My niece called me all excited the Monday before Christmas:  I was the first to know she put down a deposit on a King Charles pup she fell in love with.  My heart sank.  She broke two of my cardinal rules:  1) Don’t buy a dog; 2) Don’t get suckered into the holiday spirit of buying a puppy.  I was so distraught knowing she was the least appropriate candidate for dog ownership.  At 25, she recently relocated to another city and was still trying to find her direction.  Feeling lonely and affected by all-things holiday, she made an emotional and impulsive choice.  As I tried to convince her not to do it, she began to reveal that she had been hearing my voice in her head the whole time telling her she was making a mistake. The puppy was eight weeks old and had already been neutered because he had a cyst!  She even noticed when she went to see him that his eyes looked glazed. She admitted she made a mistake.  

Of course when she called to cancel her purchase, she was told she lost her deposit because she signed a contract!

And the contract was basically to avoid what just happened:  They want someone who is serious about dog ownership….and that I understand.  Although she tried numerous times they would not budge and return her $100.

I did some research online and learned that it is a rarity to get a dog deposit refunded.  While I understand the concept behind it, I also believe it is a racket in many of these stores. Many of them are getting their pups from puppy mills rather than reliable breeders.  And that is a crime in itself.

Needless to say when I called and tried to reason with the manager (who btw spoke and argued like a teenager) I hit a roadblock:  Whatever common sense I offered about returning the deposit was shot down by a snide remark.

The bad news is my niece lost $100; the good news is hopefully she learned a lesson about impulsively buying a dog.

Happy New Year to all you dog lovers!! And remember to tell your friends for the New Year:  Don’t Buy While Animals in Shelters Die.

 

Big day for the boy as he celebrated his first birthday!! And what a year it's been: Born in a garage; dumped at a shelter because he had a cold; I take him home and he gets pneumonia; in ICU for five days then has to use a nebulizer for two weeks; gets neutered (sorry guys); swallows a squeaky from a toy so has to get an x-ray; gets papilloma warts on his lips probably from the dog park and because he has a low immune system from the pneumonia; and finally last weekend gets his ear nipped at the dog park because he grabbed a ball from a rottie he was playing with! He's fine now but my apt did look like a crime scene as blood splattered everywhere every time he shook his big head.

As I've told many people, Carmine is the polar opposite of Clarice.  And as Cesar Milan says "you don't get the dog you want, you get the dog you need" so I guess CTBR (my abbreviation for “Carmine the Big Ragu”) and I connected for a reason beyond my knowledge.  But it's ok because I love him. And he's a sweet clown-of-a-dog.  So in a sense, he really is similar to Clarice.

And I know someday he'll be calm and lazy, and I'll long for his crazy pup days or rather his adolescent days!!

I think we hit a milestone this weekend: At the park, I noticed his leash was fraying, so I figured we would stop at the store and buy him a new one on the way home. As we left the dog park, he put on his big foot brakes—he usually does this as we’re leaving the dog park similar to a child refusing to leave the playground. I usually give a slight tug and he’ll walk and then stop and we continue our start/stop dance until we’re out of the park when he starts walking just perfectly. This time, the second or third time I gave him a tug, the leash snapped in half in my hand and I went falling backwards. I thankfully landed on my big butt cracking up the whole time. My friend Jane was walking with me with her two dogs and she freaked out:  “Maria are you ok?”  I couldn’t stop laughing as I watched Carmine stand still in his own doggie shock and then he came rushing over to me, climbed onto my lap and licked my face!!!! I was thrilled!  My boy realized that I’m his mom and I was “hurt” and came rushing to my aid ignoring all the other dogs and other people he usually is in such a rush to drag me back to. The memory of it still makes me smile.

Yesterday it snowed in NYC and at times the snowflakes were huge, looking like post-its!  When I came home, Carmine took his first walk in the snow….and he liked it!  So I brought him to the dog park where I made snowballs (good packing snow) and he endlessly chased them as if they were tennis balls.  And the best part was throwing the snowballs in the air and Carmine would jump up and try to catch them in his boxer-mix way. A little confused when they broke up on his face, he then ate the snow as if it was a new fluffy treat!

