York Police Station Please

'Let's have a quick walk along the Ings and give Sally a run off before we go out.' suggested Tony just as the light outside was starting to fade. What a good suggestion. We wrapped up - hats - check, coats - check, scarves, gloves - check. It was the day after Boxing Day and Tony's new chair person from work had very kindly invited us round for an evening of festive fun. A lovely gesture, a hand of kindness stretched towards us that meant so much to us especially at this time, having recently relocated to York earlier in the year. We decided, for speed to bundle Sally into the car and we headed off to the nearby 'Park and Ride' car park which has footpaths leading onto the Ings (pasture land along the verge of the River Ouse meandering for miles in either direction). The perfect place for a game of fetch and back to the car again in under half an hour. That was our plan. Not Sally's! By now, having read any of my previous blogs you won't be surprised to hear that. The rest could write itself. You may wonder why I bother... until you read the event that ensued! After watching Sally run rings around us with no intention of returning to us for around half an hour and after calling her name and finally lose sight of her, in light of my weakened heart, we made a conscious decision not to let the stress levels rise and not to be late for our hosts. We left Sally hiding in the bushes and lifted heartfelt and hopeful prayers before picking up our son and heading off for an evening of charades and nibbles. Life is sometimes a little bizarre to say the least! It was 8 pm when we finally returned to the Ings, a torch in hand, 3 silhouettes linking arms, eyes desperately trying to scan the distant darkness, ears alert to any Sally sounds. Nothing, only absolute silence! Our hearts sank. Only one thing for it. We headed home without Sally. Tony thumbed through the phone book failing to find the number for York police station. I tried to stay calm, I really did. I made a cup of tea but then lost it. 'Please just phone directory enquiries and phone the police now!' The stress was getting to us all by this point. In the time we'd moved here we'd already needed to phone the fire brigade and ambulance services, now here we were, unbelievably on the verge of phoning the police too: hat trick! 'Excuse me officer we've lost our dog, a border collie, what, oh no, her name tag fell off a week or so ago but we are about to move house so we let if, yes officer we know it would have been helpful. She has a purple collar with daisies on it though. Oh you have Sally! That's great! Oh you don't have her any more? At Haxby boarding kennels, right. Please can you give me the number? Thanks, got it. I'll phone them now, thanks again, good bye'. It was great news, Sally had finally got bored and ran up to kind people who had taken her to a nearby police station. She had spent a couple of hours there and then paperwork had to be done and she'd been taken to a boarding kennels a few miles away in the sticks on a rural farm. It took a little time to reach the place as there were no street lights and the sign for the kennels had recently blown down! Never mind the story has a happy end - we found Sally once again. But that's not all... ...To our horror we found that we had phoned the police only 5 minutes before they'd done the paperwork and before Sally had been transported to the kennels therefore there was a cost of 50 British pounds that we needed to pay on the spot for the return of our precious pooch - arghhh! Happy Christmas to you Sally!!!!!