We've always had a dog in the house. My mom's pretty much a bona fide dog whisperer. She's taught our German Shorthaired Pointer, Doogle, all sorts of tricks. Yes, she loves animals and they love her.
Perhaps a little too much... ;)
For example, this is a typical sight at our house.
When I kicked him off the guestroom bed, he simply went and jumped in mine. Doogle is clearly the favorite child around here.
Doogle. That's a funny name, how'd he get that name, Alena?
Well, I'll tell ya. When I was in first grade I read some book with a character named "Doogle". Thinking that was the coolest name ever, I asked mom if we ever had a boy dog if we could call him Doogle. (In hindsight, I'm pretty sure that the character's name was McDoogle or something, but Doogle is what I remembered, so Doogle the name became.) Since our family usually stuck to female dogs my mom readily agreed, never thinking she'd have to make good on that promise. SURPRISE!
Seven years ago we brought home a handsome six month old puppy. Having literally spent the first six months of his life in a barn, the adjustment was...interesting. In the first 15 minutes he spent in our house he managed to knock down the kitchen curtains twice. He wouldn't walk up the stairs, or between the tile and carpet.
But, boy, could he could run. When he was younger, Doogle would run circles around our house at breakneck speed, even after going for a run and two walks earlier in the day. Indiana winters made it a little harder to make sure our rambunctious puppy got enough exercise, so Luke and I would set up obstacle courses with the kitchen chairs for him to run through, or, when he finally got over his fear of stairs, play monkey in the middle, making him run up and down the stairs just to tire him out.
Yet, despite his brains and brawn, Doogle is terrified of thunder. When it starts to rain he starts to shake and tries to squeeze himself into the smallest space available, like the computer hutch or the tiny space behind the toilet. Once we came home after a storm to discover that he'd locked himself in our shower. Ya.....
The funny thing is, before going off to college I claimed that I wasn't much of a pet person. While this is still mostly true, I must confess that I did, in fact, miss our precious pooch.