…or so it seemed.
I started the day thankful that I had gone in on Sunday and put in a few hours. I was able to get some of the tedious Monday morning tasks out of the way. Logging the weekend's dispatch calls, calculating and balancing the weekend's monetary intake, logging licenses sold. These are things that usually pile up on me first thing Monday morning…while I'm trying to stay afloat through the influx of phone calls, bark complaints and miscellaneous crap that flies our way first thing in the week.
This morning, I worked on organizing personnel files and correcting some paperwork. We were all in a jolly mood - laughing and joking as only our crew can. We were plugging through our morning and getting caught up.
And then it was ten o'clock.
Supervisor had gone off in the Mack Daddy to deliver some animals to one of our veterinarian offices for surgeries. Boss Lady and I were reveling in the fresh reorganization of her office that we completed over the weekend. Field-Officer-In-Training (FOIT) had declared today to be an organizational day for herself, and was diligently working on organizing her work bag and inventorying our excess uniform bits and bobs. The police radio was chirping away in the background…senseless babble that we keep turned on so that we have the appearance that we keep up with what is going on in the city. Meanwhile, in the shelter, Livestock Officer (dubbed as such because she's in school to become a large-animal vet) and our janitorial staff were seeing to the animals and taking care of the building.
I was chatting and joking with the Boss Lady, and was walking through the office when I was stopped cold in my tracks. I wasn't sure I had heard what I thought I just heard coming across the police radio…could it be? Were my ears playing tricks on me? It was one of those moments when I wished that I had TiVo for the radio…just back it up a bit and listen again.
I stopped and looked at FOIT and asked her, "Did I just hear that right? Did they say 'bull?'" Both FOIT and Boss Lady stopped and asked me, "What?"
"I think I just heard them (Dispatch) talking about a bull…"
Sure enough, the phone rings. While FOIT and Boss Lady are experiencing a new state of baffledness (we're all baffled at one time or another in our department), I answered the phone. At least this time M in dispatch let me get through my introductory spiel before he started talking. And when he identified himself, it was in a fit of laughter. To which I replied, "M…did I just hear you guys right? There's a bull loose?"
Yes, he assured me…there is a bull loose at the intersection of X and Y streets.
Innnteresting.
I confirm verbally to Boss Lady and FOIT that yes, indeed there is a bull loose in the city. Boss Lady is in denial - "It's a prank call…it's gotta be," she declared. M must have heard her because he said, "No…I've gotten a lot of calls on it…it's there." As I furiously scribble notes on my notepad, Boss Lady gets on her cell phone and dials up Livestock Officer.
"Get over here and get your ropin' boots on," she yells, "We've got a bull loose in the city!"
Understandably, this must have come as a surprise to Livestock Officer, because Boss Lady had to repeat herself.
As I'm writing up the call on our official log, I look at Boss Lady and I can see the wheels spinning. She's thinking to herself, "What the hell are we going to do with a bull?" She scurries to the key hooks and starts inventorying the vehicles we have on site. Mack Daddy is gone, leaving us with the van and the little truck. Hmm.
Meanwhile, Livestock Officer comes blowing into the building to pull on her uniform top and duty belt. The first words out of her mouth are, "Finally!! I get to rope something!!"
As she rushes to get her gear on, Boss Lady and I shout to let her know where to meet us, and we're out the door, FOIT in tow. Boss Lady and I jump into the van, while FOIT hops into her own truck. She's coming along to observe, but can't stay because she has an appointment to get to.
Boss Lady and I take flight out of the parking lot (almost literally - there's a HUGE dip in the parking lot that you can go airborne over if you're not careful), and as we pull out to the end of the driveway and turn onto the main road, I decide to call Supervisor.
"You must not be listening to your radio," I tell her, "because if you were, I would have heard from you by now."
"Uh oh," she responds, "what's going on now."
"There's a bull loose," I tell her, knowing what is coming next.
"A what?!?"
