The saga of the pet dog has taken a new turn.

Earlier this week, our needy patient was approved to step down their treatment, by moving out of the main residence (where my room is) and relocating to a different building here on the clinic campus, where the treatment plan rate is cheaper.

The move happened immediately upon approval, the patient cleared out of the room here, and relocated to that other building.
And on that same day, their puppy dog went missing.
Now, HERE AT THE PATIENT RESIDENCE,
a Lost Dog Notice has been posted with a photograph of the seven-month-old puppy dog.

As if!
I'm sorry ... under no circumstances are we patients permitted to have a pet animal with us, and here is this Lost Dog notice on the patients' community bulletin board.

There are a bunch of questions I don't know the answers to. Like, what about the relative who paid for a hotel room somewhere close by where they looked after the puppy dog. And where, often as not, the patient would spend every night.
I recall being in my room after hours, and hearing in the hallway outside,
the nurse on duty coming to the other patient's room, knocking on the door, calling the patient's name, then shouting that she, the nurse, was going to unlock the door and let herself into the patient's room to see if anyone were there. Then the nurse would unlock the door, I would hear the key in the lock and all that, and the nurse would confirm, No, the bedroom has nobody in it, either human or canine, and would lock the room back up and return to the nurses' station to report.

Sigh.