Millie Come Home!

At one time, we found ourselves dogsitting a relative's Min-Pin, a teeny version of a Doberman Pinscher. Unlike a cat, a dog needs to be escorted to the men's room, which is also known as The Great Outdoors, and then his/her escort gets to pull out a plastic bag and remove the evidence. 

A cat, by comparison, will take itself to the rest room, often carrying a newspaper along to read, and will bury the evidence, even going so far as to round up the clumped waste, bag it neatly, and leave it for you to take out on trash night.

Not looking to start a dog vs. cat war, just saying that if you enjoy staying inside as much as I do, cats are the ticket, because this happens with dogs:

In Hampshire, southern England, a dog named Millie was out playing on a dangerous tidal flat. She slipped her collar, and away she went!

British Hampshire-Volunteers got the call on Thursday, January 13, that Millie was on the loose.  Millie is a cross between a Jack Russell and a whippet, so she moves about as fast as a dragstrip car, and a human can't run that fast.

Stephanie Dennis, 20, is Millie's human, and she knew that the tidal flat was prone to flooding, so she got in touch with a volunteer organization called Denmy Drone Search and Rescue (DDSAR), and they came up with a new idea: a drone.

At first, people went on foot and in a kayak to get to Millie, but no soap.

The Coast Guard, the local fire department, and the police also tried to help catch her.

But the pooch kept creeping farther away the closer the humans got to her.

By Sunday the 16th, the volunteers were getting frantic, and one of them came up with an idea: Let's hang sausages from the drone and lure Millie back to safety.

A neighbor who lives out by the beach stepped up and offered to cook the sausages. "She was under great pressure. The world is on her shoulders. But these sausages were obviously very tasty.”

Someone came up with string, and people tied the cooked bangers (sausages) to the drone and sent them out as bait.

“The string was tied around the drone’s body and the sausage and hung about a couple of meters. It was very difficult to determine how close it was to the ground, but it worked."

“People were passing by and didn’t know what was going on. It was cheerful,” she said.

Millie, no fool, caught on fast. She sniffed the air and tried to catch a tube of meat.

“She was very hungry and got it at some point, and she almost took a drone and got about half of the sausage.”

The dog ran from the tidal flats to safe ground, finally running back to her owner's happy arms on Monday the 17th.

“I think we all cried. I’m very grateful she got home,” Dennis said. “Millie was saved in a way that the community got together.”

Happy ending!