Month: May 2019

I thought this guy would be a nice companion to the three whites. He need some touch up, but I am too impatient to wait to publish him.

Squash is pretty tasteless. I wonder if it has any nutritional value? This one needs some touch up.

Eggplant is a great color. Purple or black?

I was bored with TV so I decided to paint something. The criteria were quick, easy, and fun.

This is my dog. His name is Dusty. He is a 4 year old Wheaten Terrier. He is adorable, right? No, he isn’t.

I don’t really know how to make sense of Dusty, so I am going to just describe him for you.

He likes nothing better than to put his head in your lap and be scratched around his ears.
If a perfectly nice man comes to the door he will try to bite his leg off.

If I take him for a walk with his training collar on, the kind that fits over his snout, he will walk placidly beside me and mimic my stride.
If I walk him with his regular collar he will try to yank my arm from its socket.

If he sees we are going for a walk, he will run laps around the house, jump in the air and spin a 360, and bark excitedly.
But if he sees the training collar he will cower under the table and whimper, ignore my pleas, and refuse offers of filet mignon.

He can poop 5 times on a single walk.

He will not allow an electric trimmer to get within 10 yards of him. We can trim him with scissors if we put a vet’s hood over him, feed him treats, and coo softly in his ear. He still won’t let us get near his face, legs, or abdomen.

He once got lost in Stonington, Connecticut, a place he had never been before, near the junction of two four lane highways and numerous secondary roads. We knew he was dead. He slinked home at 10:00 that night, eight hours after he wandered off.

He is OK with women and children. He hates men.

He has learned to not chase cars. but if a UPS truck so much as enters our zip code, he goes on high alert. If a delivery man dares to approach the door, he becomes a snarling, foaming descendant of wolves. Apparently in his universe Satan wears brown.

If we look at Dusty or speak to him nicely, he rolls over on his back and points his paws in the air in ultimate submission and begs to have his belly rubbed. He can’t get enough of this.

He is by far the smartest dog we have had. He can tell when I am calling him to do something fun like ride in the car versus when I am calling him for a haircut or visit to the vet. I can try to project any voice I want, he can tell the difference. He knows when he can climb up on the couch and get away with it, and when he can’t. If I pick up the hated training collar from two rooms away he goes into hiding.

On our walks he will barely acknowledge many of the dogs who might be approaching from the other direction. But if it’s an aspiring alpha-dog like him, he can tell from fifty yards away and he goes into a full on frenzy, barking, snarling, and yanking me out of my shoes.

It’s pretty clear to me that he knows exactly how I expect him to behave. He couldn’t care less. He’s a terrier.

He will bite, he has bitten. He does not try to injure people, he won’t clamp down and hold his bite, but he will nip you quickly and aggressively enough to break your skin. We have to keep him away from people. He can lie in my lap for an hour, but if I try to move him to get up he might nip even me. What kind of ungrateful creature does that?

We hired a dog whisperer for awhile. He told us that Dusty probably wasn’t raised very well by his breeders, who ironically were Menonnite missionaries. I know nothing about dog breeding, but I guess he was treated like a red-headed step child. They only had him for 8 weeks, but that’s a year in dog years. I guess a lot of damage can be done in the first year of life.
Dusty is on Prozac. I have a hard time wrapping my head around that one.
I think about getting rid of him at least once a day. Somehow he is just endearing enough to prolong his stay for another day. He gives new meaning to “one day at a time”.

We met a nice woman on a walk once. She said, “Oh, a Wheaten Terrier, they are such sweet dogs!”, and put out her hand. She is lucky to still have all of her fingers.
I’m sure that God probably gave us Dusty to teach us a profound life lesson. But I have no idea what She was thinking! I wonder if the warranty has run out.