So the boy who had a rough start is now maturing into a fine young adolescent. Well at least he is today as he snoozes and lets me write in peace.

 

I decided I needed an alternative to the dog park.  As much as I love to watch Carmine play and interact with other pooches, I started to see what every trainer I know always says:  Dog parks are a breeding ground for unstable, aggressive, and untrained dogs. And even if your dog is the best behaved dog (don’t we all think that) it’s the other dog and most likely the owner who is the problem.

So I decided to take Carmine on his first “run” (actually jog) on his first Thanksgiving.  I also figured it was good for me to run that morning to absolve my guilt-to-come as I would be eating later in the day as if I were going to the electric chair!!!!

We walked briskly to the river where there’s a bicycle/runners path.

Carmine was like a kid in a candy shop!! The water, the seagulls, the bushes, the trees, the bicycles whizzing by, and the runners!  What’s a dog to do??!! Where do I look?? All these new sights and smells!!!!

His head was spinning from left to right.  We did jog a bit, and then we’d walk and alternate between jogging and walking for about an hour.  I brought home a very tired Carmine.

Thinking that our run was a huge success, I decided to try it again on Friday morning to burn off all those millions of calories I ingested the day and night before, and also to see how Carmine would do.  A different outcome this time:  Carmine was either still tired from the day before or he’s just not a fan of the jog.  He did do a couple of sprints, you know those puppy bursts of energy…but we mostly walked.  In fact, he flat-out laid down a couple of times.  Maybe the two days in a row wasn’t such a hot idea after all.

But I’m not giving up!  I’ll try again to get the young boy on the run.

And after that?   Agility here we come!!!







 

I crate Carmine. And I crated Clarice as well. There I admitted it. I believe in crating 100% to help housetrain a dog as well as keep the destruction to a minimum.

Carmine loves his crate (the den mentality of animals) so when we come back from the dog park, he usually nestles into his crate and naps. When I leave in the morning for work, he actually waits to go into his crate because a Kong stuffed with frozen peanut butter will go in before him and he loves it! I then leave and go to work without talking to him or saying goodbye.  

The other night I was watching “It’s Me or the Dog” (love her!) and she berated a woman who crated her 11 month old puppy (Carmine’s age) while she went out to work!! She said three hours in the crate is the maximum!!! I never heard that before and of course felt guilty about Carmine being crated for a longer period of time.  So I decided to start weaning him.

I left him alone on Sunday for about two hours.  I went through the “leaving” ritual but instead of locking the crate door behind him, I just closed it and left it unlocked.  I closed the doors of the rooms in my apt except the small work room where he likes to sleep on the futon.
I came home…..and although he greeted me at the door, I knew he’d been sleeping on the futon.  Nice job!!!  Later in the day, I left him again for about an hour.  This time when I came home he was just chilling in his crate.  Both times, no damage anywhere.

Of course I now had false security!! 

What separation anxiety?? He can handle my leaving!!  So Monday after work, I had to go to another job.  I stopped in to take him for a long walk and figured I’d test him again.  Went through the ritual and left him for about three hours.  When I came home, I saw a pillow from the futon on the living room floor.  I also saw white stuff scattered all over the living room:  at first I thought it was the pillow stuffing because he had ripped open the pillow. When I got closer, I realized he had taken some magazines out of the magazine rack and shredded a bunch of the pages.  I guess he disapproved of the front covers—not enough canines on them! The worst thing?  He chewed a piece of the rug, leaving an imprint of his teeth on the bottom of the rug as well as a hole in it.  Not very noticeable but I know it’s there. I was so disappointed.  

But then I realized: Why was he fine on Sunday and destructive on Monday? Probably because he spent some quality time running around the dog park Sunday morning.  Monday he only had a long walk in between.  So, I decided to try it again tonight.  After spending time at the dog park, I fed him then left for almost two hours.

I held my breath as I opened the front door, expecting to see confetti all over the floor or maybe even worse. The outcome?  All fine. He threw two pillows on the floor but who cares?  They were intact.

The answer is in the exercise.  Not just walking but running around, playing, being-a-dog exercise. So now I’ll continue to exercise him before he gets tested again.  And hopefully between the exercise and maturity, Carmine will decide when he wants to use his crate.