Turns out that Supervisor has just exited the freeway and is mere minutes behind us. We let her know where to meet us and we're on our way.
As we cross the main thoroughfare through the city and approach the next stop, Boss Lady asks me which direction we're headed at the intersection. Like I know…I have no clue how to navigate this city! Fortunately, the large crowd just east of the intersection offers us a huge indication of where we should be.
And sure enough, there is our bull…tethered to a tree.
The fire department apparently received an emergency call…it seems that in all the kerfuffle of having a bullwandering the streets just one block south of the city's main thoroughfare, citizens decided to try to get involved.
Did they think that the bull was cute and cuddly? Heeeere, bully, bully. A citizen's arrest, maybe??
By the time we arrived on scene, the fire department had managed to rope the bull and had him secured to a huge tree in someone's front yard. They were still in the process of securing the ropes when Boss Lady and I pulled in.
"Livestock Officer is going to be disappointed," I comment, "She didn't get to rope herself a bull."
And then, I've never seen someone take action quite like this…Boss Lady is right there in the thick of things. Finding out the whos, whats, whens, wheres and whys of it all. A couple of police officers were on scene. (One declared, "I grew up in the city of Compton…we aint' got to worry about things like this there!") The public is standing by. Livestock Officer is barreling out of the little truck with her lasso ready to go. Supervisor pulls up in the Mack Daddy and takes the entire scene in.
Meanwhile, Boss Lady is already on the phone…figuring out how we're going to get this bloody bull transported to someplace that we can store it.
Right. Somehow, I don't think that our chain link fence back at the shelter is going to manage to contain this one…
After a few minutes on scene to find our footing…when everyone and their mother has to come by and offer their take on events, the fire fighters are taking their pictures with the bull, some older man in a denim shirt is relaying a story about how a little old lady thought she could step out of her car and coax the bull her way - only to have second thoughts when it started to charge her, some incredibly sort and sweaty man is going on and on about making sure that he gets his rope back (I think he was the first one to get a rope around the bull's horns), a topless man in incredibly loose-fitting sweat pants (surely those things were a municipal code violation in themselves!) and long greasy gray hair is wandering around the scene offering tidbits of information, and people are just walking up to the thing thinking that a petting zoo has sprung up in the middle of the city...Boss Lady has finally organized a game planand managed to pull transportation for the bull out of her ass. We'll use the mounted patrol's truck and trailer to haul the beast out to the rodeo grounds and store it in a pen there.
So Livestock Officer and I take off in the little truck and head to the police department to pick up the truck and trailer. It takes awhile to track down the keys, get the truck and make sure the trailer is still hooked up and ready to go. But we eventually get everything sorted out and are back on scene before too much time has elapsed.
Pulling back up to the scene behind the wheel of the little truck, I am amazed at the sight before me. There is Adoption Center Employee (ACE), on scene and helping with the bull. And it's her day off! It's like de ja vu!! I whip the little truck into a parking spot and cross the street, declaring, "Well, look who it is! The Adoption Center Employee!!"
I quickly follow up with, "You know, that thing isn't going to be adoptable."
She just laughed. Apparently, she had been across town, unwittingly running personal errands when her phone rang. It was Supervisor declaring, "Guess what I'm doing, guess what I'm doing!!" Having been informed of the morning's events, ACE dropped her morning itinerary and sped across town to either help, or watch the freak show unfold.
After a few minutes of organizing ourselves and getting our gear into place, Livestock Officer has managed to whip up a makeshift halter out of the sweaty wee-man's rope. Like she's a master of origami or something. The owner of the bull has turned up and is now under a barrage of questions. Is it halter trained? No, but I ride it sometimes.
What??
It takes ACE, Livestock Officer, Bull Owner and Boss Lady to get the silly bull moving. At this point, you can tell that Supervisor and I obviously have little to no livestock experience. We're just standing back and watching…supervisor making sure that everyone is moving together, and me with a camera snapping photos.
