My Old Man

My old man is sacked out next to me on the sofa right now. He's sound asleep on his back, feet in the air. This picture is from a couple of weeks ago. Right now, his eyes aren't open at all, and his tail isn't as discreetly positioned--otherwise, it's an accurate picture.

Nine years ago today, a six-year-old blue fawn bitch named Hondo Comet gave birth to a litter of nine puppies--three males, six females: Stat Chiara, Stat Dimetri, Stat Echo, Stat Faust, Stat K Sally, Stat K Sam, Stat K Suzy, Stat Savage, and Stat Slick (Dimetri, Sam, and Slick were the boys). The owner of at least some of the dogs was a vet, but if he thought the name "stat"--medical-speak for "hurry up"--would produce some fast dogs, I'm sure he found this litter a disappointment. As near as I can tell, none of the nine ever raced. Sam, Sally, and Suzy were in Atlanta and looking for homes not long after their second birthdays.



I fell in love with Sam's adoption photo, and by October 2002, he was living in my home.

Sam is fearless. Well, nearly so. He's a bit intimidated by Jacey-Kasey, but otherwise, there's not much he's afraid of.



Sam is single-minded. He once put his foot through my living room window in pursuit of a cat on the other side of the glass. I bolted Plexiglas over the window, the cat came back, and Sam threw himself at the cat. He bounced off the Plexiglas, picked himself up, and hurled himself at the cat again. I got to him and stopped him before his third attempt. I got rid of the bird feeder outside the living room window: it had attracted birds, the birds had attracted the cat, and the cat...well, it stalked off with its tail held high, but not before Sam scared the bejeebers out of it by rebounding off the Plexiglas.



Sam is a serious eater. He's muzzled when I'm not at home, in the vague hope that a muzzle will stop him from eating the house. He's eaten Scotch Magic Mending Tape, pencils, lip liner, Valentine's candy, dead mice, butterscotch candy, animal crackers, and other odds and ends with no harm. A bag of raw potatoes gave him only mild indigestion. But wheat...plain, ordinary wheat, which is in many dog foods, dog biscuits, and coveted people food...wheat is Sam's digestive downfall. In the following picture, I've mentioned the word "cookie"; just the mention of the word was enough to trigger the drool starting to form:



Sam is a serious sleeper. Aside from the roaching--the sleeping on his back--he'll sleep curled up tight in cold weather:



sprawled on my bed in all weather:



and on top of his sister any time he gets the chance:



Sam is cuddly, entertaining, and always good for a laugh:



I'm lucky to have him in my life.