Run, Lucy, Run

Lucy

November 15th, 2007

I was reading Courtney’s blog tonight and was reminded that not everyone is a dog person.  That is totally ok with me, my own mother is not a dog person and yet both she and Courtney have developed a sort of no-touching love for Lucy.  This says a lot about my dog and her larger than life personality.  Since this blog is named after Lucy, I thought I would take this opportunity to tell you all a little bit about her.

Lucy, first day at home

We adopted Lucy from a shelter when she was 8 weeks old.  She basically looked exactly the same then as she does now, except smaller.   She was a bit malnourished and full of worms, as you can expect a shelter pup to be, but she cleaned up quickly and started packing on the pounds.  Her breed is unknown, she is the ultimate mutt.  We like to say she’s part deer, part kangaroo.

Lucy has always been, how you say….boisterous.  That dog has a ton of energy, even now, at 3 years old.  As a result, she makes a pretty good running partner-I am continually amazed that she can go out and run 5-6 miles with me or Brian and still come home and be bouncing off the walls.  Unfortunately, that energy level has not translated into obedience.  We took her to two different training classes, I have the doggie diplomas to prove it, but she still doesn’t listen.  In fact, in the “final exam” at her last class, she not only failed one portion of the exam which required her to sit still for a minute, she also convinced another dog to fail along with her.  At least they had fun.

She has her quirks-an intense love of crotch sniffing (sometimes bordering on violent), a deathly fear of basketballs (unexplained), and a deep hatred of dancing.  Seriously, do not dance around her-she will try to bite your crotch.  I have no idea how she developed this, perhaps her original owners were retired Solid Gold Dancers?

This last year has been a bit of an adjustment for Lucy.  Now that she is no longer the baby of the house and the center of our universe, she’s had to deal with slightly less exercise and attention.  We do our best to correct this, and now that we’re both running again, she gets more of a chance to blow off steam.  Luckily, she loves Ashok, and he certainly loves her-his first word was “doggie” after all.  It’s really sweet, although lately Ashok has gone into a phase of hitting her with toys that she doesn’t enjoy so much.  I’m working on getting him to stop and Lucy has been very patient.  Thank goodness, I don’t know what I would have done if she hadn’t been good with him.  I’m so glad we haven’t had to worry about any of that.

So, this post’s for you, Lucy.   As my sister often says about you, “She’s not a good dog, but she’s a very nice dog.”

Entry Filed under: Animals