NOT WITHOUT MY CORGI: THE TOBY JONES STORY

PART III

So where was I?

It has just been discovered that Toby was placed on Petfinder.com by Karin (after being given a new name and backstory) and adopted by a family in Maine.  This happened on a Saturday night, the day before I was set to move out of Susan’s house.  The next morning I moved out – without running into Susan, who didn’t know that I found out about Toby – and my detective contacted the family in Maine.

The family in Maine was stunned when my detective told them the truth of Colby Cheddar’s past; in fact, they didn’t believe him.  They were under the impression that Toby was a neglected dog.  That his owner had cancer and he was placed into foster care with Susan.  They thought they “rescued” him.  So, when a detective called saying it’s all a ruse and Colby is in fact TOBY, and stolen, they called BS on my detective.

This was a minor set-back.

My detective contacted the local police in Maine and gave them all the evidence proving that Toby belongs to me.  The family in Maine also contacted the police, informing them that a “detective” is after their rescued dog.  The police share the evidence with the Maine family and they begin to believe.

In the meantime, it’s Monday and I’m back at work, on a high after discovering that Toby is 1) alive and 2) chilling in Maine.  I enter triumphant into the office, greeting my co-workers with:

Guess who’s dog isn’t dead!?  Guess who found out that those crazy bitches stole him!?  I told you I wasn’t crazy!  WHO’S CRAZY NOW, PEOPLE??  WHO’S. CRAZY. NOW!?

Hey, I think I deserved to gloat a little bit.

My co-workers were shocked, to say the least.  I mean, you can attest to this after reading so far – who would have ever thought a pair of old white women would steal someone’s dog?

Not our lunch lady, that’s for sure.  As she explained,

Shit, only crazy white people would steal someone’s dog.

She’s black and apparently this is not something that happens in the african american community.  No one would dare to steal someone’s dog because they think it’s being neglected.  Apparently they have bigger problems to deal with than a middle-class girl and her purebred corgi.  I mean, really? #whitegirlproblems

About that time, I started getting phone calls from Karin.  Turns out that the Maine family contacted her, in panic and confusion, after hearing from my detective.  From what I learned later, she told the Maine family not to worry.  That the whole thing was going to be worked out and they would get to keep Colby Cheddar.  In fact, she told them that they didn’t have to give him up because this was just like the Hurricane Katrina situation.

Come again, crazy putty?

Yes.   Just like how abandoned dogs were adopted after the destruction from Hurricane Katrina, that’s how they came to have Toby.  Because I am now a natural disaster (hmm, there are some that might agree with this comparison).  I guess Karin thought that ruling would translate in this situation?   I had “abandoned” my dog in Susan’s care (HE WAS STOLEN) and the Maine family now had claim to him?   Yup, that’s what she told them.

So Karin kept calling me at work and I ignored her calls.  Well, mostly.  I answered a couple of times.  She took the position that she had no idea that I didn’t willingly give up Toby for adoption.  Yeah, you read that correctly.  That bitch tried to convince me that Susan came to her and said that I was moving to DC and couldn’t take Toby with me.  Sure, that makes sense.  That completely exlains why she 1) changed his name 2) said I died from cancer and neglected him 3) took him to a new vet for shots and tried to change his microchip information and 4) DIDN’T INVOLVE ME AT ALL.

I tried to say as little as possible to her because I was certain we’d be going to court and I didn’t want anything held against me in a court of law (I watched a lot of “Law and Order” back in the day).  So when she started spouting these lies to me, to try and cover her ass, I calmly told her that her story didn’t add up.  Even if I were to accept the idea that she gave Toby a new name and backstory “so he could make a fresh start,” why in the hell didn’t she tell me what was going on when I called him the night he went missing??

Oh, well by then it just too late!  Toby had already left for Maine and I just didn’t know what to do.  Everything had been done!

Yeah…so instead of telling me that you just LIED AND SAID YOU HAD NO IDEA WHERE HE WAS?!

Sorry, this is the point of the story where I start getting really angry.  Isn’t anger one of the stages of grief?  Since I was no longer grieving over his loss, I was free to focus on the anger stage.  Permanently.

