Catchy Title Here!

Well, our littlest charge went home this morning. Drew (and probably Stephanie too) couldn't be without their little girl any longer. She is such a sweet little girl and for only being four months old tomorrow she does amazingly great in the housetrained department.

I hope to see her (or at least some pics) in another month or so. She'll probably be as big or bigger than our dear Te'a. The weight probably won't be there in a month but it won't be long.

In celebration of this beautiful spring day, Grade Lodge residents headed out for a stroll around the neighborhood. Chancey is walking soo much better on the leash than he ever did before and "heel" is a word that he knows and understands (I hope).

I was watching him play, in the house, with Te'a this afternoon and I was amazed at how far this adorable little guy has come. He had confidence and a smile and a wag. Every week it grows seemingly exponentially and he's doing great.

He wants to run.

I haven't run on purpose since before I met Scott about 17 years ago.

Dilemma?

Yeah.

When our first dog Andie was younger and there was less traffic, I would take her out in the evening. Her on the ground running her little heart out and me on the bike. I thought about it yesterday after walk with the dogs and how a normal walk is probably just a warm-up for Chance. So I decided that I would take him on the bike. How tough could it be? Right??

First of all, I decided to ride one of the kids bikes that was a little smaller so I could put my feet on the ground and stop if things got to be too much. That was dumb. I was eating my knees halfway down the street. (My neighbor's already think I've lost any marbles I ever had so I'm not too concerned to be making fool of myself. Last fall when Scott cut the tree down in the front yard, we were hauling chunks of wood up the driveway, across the top of the driveway and down the hill in the backyard to a pile. After a while, I got a little bored with pulling the wagon down the driveway only to have it bump into my heels. So I climbed in. Sadly our wagon is not a Radio Flyer of days gone by. Nah- it's just one of those green plastic jobs that everybody has now. There is no steering. My neighbors had pulled up lawnchairs, cellphones (to call 911) & cocktails. Encouraging me, they told me to put a helmet on. Well, duh!)

Back to my ride with Chancey...I was also wearing jeans. It's been a long, lazy winter and they're a little snuggish around the middle. I'm sure we were quite the picture.

So there I was, trying to pedal a too small bike down the street, in my tight pants and over to the subdivision behind us where there are no homes yet.

Honestly friends, he acted like he'd done it a hundred times. He trotted, not galloped, not dead on run, he trotted next to me like we'd been doing it from day one.

The only snag that we hit on was when he stopped to um...sniff... a for sale sign and I lost the leash. Well, then it was a game to get the leash back. I would pedal fast and he would trot a little faster. I pedaled faster and he began to run. Ah...sh*%.

Fortunately, our neighbor Joe was walking his kids and dogs and I wheezed out, "Joe..(puff, puff)...a...little....help...(cough)...please."

Chance took one look at Joe and ran for him like his life depended on it. Chance loves men. Have I mentioned that before?

Joe also has a yellow lab named Velvet who Chance got to know pretty well this afternoon. Add her to the list of favorites too! We also bumped into Donny, another fluffy dog (but not from Fluffy Dog) who he loves!!

If you are a new reader to this blog, you've probably seen the NO DOGS under Chancey Shandy's name. He's got some troubles with food guarding, Mama time and Doberman Puppies. There are probably other issues that we have yet to discover but I'm sure there's time.

Chance is ok with other dogs. He wants to play with other dogs he meets but just cannot live with another dog - we think. It's for everybody's safety, including his. If you have a 60# doggie and you are interested in adopting our pal Chancey for your dog, we could get together and talk about it with Lori (our director) and Bridget (our behaviorist) and your dog and Chance.

If you don't have another dog but are interested in a dog, please don't count him out because of the NO DOGS policy for him. He is lovable, sweet, funny, cuddly and in the looks department, he's one of kind! He would love your kids and you too! He's got a nice soft mouth and doesn't eat your fingers when you are giving him treats. He's even learning to catch doggie treats that are tossed to him. He's not very good at it yet, but he's learning.

If you adopted this dog and walked him around your neighborhood of kids and dogs, your biggest problem would be him wanting to play with everybody. Well, that and sniffing and marking every darn tree, bush, clump of mud, blade of grass, lamppost and for sale sign on the trip.

He likes cats and doesn't chase. We have three cats and the most he does is over sniff them. You know what I mean, those deep inhaling breaths that take in skin too!

So there you have it Fluffy Fans! Bring on Spring! I'm going to ride my bike and a. tire out my Fluffy Dog and 2. Get rid of my spare tire! Whoo hoo Everybody Wins!