Monday, October 8, 2012

Columbus Day

Ahhh, a long weekend actually feeling long.  Happy mini-vacation to me!

Friday I don't know what the heck I did, but Saturday was spent meeting dogs.  Dogs, wonderful dogs!  Mom came out with me, and we went to a farm first, where they breed and I believe compete labs.  Boy, purebred labs are HUGE.  Not for me, sadly, though a couple of these kids were total sweethearts to be sure.

Then the adoption stand where ten years ago this month I first met my beautiful, wonderful Siddy-La.  They had a LOT of dogs there, so many adorable animals of many shapes and sizes.  Sadly, EVERY one of them would be bad with cats.  Mom and I did spend a bit of time with one Eliza, who was a nice size, very very sweet indeed, and purty puppy eyes.  We talked with the woman volunteer, who said, no, probably not good with cats.  Then her husband came by, and he said, aw, not true.

Of course, he also said - when he saw a customer coming in the store with a muzzled dog who appeared to be less than happily socialized - "It takes forty-five cents to fix that!" and went on to explain to my mom about a forty-five cent shell and a three-fifty-seven magnum ...

TIP TO ANIMAL ADOPTION AND RESCUE FOUNDATION:  Please do not let this man come to any more of your events.  Hearing a man discuss SHOOTING A DOG at a DOG ADOPTION STAND perhaps undermines your mission.  And goes beyond seriously creepy.  Just sayin'.

Anyway, we took Eliza inside just to *see* how she might respond to a real live cat - and she was perhaps way too interested.  So.

The next adoption stand was out in mom's neck of the burg, and there we met Penelope.  Aww.  Some similarities to my Siddy - much younger than I meant to be looking at, but finishing up her house training, a body just like Lolly's, a way curlier tail, hilariously amazing funky ears, and a wompy lump in the middle of her head where Siddy had a deep groove down the middle.  Got along great with the other dogs, super with a little kid or two, and liked people - but given the likelihood of something else in common with Sid (a strong look of a husky mix), it seemed to me Gossamer might make her a deal breaker.

So we took her inside that store, too, to see how she would react to the cats.

And she had zero response at all.



At this point, I've put in applications for three dogs - two I haven't had the opportunity to meet just yet, but would like to set appointments to see, and Penelope.  One of the two unseen is also part of the same rescue group as Penelope, and I hope to hear from both rescue groups somewhat soon.

Yesterday, I cleaned, and had some of my favorite friends over, ate great pizza, laughed a lot, and just enjoyed.

Today ... ahh, today.  Query research, comfy clothes, a cozy kit, and whatever I want to do.  Rapture!

2 comments:

Mo said...

Wow. I'd hoped he was talking about the bemuzzler, and not the bemuzzled. Sounds like this guy was lost, and should have been down at Planned Parenthood telling young women what to do.

Penelope sounds like a good dog, and a good name to boot.

DLM said...

The bemuzzler's mistake to my mind was bringing a dog to whom it would obviously cause anxiety, to a public place. Maybe there was some reason for it - she needed to have some medical assistance or something - but poor planning to take a badly socialized animal to a pet store on Saturday-huge-crowd-of-dogs-outside-day, to be sure. Of course, I say that as someone with a work schedule which would allow me to choose another time, and I am grateful/blessed/fortunate all that.

Mo, if I sent you the link to Penelope (I'm pretty sure I sent it to the kidlet), there's a video on her page now. You can really see what she's like in that! All flopping ears and jouncy waggling tail.

TRYING not to get my hopes too attached to her - there are probably six other people who've applied for her - but she is a pretty cute little bug, yep. I figure if *any* dog is willing to put up with me, I'll be fortunate ... *Grin*