The Benny Update - One Year Later

About one year ago, to the day, we picked up Benny our beagle from the foster home. He'd been out of the research labs for about a month and was just getting used to life as a dog, and not a lab rat.

How could we know what we were all in for?

The good parts were experiencing a lot of firsts with Benny. The first time touching snow and grass. The first time he ran at full speed. The early thunderstorms that freaked him out. The first hot, summer days when he couldn't figure out that sitting in the shade would be better than laying in the sun.

The bad parts, too. House training him (gross!). Finding out just how sensitive his stomach is (vomiting). He's scared of everything!

But, overall, he's been a very good dog for us. He tolerates the girls and all their "attention;" Be it, dressing him, chasing him, Alice is particularly fond of rubbing his nose with her finger. He will occasionally snap when he's had enough. But that is very seldom. Otherwise, he's pretty happy when someone is touching him.

The irony of it all is David wanted a dog for male companionship, in a house so full of females. He wanted a buddy to take on walks and play fetch with outside. This is not the dog we got. Benny doesn't want anything to do with David -- even 12 months later. He's more friendly with David outside, but insides, he avoids being in the same room. At the same time, the dog is still really attached to me. He cries when I leave. And, I can take him off the leash for walks to the bus stop, because he always (usually) comes when I call.

Otherwise, he's got a pretty sweet life. He sleeps all day. Enjoys his walks with the neighbor-dog-walker. And has discovered that if he hangs out in the kitchen while I'm cooking, and if it's chicken or turkey, I might just drop a few scraps for him.





Related posts:
All the Dog posts

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The $80 Kitchen Pantry Update

Image
It took two days and about $80 in supplies, and now our kitchen pantry is REBORN! Here's a quick review of the project in pictures, starting with the BEFORE pictures: My main issue with the wire shelves were bottles or anything "thin" would tip over. And with my commitment to bulk, I wanted to store glass containers in here but knew they wouldn't be "safe." I foresaw broken glass at some point. Plus, it's a great space, so I knew I could add more storage space if I was strategic. Last, wire shelves are ugly. So then I demo'd the pantry and painted the walls (which was just primer) with leftover paint from the rest of the house. It's called Polar Bear. I paid an electrician to install an outlet at "counter height" in the pantry, so I could move the dumb microwave off the counter. (The electrician did a slew of other small jobs around the house, not just this outlet, including a motion-activated light in this pantry. Tres Fancy
Keep reading »

Family Calendar Improvement

Image
 Made a quick improvement at the start of the school year that I'm pretty excited about.  And yes, I'm probably the only one excited about it, but here goes ...  Here's our "command central" in our kitchen. This is a good landing spot, and a central place to all look at the family calendar ... it's that huge wipe board in the middle of the photo. All our activities are supposed to be written on here and our electronic family calendar on Google.  (Brief aside: my family is the WORST at writing their plans down in either calendar and Dave still doesn't share his events on our Google Shared Family Calendar consistently, which makes me nuts. And they all ask me "what are we doing today?" instead of looking at the calendar, usually directly behind me. But, that's another post.) I went to so much trouble putting this little area together and that huge calendar with wobbly writing was really killing the sophisticated look of that space. PLUS, we don
Keep reading »

Basement Shiplap Project

Image
The guys left me all the unused shiplap from the bathroom and I've been trying to think about where to use it. I had so many ideas but not a lot of shiplap, so I eventually settled on this corner of our basement. It's where the exercise mats and treadmill live, right behind the sofa. And also where the Marvel-themed bathroom with shiplap is located. So it made sense. It took much of a rainy Sunday to cut and nail up the new boards ...    I even had enough to do on the "backsplash" of our little kitchenette in the basement I've been slowly building out.  Next up will be to patch all the nail holes and calk around the edges for a clean look. And then the best part ... picking out paint color. Since this is a "free" project, I'm hoping I can find a color in my paint cabinet.  I'll keep you posted. 
Keep reading »