 

I love the fact that dogs go to the bathroom wherever and whenever.
There’s never a bad time or a better time in the dog world. I
remember a friend who had a three-legged Dalmatian telling me that one night while they were at an upscale charity event with yellow-haired whippet-thin women, her dog stood in the middle of the “red carpet” and took a dump.  She laughed while those around were mortified.

Clarice, my dog before Carmine, did the same thing at a charity event.  I remember John Leguizamo was in attendance (but thankfully didn’t see it). As we walked down a long room making our way to the bar, she squatted and took a dump. I didn’t care except there weren’t any garbage pails around so I had to dump “the dump” by the bar.

I really had no choice.

Carmine randomly squats.  And since he still pees like a girl, he goes wherever on the sidewalk.  I try to pull him over to the curb, but sometimes it just doesn’t happen.  Most times people pass and smile
(probably laughing at us because I’m saying “Good boy” and they’re thinking boy??) But sometimes I get the dirtiest looks and comments because the dog had the nerve to make the person alter his/her path.

It is a big sidewalk isn’t it??

I keep reading that plastic bags are going to be banned in NYC.This panics me because sometimes those bags that come out of the hydrant-on-the-leash are just too small. Everything about Carmine is extra-large! Well if there is a ban on the plastic, then I guess newspapers and paper towels will do – the Sunday Times and whole lotta paper towels.  As long as we clean it up!!

 

Sorry for not writing sooner but it’s tough to do what I want to do living with a needy 10 month old puppy.  I love that he’s a mama’s boy and attached to me, but sometimes it doesn’t give me much time to do what I need to do.  Which brings me to today’s thoughts:  If push came to shove, would Carmine be the ultimate mama’s boy and protect me??  

I ask this because a neighbor called me to let me know she was accosted last night in the neighborhood while walking her own young “mama’s boy.”  And although she wasn’t physically harmed, she was terribly disappointed that her male Pomerian mix didn’t come to her rescue, nip the guy who grabbed her, or even bark at him!! She had to pick up her dog, punch the guy in the stomach, and run away.

She told me that she almost wished she had a big dog.  And that brought back an incident that happened when Carmine was four or five months old and still doing his “sit-downs”:  refusing to walk at all on the leash unless I walked backwards and led him with a treat.

And one bright and sunny Saturday afternoon, a very drunk and loud man came up to us during one of the sit-downs and started petting Carmine in a very heavy-handed manner while I desperately tried to get the boy to walk away with me.  And then the man grabbed my arm while shouting “I love you” at me!  I pulled my arm away angrily while Carmine just sat and looked the other way.  I dragged Carmine away while the guy shouted “I love you” for half a block!  And I thought what’s the point of having a dog—big or small—if he doesn’t know to protect me!  I asked my friends with adult dogs and they all responded the same:  If he senses you’re in danger, a dog will come to your rescue.  Maybe not as a young pup, but as he matures and knows you better.  They reassured me that he’ll sense that you’re in danger and will react.  

I knew my tone was annoyance not fear that day.  I know my friend’s was anger last night and not fear either.  It’s not that I want to be tested or anything, but I’m curious as to what would happen.

I guess I’m sharing this story to give you a bit of advice:  Don’t feel over-confident because you’re walking with a dog, especially at night.  

My friend with the Pomeranian mix told me she was on her cell.  Not a good idea I suppose.  That’s a distraction and maybe the guy knew that.  I guess we should consider carrying pepper spray or mace?  She told me she wants to carry a golf club with her from now on.  That might look funny and actual be quite a nuisance.

But whatever you do, be careful out there.




 

When I first saw Carmine on the shelter’s website, his name was Mugsy and it said he was an 8 week-old Bulldog.  I have a thing for pushed-in faces (actually called “brachycephalic”) so I thought

I gotta have him.  In reality, he was a 10 week-old Boxer/Bulldog mix.

After changing his name to Carmine (that night at the shelter) and nursing him through a cold which became pneumonia before he finally got better, he started to grow tall & long.  And as he grew, he looked more and more like a Boxer; not a purebred Boxer but a mix.  When we went back to the medical center for some shots, the vets and technicians didn’t recognize him – the baby Bulldog they treated had become a Boxer boy!!

