church, I noticed Charlie's leash hanging on the door knob. What a nice guy! The dog pound was all the way across town and he'd driven all the way back to our place just to return the leash. There are some very nice people in the world - including the two young women who also helped in getting the Husky off the road and into a safe yard. The leash smelled horrible and I left it outside for a couple of weeks and was happy to have it rained on a few times. Finally, after about the third rain, I smelled the leash and it wasn't bad. I wonder how long it took that young man to get the smell out of his car? If ever.

[Update: I added this picture of Charlie and his leash. I tried to get him to hold it in his mouth for the picture but he refused. Maybe it stills smells, and tastes, a bit like skunk?]