Dog Business P. 2

As it has been exactly one year since we took our Penny home, I thought it a fitting time to follow up with a report on small dog # 2; the one we decided to acquire as a much needed companion to our little copper girl.  Well, as much as I do love a good sugar coat...there really is only one word for New Dog.  Bricksforbrains.  Not a word yet recognized by Webster; but if it were, there would be an ugly cute picture of a s'mores colored, unnaturally large footed, rat weenie.  Let me begin where I left off last post though, so my readers don't miss a single, gorry detail.

That Tuesday afternoon, we went to go get Mr. Sam (a name decided by children who, sick of ironic animal names-have you met our cat, Hungry?- had wrested naming rights from Matt and me).  He was groggy from boy dog surgery but still rapturous to see his! new! home!
We introduced him to Penny...slowly at first lest there be any hostility...Penny has never stopped being a firecracker...but it went beautifully!  Sam loved Penny!  Penny loved Sam!  We even made up a song for them and we though the rest would be history.  We would be that family with the cute pair of perfect tiny dogs; the ones to whom small children flocked, and newspapermen photographed...we had (dog) arrived.

48 hours in and we knew we were in trouble.  In that short space of time, Sam had met one set of grandparents (from whom he tried to alternately hide and then eat), pooped in the dining room 86 times, howled all night long and then pooped in the living room 76 more times.   72 hours in and we were hoping that this time when he went out to notpoop outside, he might find another sweet family (or a speedy bumper along the busy highway near our house).  This boy was a mess!!  He couldn't ride in the car without drooling, go outside without terrorizing the neighbors or go inside without...well GOING inside.  The word, "rehome" was thrown around quite a bit.

But never around the littles.  Hannah and Ben had decided to champion Sam's cause...they saw how well he and Penny played, and how much Sam NEEDED affection.  How much he appreciated a warm lap and a bowl that belonged only to him.   And he had made strides since that first 72 hours.  The howling all night ended once we put him in the same crate as Penny (an arrangement she also appreciated...in the morning, we would wake up to a two a dog doughnut where it was impossible to tell where one ended and the other began).  He tried to listen when we called him and it was very nice to really see how tolerant our neighbors on either side could be.

So we decided to stick it out.  Penny and Sam's love won out in the end...and this week when we went around the table naming the one thing that we were thankful for in the past year, most of the answers were, "Sam".  He still has work to do with Matthew...apparently Sam is the only one that thinks pooping in Matthew's room is a great way to make friends...but all in all, our lives are better with Sam than without him.

And we needed that $5,000 fence anyway....