And so the questions and answers began. I’ve been told – not asked but told with extreme certainty – by people on the street Carmine is A) An Old English Bulldog, B) An American Bulldog, C) An American Boxer, D) A German Boxer, E) An Alapaha Blue Bulldog, (Say what?? I have no idea either. Not even if they said Alpha or Alfalfa), F) A Mastiff, G) A Great Dane, and H) A Pitbull.  And each persons insists that that’s what Carmine is and they know better, so there! One person even said, “Oh I never heard of that breed…is it new?,” as if a Boxer/Bulldog is one of the new designer breeds!  So that would make him a Boxbull or a Buller???!!! Shut Up!!

I remember finding a Boston Terrier/Pug mix on the Humane Society’s website before I found Carmine, but he was instantly adopted.  Intrigued by the mix, I Googled “Boston Terrier Pug mix” to find all these breeders specializing in the new designer breed called a “Bugg”!!

Seriously, a Bugg.  Then one day, I saw a baby “Bugg” in the dog park.  It was an east coast Paris Hilton moment as this very young girl had this very tiny dog and told me some silly nickname for it even though I told her it was a Bugg. She disagreed, having a problem wrapping her head around the fact that a bug usually has wings, antennae, lotsa legs, and can fly.

I will scream if one more person suggests I do a DNA test on Carmine that supposedly can tell you the different breeds that make up your dog.  Why?  I’d rather spend the bucks on dog food or treats, y’know the yummy doggy crack known as lamb lung.

And who really cares what Carmine is or what any dog is?

He has four legs; a heartbeat; a big head; a bark; and a tail that wags when he sees me.  He’s a dog and that’s all that matters.

I’m not sure exactly when it started; probably when I was a kid andloved going to my Aunt Sophie’s house in Brooklyn because she had a dog, a fat beagle named Spike.

And I would sit and pet him and pet him and pet him for hours.

And so my love affair with dogs began. My parents never let me have my own although I swore I would take care of it but you know how most parents react to that promise and how most kids break that promise anyway. So I had to settle for red-eared turtles and goldfish.

I actually had to get married to get a dog! Well not really but finally got my own dog back when I was married. My husband (at the time now the ex) had a dog allergy and we heard pugs were one of the breeds suitable for people with allergies. And so Clarice the Wonder Pug became my first official dog. And yes, I did name her after Clarice Starling from “Silence of the Lambs” because I loved the way Anthony Hopkins pronounced “I’ll help you catch him Clarice”….y’know I am in Radio so I have a thing for voices and pronunciations. I’m not sure where the Wonder Pug part came from but it stuck. (Although I did see an Odd Couple episode where Oscar Felix owned a greyhound named Golden Earring and they called it “The Wonder Dog”….ooops, maybe I stole it from them!)

The love affair blossomed. Between Clarice and me that is. And yes I did get her in the divorce and we spent the next 13 years together until she died in her sleep a few weeks shy of 16. She taught me everything about dogs and she opened my heart to the plight of animals less fortunate than she. Together we experienced life, death, happiness, sorrow, loss, and accomplishments. I shared Clarice with my radio audience for many years. When I would meet someone for the first time, he/she never asked how I was…it was always “How’s the Wonder Pug”??

When she left me in 2006, the hole in my heart appeared. And as I always say, it gets a little smaller but it’ll always be there.

This past February, Clarice guided me to my next dog, Carmine the Big Ragu. (Yes I’m all about entertainment!) For those of you who are fans of the TV show “Laverne & Shirley”, Carmine was Laverne’s bf played by Eddie Mekka who I had a crush on. Hence the name of my adopted Boxer/Bulldog mix. My first male dog (everyone in my family always had females) and my first BIG dog! Carmine, or CTBR as I refer to him on-air, has now joined the ranks of his older sister Clarice in being part of my radio show.

And he’s a big goofy clown-of-a dog!

So….what’s the point of all this? Am I a dog expert? No. A dog trainer? Nope. Just one of those people who loves dogs, probably more than humans sometimes. And I want to share my various canine experiences with you. Who knows?

Maybe something I write will help you with your pooch or guide you in a direction that you’re seeking. We shall see.