My distress as Jade goes missing

I did it. Got a decent photo of a bird in flight. It was yesterday morning on the most glorious autumnal day just right for trying out my new found knowledge on camera settings. I found a good tree full of berries and, with Jade by my side, watched for a bird to alight on a branch.  So I waited and waited without moving a muscle and my camera poised ready to take a photo. I'm not sure when I became aware of Jade not being with me. It could have been a minute or ten minutes but when realisation did hit that's when panic set in. Where was Jade? No point in my calling her name as she is now nearly totally deaf and has been for quite a while. So which way would she have gone? I was standing on part of the Nottingham canal with a bridge to my right leading to the Erewash canal and another track leading off left. Abandoning all thoughts now of taking photos I headed off in the direction of our boat hoping that on every turn Jade would be waiting. Then I spied a jogger coming toward me. She stopped and asked if I had lost a black Labrador and pointed in the direction of the Erewash towpath. So with me high tailing it back as fast as I could, eventually saw her in the distance looking all forlorn and dejected. The only thing I could do was to give her the sign that I taught her when she first lost her hearing. It's a 'come to me'  with open arms and she obviously saw it as she launched herself in my direction running like a dog possessed. She was beside herself with delight when she reached me and I couldn't praise her enough for coming on my command. Talk about relieved. I have the jogger to thank because heaven knows where she would have ended up if the jogger hadn't seen her. I'm still not sure as to why she wandered off. She never usually strays but I can only think that she got fed up waiting for me and decided to head for home. Anyway with Jade now glued to my side I did get the photo of the Redwing purely by chance on my way back to Free Spirit as most of my other attempts were (as Graig Revel Horwood would say) disastrous.

And finally:-