SIDENOTE:  I had forgotten to mention this in Part I or II, but Karin has done this before.  Stolen someone’s dog from right out of their yard.  When I was looking for Toby I ran into the director of one of the rescue leagues in DC.  He knew Karin personally.  And he told me that she had brought dogs, more than me, into their facility that she claimed she “found.”  That they were abandoned animals.  Turns out that the scanned these dogs microchips and they weren’t lost dogs at all; they all had owners who were looking for them.  And she kept that defense, that she had “found them.”

I ran into Susan that night when I went back to the house to pick up the last of my stuff.  I wasn’t sure if she knew by now, so I took David with me as my witness in case I saw her.  It wasn’t until I was about to leave that she called me, asking where I was.  When I told her I was at the house she said “me too!” and came into my room.  She said that she knew that I had found out about Toby.  I quickly found my boyfriend outside and asked him to come in.  I didn’t say ONE WORD to Susan the entire time.  She told me that I needed to “think long and hard” about what I was going to do.  That Toby was “in a good place, a real good place” and I should leave him there.  That he was “badly neglected in my care” and was better off with the family in Maine and   I was fuming inside,  fuming, but I said nothing.  It was David who spoke up with, “are you serious?  You stole her fucking dog!”  God bless him.  I’m lucky (she’s lucky) I didn’t bitch slap her, I was so close.  Instead, I took that last box and calmy left the house.

Susan started contacting me as well.  However, when I wouldn’t take her calls she resorted to faxing me.  You need to read that one, it’s a doozy.  She basically tells me that while I am a “sweetheart,” I am also a harlot who spends her nights on the town with various men and am a “terrible pet owner.”  The best line?

Please don’t cry when you read this.

No worries there, Susan.  In this fax she reveals some of the dellusional thinking that led her to kidnap Toby.  She accused me of not feeding Toby or the rabbits and abandoning them for days at a time.  She speaks of Toby as a dog who is “haunted by human touch.”

HAUNTED BY HUMAN TOUCH, PEOPLE.

Have you guys met this dog?  Has SHE met this dog?  He had a goofy smile planted permanently on his face.  He is happier than any human I know.  Sure, he would snap at her dogs from time to time, when there was food involved.  I’m not saying Toby isn’t an asshole, I’m just saying he’s not void of human attention.

And the accusation that I abanoned them for days and didn’t feed them?  Complely and utterly false.  First of all,  I think I was out of town twice during the year I lived there – once for Christmas vacation and once in February.  The first Susan offered to take care of Toby and it was all planned out in advance.  The second, my friend was staying with me at that time and watched Toby.  Hell, you can check my work attendance records, I was there.  Every day.  You don’t just “skip” days while working at a charter school.  Please.  And the idea that I didn’t feed and water them??  Is she crazy?  Actually, she is.  Susan did give them food and water, don’t get me wrong.  She was there all day long (because she couldn’t get a job) and did take care of them.  Hell, I used to have to tell Susan not to give Toby human food because he was overweight.  WHO’S NEGLECTING THE DOG NOW?

Karin began to email me, along with Susan, after a couple of days.  Click on the link to the back and forth where I explain to Karin that her story doesn’t add up.  That she stole my dog, pure and simple, and covered the whole thing up.  Susan chimes in with some awesome crazy talk, that email is worth reading the whole thing.

So back to the people in Maine.  They contact me, after I send them approximately 500 pictures of Toby (one for each day of his life, I believe).  The wife calls me and tells me that they believe me.  That they know I didn’t neglect Toby and that they are going to give him back.   And she’s a wreck.   She is so so upset.  And I can understand why.   She had been looking for a corgi to adopt for several years – she drove all the way to Maryland because she wanted him so much.  In fact, she actually asked me at some point in the conversation if I would be willing to let them keep him.  It broke my heart, she was crying and just so upset.  So I just gently explained that I coudn’t, that I loved him so much I had hired a detective to find him.

CRAZY SIDE NOTE:  I found out, after speaking to the husband, that we had more in common than a corgi.  Turns out the husband went to my high school in Florida!  At the same time as me!  He’s only two years older than me and moved to my hometown for a couple of years.  He and I actually had a few friends in common.  How crazy is that?  Well, I mean, not as crazy as the rest of this story, but still.  What a small world!

