Thursday Thoughts - Puppy Love

What a day I've had. I just got us a new puppy and I forgot how exhausting baby animals can be. Kittens aren't bad at all, but puppies require a lot more supervision and care. It's been years since I've had a puppy so I'm being re-initiated by wee little Kinsey here.

Isn't she a cutey? I originally tried to get a pup from Save the Pets in Eugene, but the process of adopting from their Border Collie Rescue group was excruciatingly time-consuming. It took days just to get them to respond to my phone call, then days to respond to my email, then days to get the application, and then we were supposed to wait for who knew how long for a "home study" to make sure we were fit doggie parents. I appreciate the thoroughness, but get real. The puppies I was looking at would be full grown by the time I got one. So we sought other alternatives.

Our local shelter here in Bend has no small puppies, but they do have 3 month old ones that would be fine for most families. We were concerned about our cats and wanted youngsters, like 6 to 8 weeks. This is not the time of year to go puppy shopping. Lots of puppies in the spring and summer, not so many once the temperature drops. So the Bend Human Society was a no-go.

Then on Tuesday I checked Craig's List and low and behold, someone was giving away puppies! OMG, I couldn't believe my luck. They had 6 babies just weened, so I called to inquire. The mom's a pit pull, the dad's a Border Collie Aussie mix, which seemed perfect to me. For $50, he'd drive to my house from Paisley (120 miles) with all the puppies, and I'd get my pick. He came this morning and I picked out the little girl pup you see at the top of this post. Her name is Kinsey and she's just as sweet as she looks.

She is very, very young. Like just weened. Like too young to be away from momma. But I took her to the vet today and she checks out as very healthy, but too young yet to get her shots. My vet is also a very good friend, Doug Evans, who's a writer, so we always hang out after an appointment to talk about the important stuff. Ahem. Anyway, he still needs to make sure she has no parasites so I'll have to bring him stool sample at some point. Lovely.

Two of my cats aren't having any problems with Kinsey being added to the family. They're curious and do a lot of sniffing, but their behavior hasn't changed. They prefer her over strange people in the house. The cats hang out and watch the baby dog. The third cat, my oldest, who's 5, hid before I even brought Kinsey in the house. In fact, I looked for him all day! I got scared, thinking he'd somehow gotten out of the house (our cats are indoor only) because I looked everywhere. I was starting to think I'd made a huge mistake adding a new dog to the family. Then tonight, about an hour ago, when I was taking Kinsey to her crate for nap time, there was Cody crouched by the bed glaring daggers at me. He saw the dog and went right back under the bed. Sigh. It's going to be an adjustment for him, but he'll do fine. He was the baby when our other dog was full grown, and he terrorized that poor dog. Turnabout's fair play.

Puppies have the oddest sleep/play patterns. Play for 15 minutes, sleep for 15 minutes, then back at it again. It's exhausting! But when she wakes up, she whines to let me know she has to pee. We go outside and she does her business like a good little girl. Kinsey's eye's are still newborn and have that violet hue, so she doesn't see very well. If she's three feet away from me, she can't see me and starts crying. Also, she's afraid of the dark. That's going to be real interesting when we go to bed tonight.

As for getting any writing done... oy.