Some of my fondest memories from growing up are those of my pet dogs. Its seems as if I have always had an animal companion to greet me when I got home, play w/ me when I was outside, and to just be there when I was feeling a little down. There is something wonderful about simple animal comforts – their selfless love – and the fact that they are always 110% excited to see you. I am very grateful to Mom and Dad for always going out of their way to make sure that I could enjoy the experience of owning a pet while I was growing up.
Since moving to Knoxville, I have not been able to justify getting a dog. Due to the fact that we lived close to the interstate and that it probably would have ended up w/ a note stapled to it (gonna have to dig up a link that this story…), I have had to forgo the pleasure of reliving some of my childhood by getting a dog.
Now that Crystal and I have our own place, we decided that we were finally in a position to start looking around for a new pet. Of course, being the realist and all, I justified this as getting an animal to assist w/ the guarding and protection of our investments in our home (which really meant – I want a dog like I had when I was a kid!) and Crystal, of course agreed w/ my assessment adding that she would feel safer at night knowing that the dog would help w/ alerting us of potential strangers (which really meant – I want PUPPIES!!!).
After looking around in newspapers, the different animal shelters (the human society guidelines suck, btw – blog post on this later), and asking around, we could not really find anything that was doable. When we did find what we wanted – either we were deemed as ‘unfit’ (refer to the Human Society and their standards sucking above) or the dogs were for sell for an exorbitant price. Anyway, to make a long story short – we found a listing on Craig’s List list for puppies as was able to get one… I mean… two… ;)
Without further ago, let me introduce Reox (blue collar) and Saber(red collar)…
Reox and Saber are children of a mostly lab mother (w/ some cocker spaniel) and a mutt father. Reox, the male, probably leans more in the lab direction, being the bigger dog, having those sad lab eyes, and the easy temperament. Saber, on the other hand, probably takes after her father’s breed more – being a smaller dog, feisty as can be, and completely destructive (in a good way).
In case you were wondering, their name sakes come from two different sources. For those anime fans, Saber is named after the main character in Fates Stay Night (one of the best animes ever). Reox is named after a dwarven god from the Dragonlance series and also, as most of your all know, is the gamer name that I use the most.
So, we now have two puppies running around and the most popular question we have been asked is, “What do the cats think about it?” Well, I think I will let Tater speak for both of the cats:
This picture was taken after Reox decided to ‘hitch a ride’ by grabbing Tater’s tail and being drug around the house. Good times! Of course, Tater finally grew tired of it and had to establish his authority…
All in all, we are totally happy w/ our new additions. In fact we are so pleased that the constant scooping of feces and cleaning up of ‘oopses’ are only a minor irritation. TBH, we are really enjoying them and I think they will be great companions!