So we arranged for Toby’s departure.  I would fly up to Boston that upcoming weekend and pick him up.  Actually, my ex-fiance was awesome and willing to drive to Maine (several hours from where he lived in Boston) and picked him up from them, so that I would only have to fly to Boston.

Susan and Karin continued to try to and convince me that I should let Toby stay in Maine.  Karin offered me money to let him stay there – thoughtful of her, no?  I’m guessing she was just freaked out that the family in Maine was going to sue her.  In fact, the only point at which I almost went off on her was when she was told me to really think about keeping in Maine, and that I needed to:

Let go and let God.

She told me this over the phone and if it had been possible to punch someone through the phone, I would have done it then.  I mean, let go and let God?!  Was she really using that proverb (I think that’s what that is) to convince me to give up my dog?!  I’m sorry, did GOD tell her to steal him?? Yeah, I don’t F’ING think so.

Another gem came after I accused her of “stealing” him.

That’s your problem, you think of him as your property.

Oh, you’ll have to EXCUSE ME, did I miss the part where Toby was an independent member of society!  Can he vote and pay taxes?!  He IS my property, bitch.

(Sorry, I normally wouldn’t refer to him as such, but the audacity of that woman, I can’t even begin to explain.  To use anything to justify stealing someone’s animal is just sick.)

And here’s the thing.  If Susan and Karin ACTUALLY thought I was neglecting Toby, if they ACTUALLY believed it, then they should have reported me to the authorities.  They should have had me investigated.  But they didn’t, they took matters into their own  hands.  Hmm, what is that similar to?  Oh, I know.  It’s like a Neighborhood Watch person believing they saw something “suspicious” and instead of letting the police handle it, trying to handle things on their own.  And we saw how well THAT turned out.  I know, it’s not the same thing, but you get my point.  They had legal options to persue and they didnt’t.

I went up to Boston that weekend and flew back with Toby.  And we went to our new home in DC.  With a sane roomate, thank god.  A few weeks after I arrived, we had a party.  Partly to welcome me to the house.  Here’s what Toby wore:

My detective advised me to take Karin and Susan to small claims court so that I could re-coop the costs of finding Toby.  At first, I wanted to press criminal charges against them, and for good reason.  However, my detective pointed out that not much would happen to them.  That it would be deemed petty theft (like past charges that Karin had) and they would be slapped with probation.  Also, given the way in which I found out about Toby, he wasn’t sure we should pursue the criminal route.

I would have liked to have sued Karin and Susan for emotional damage in real court, and take every penny they had, but do you know how expensive a lawyer is?  RULL EXPENSIVE.  So, being a person of “limited means,” I resorted to small claims court, where you can only sue for the actual costs you incured.

I sued Karin and Susan; Susan then countersued me.  For what, you ask?  FOR A YEAR’S WORTH OF PETSITTING.   She was claiming I had abandoned Toby in her care.  For the year.  God, I can’t even begin to explain her crazyness.

In the end I settled with Karin (only) out of court.  She paid me for all my expenses.  It was done with, finally.  It took several months of going back and forth to settle between us.  To the very end, she continued to claim she had “no idea” I hadn’t given Toby up on my own.  Still makes me want to vomit.

The last bit of trivia involved with this story came a few months later.  I got a FedEx from daytime TV’s Judge Joe Mathis.  They had seen my small claims court paperwork and wanted Karin and I on the show.  Unfortunately, we have already settled by then (and I doubt Karin would have gone for it).  Otherwise, how awesome would that have been?!  Can you imagine the spectacle?  I would have loved to have brought Toby on there, show everyone the “haunted by human touch” “neglected” dog.   Also, it would have been in the running for most insane story every told on court tv.

And that’s it, that’s the story of how my dog was stolen by a posssible terrorist and her senior citizen animal rights activitist neighbor and adopted to a family in Maine.  Completely true and almost unbelievable.

Stay tuned for the Lifetime movie, you know it’s coming.

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LIZ:  Oh, no no no, she is nuts when it comes to guys.  We had a name for her back in Chicago, it’s to rude to say outloud.

Liz writes something down on a “Variety” magazine.  Jack reads it.

JACK: Crazy putty?