Latest posts by Martin Moodie (see all)
We closed out 2014 with the story of a real-life cat burglar, a feline fiend that ate its way through US$1,100 of gourmet fish products at Vladivostok Airport’s duty free shop – well in excess of his purrsonal allowance.
Now word reaches The Moodie Blog of an equally talented animal, a beagle by the highly appropriate name of Sherlock that is allegedly (see my disclaimer below) employed by KLM in the airline’s lost & found department.
More mature readers (that’s presuming anyone who has read this far has any element of maturity at all) will remember Walt Disney’s Beagle Boys, a group of fictional characters who were always trying to rob Scrooge McDuck of his riches.
Well Sherlock is a very different type of Beagle boy, one whose job is to sniff out lost phones and other items and reunite them with their owners, who presumably think that he’s a New Foundland. [A disclaimer: The story of Sherlock may not be true, alas – see the extremely sad response of reader John Watson at the foot of this Blog who clearly wouldn’t recognise satire even if Sherlock personally reunited him with his long lost sense of humour].
My question is this. Where has Sherlock been all my life? As I wrote in a previous Blog, I’m someone who during my travels has lost around 22 cell phones; numerous blackberries (probably a few strawberries and blueberries along the way); countless (and I do mean countless) chargers, adaptors and headphones; two passports; a briefcase (appropriately, only briefly); half a dozen or so tape recorders; I estimate around five dozen pairs of spectacles (two over Christmas alone); many duty free purchases (I believe in giving back to our industry) and believe it or not at least a dozen shirts (do not ask).
If every airport and airline employed a Sherlock, all this angst could have been avoided. As the video on this page reveals, Sherlock is proving a highly pawpular and much-loved staff member. He’s talented too – a Beagle-eyed detective who has found numerous phones, timepieces (in his spare time Sherlock moonlights as a watch dog) and other items since he took on the job and gained a new leash of life.
An orphan (he never knew his Paw) affectionately nicknamed K9LM, Sherlock homes in on lost property, constantly hounding his airline colleagues for more work and even once collaring a petty thief in the airport barking lot.
“Even when he feels a little ruff, Sherlock always turns up to work,” an airline source tells The Moodie Blog. “Last week his master, called Ken, was off work with the flu but that didn’t stop Sherlock from being here on time. Ken ill coughing is nothing to a dog as tough as him.
“After work we like to reward him with a biscuit washed down with a little bowl of whine, normally a good Burgundy from the Côte de Bone. We find that the perfect way to hush puppy after a long day.”
There is, it seems, no end to Sherlock’s talents. We’re not sure whether to believe this but apparently he can even howl along to the tune of Toccata and Fugue in D minor for Organ, though his Bach is reputed to be much worse than his bite.
Such an inspiring tale (and the rest of Sherlock is pretty impressive too). Perhaps the World Health Organization (WHO) could sponsor a scheme so that hounds such as Sherlock could be employed to sniff out Ebola carriers (and even chase terrierists) at airports worldwide to limit the disease’s spread. Certainly that would be a case of WHO let the dogs out?
This story is:
– Not new, it is at least from September
– Not true. Please check http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/09/25/klms-iphone-sniffing-beagle-is-not-real/
I hope the rest of the posts on this website are more thoroughly researched than this one.
Mrs Earley needs to get you a Sherlock travel companion.