Oliver

On Saturday, I was sitting in the parking lot of the grocery store, when I glanced down at my iphone and realized I had missed several calls from Adam.  I let out a groan because he always manages to call me after I've finished checking out, and then I have to go back inside to buy the item.  ANNOYING. So I called him back, expecting him to tell me that he needed some Mountain Dew, and it was dire emergency! However, he told me he needed me to come pick up Sarah because he had picked up a small stray on the walk, and he was having trouble juggling them both. He was going to continue to try and locate the owner, but if he couldn't, he wanted to know if he could just bring the dog home.

I was, of course, totally fine with him bringing the pooch home. But I was pretty shocked by the situation because Adam has never been pro bringing another dog into the home. Heck, he wasn't even pro having one dog in the home. But I won the "Adopt Sarah" battle with my blood, sweat, and tears. OK maybe no blood or sweat, but there was a lot of TEARS. But  now he adores Miss. Sarah. Which just proves my point that I always know better.  I have to admit a small part of me was hoping Adam wouldn't find the owner, so we could bring that handsome little shih tzu home with us. Adam did ask around the neighborhood about him, but he had no luck and he brought him home. I started running through possible names we could call him, and originally I thought maybe Princely or Wills (because it was the royal wedding weekend after all). But those names just didn't suit him, so finally we decided on the name Oliver. Doesn't he look like an Oliver?

Sarah was fine with Oliver when Adam was walking with him, so I never imagined that she would care when we brought him into the house. But boy was I wrong. The minute she saw Adam bringing Oliver through the door, she went and grabbed her bone, and hid it on top of the couch. The bone she hasn't chewed in weeks. The bone we thought she had totally forgotten about. But apparently she hadn't forgotten about it, and she wanted him to know that bone was hers.

Even after the bone incident, I really assumed Sarah would be indifferent to Oliver at worst. I do I think she probably would have been unfazed by Oliver if he had greeted her differently. Oliver has yet to be neutered, and he behaved "amorously" toward Sarah several times, despite her incessant growling.  And God bless Oliver because Sarah must have looked like a lion to him, and yet he showed no fear. But for his safety and Sarah's nerves, we separated the two. We put Oliver in the kitchen, fenced in by a couch, a bunch of pillows, a fan, and Sarah's dog food. But he consistently tried to jump over it anyway, and Sarah kept hopping up on the couch to look at him,  and they spent a good deal of the evening just staring each other down as pictured above.

When it was time for bed, we decided I would sleep in the bedroom with baby Oliver, and Adam would stay with Sarah so she didn't feel jealous. It took him a while to settle down because he much preferred running around the bedroom and barking at dust balls underneath the bed to sleeping. But eventually he settled down, and slept as pictured above. Spread out like a human, with one paw flipped over, and a whole lot of snoring. How does such a little dog take up so much room in a bed and snore so loudly? I don't know the answer to that, but I can't tell you how adorable it was to cuddle with this little guy.

I believe that Sarah had forgotten all about Oliver by the next morning, because when I carried him into the living room she proceeded to hide her bone again. She would also not let us pet Oliver if we weren't petting her too. Major jealously. We really did fall in love with Oliver though, but for many reasons we knew we couldn't keep him. First, we just don't have the fiances for a second dog. Vet bills, Shots, Food, and Boarding, it all really adds up. Also, while I think Sarah would eventually adjust to Oliver, she is an older dog and would only be tortured by living with a hyperactive pup. She was just so unhappy about the whole situation, and I want her to enjoy a relaxing life in her "golden years."

We were both sad as we patrolled the neighborhood again, looking for the owner, and fearing that eventually we might have to take him to a shelter. We never found the owner, but I remembered our duplex neighbor had been looking for a new dog as a playmate for his labradoodle, Tequila. We thought we would take Oliver over there, and simply ask if he had seen the dog around the neighborhood, and see what happened. He asked if he could adopt him! We were so excited, he gets a new dog, and we will still get to see him occasionally. He even sort of kept the name we gave him, but he calls him Ollie. Although I have to admit, that little guy wormed his way into my heart, and I'm still a little sad that he couldn't be ours.

Song of the Day: Hummingbird Heartbeat by Katy Perry