Yes, I've declared myself to be the official Animal Services Archivist.
The wrangler team manages to get the bull lead over to the waiting trailer. Everyone positions themselves and gets ready, and then they're coaxing the bull into the trailer. He's not too thrilled about this…apparently he's not too keen on going for a little drive. Livestock Officer is up in the trailer pulling the halter and calls down to the Bull Owner to twist the bull's tail. She later explained that if you want to get a bull to move, twisting its tail is the key. Apparently, that is also a surefire way to get a bull to take a massive shit all over the place, because that is what happened. Fortunately, Bull Owner was closest in proximity to the landing zone…
With the bull finally in the trailer and tied down to ensure that he won't go anywhere, we begin the tedious process of getting ready to go. But there is a small glitch in the plan…in the process of getting the bull up into the trailer, he tore off half of the rubber bumper. Livestock Officer is having a fit…she spent a good five minutes repairing this bumper before we even took the truck out of the police department.
Boss Lady is now in her prime operating mode. She takes one look at the bumper half resting on the street and asks for someone to go get a slip-lead. Yes…in the world of Animal Services, the slip lead is just as valuable as duct tape.There isn't anything that we can't create or secure with a hefty supply of these little nylon leashes. A little bit of wrapping, pulling and knot tying sees the bumper now securely attached to the trailer.
Amazing.
So in the blink of an eye, we've formed a caravan of animal services vehicles to escort our guest of honor across the city. Boss Lady takes the lead in the van, followed by Livestock Officer and the bull in the mounted patrol truck and trailer, ACE in her own SUV, Supervisor in the Mack Daddy and me in the little truck. We wind our way through the city, an honor guard of sorts.
In the police truck with the radio going, I hear Boss Lady log on and inform Dispatch to show Animal Services enroute to the rodeo grounds. Unable to skip a beat, I'm on my cell phone to Supervisor quipping, "And by 'show Animal Services enroute to the rodeo grounds'…she means all of us!"
It doesn't take long to get to our destination. We line up all the vehicles and locate the pens - and graciously find an empty one right up front. While Livestock Officer is backing the truck and trailer up to the pens, the rest of us are forming a game plan. I'm to brace one of the gates…with the intent of not letting the bull push through the gate and wind up in the wrong area. Supervisor is to use her body to block the gap to the left of the trailer, so that the bull cannot escape. The goal is to coax the bull off of the trailer and into the pen without incident.
Right. Like if there's any indication that the bull is going to veer off course and head in the direction of either of us, Supervisor and I aren't going to dive out of the way. We might be crazy, but we're not stupid.
Fortunately, the bull comes off the trailer with just a bit of coaxing, and no real fighting. Granted, Livestock Officer was pulling with all her might, and Boss Lady and ACE were behind pushing for all that they were worth…but it could have been worse. In a few minutes, he's in a pen and ACE, Boss Lady and Livestock Officer have removed the ropes that bound him.
The fire department arrives to reclaim their rope, and I am tasked with returning the other rope to the wee man that loaned it to us.
When I show up at his house to hand over his rope to him, he appears to have lost his shirt. eeewww!!
We all return back to our mundane existence, out in the Animal Services compound. With the added bonus of throwing bull jokes around for the rest of the day.
Once again, all is right with the world.
We later found out that the entire police department had their radios tuned in and turned up…following the progress of our saga from start to finish. So happy that we could all provide a little bit of entertainment in their day.
In a weird twist of fate, I was wearing the same sandals that I had on when I went on my dog-chasing excursion. They're my favorite pair, but I'm beginning to think that they're cursed.
And this time we had one officer in complete uniform.
At least I got my morning cup of coffee.
Move 'em on, head 'em up
Head 'em up, move 'em on
Move 'em on, head 'em up
Rawhide
Count 'em out, ride 'em in,
Ride 'em in, count 'em out,
Count 'em out, ride 'em in
Rawhide!
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