Puppy

March 10, 2011

After 22 years of begging my parents to get me a puppy my dream has finally come true. I only had to move to Honduras and get a new mom to do it. Incidentally, since I left the states 7 months ago my mom, brother, and uncle have all gotten dogs. Life is cruel.

It’s 5:15 AM.It’s night one of life as a puppy owner. This is my third time getting up tonight to see why he is crying. First at 10:30, then 3:30,now 5:00. Each time he wanted to get out of his box to take a poop (huge in comparison to the size of his tiny body), pee, eat puppy food, drink water out of his little cup, and wander around. I finally gave up and moved his box to the bathroom where he can feel free to wander around, cry, and take big poops without waking me up. Tomorrow night he will be sleeping out in the chicken coop.

Each time after getting him to sleep it took me another hour of reading old magazines to fall asleep. Add in my fear of fleas (I kept waking up to check my body for them) and I got probably 3 hours of real sleep tonight.

The puppy is pretty cute which makes it less painful. He is half Rottweiler and jet black except for a little tuft of white fur under his head. He is only a month old. I wanted to wait to take him home for another month but his doggy mom stopped producing milk and his owners don’t have the money to buy puppy food. I like the way he falls over himself when he walks. Sometimes when the tile floor is a little wet from his puppy pee he slips and looks like he is learning to ice skate.

I haven’t picked a name yet. I liked Pato (which means duck in Spanish) but naturally my Honduran family thought it was ridiculous. Next I tried Duke but my friend said it was ugly and started calling him bus to make his point (bus and duke sound similar in Spanish). I kinda like Fidel (in honor of my Grandpa Fidel), Lobo (wolf), and Leon (lion) but they just don’t have much punch. I want a name that says, “This dog will eat you alive if you mess with his owner.” I just haven’t found it yet.

Pre-bath photo.

During the bath. Poor little guy.

Hanging out in his box. I gave him my "Mom Loves Me Best" t-shirt to sleep with.