March 19th 2011 6:59 am
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Wow! Many of my Rainbow Angel friends barked me awake this morning to the news that I am Dog of the Day!
Despite my passage to the Bridge in June, 2005, my family still talks of me frequently!
I was known as Mother Tyler, for my nurturing qualities and the Stealth Dog, for my ability to steal food from a victim's plate without the person noticing.
As some sort of Mixed Breed, probably shepherd, I had a double coat. This was one of Mom's favorite things to do:
I was quite the shedder, sending off great billowing clouds of white all over the house, or preferable outside.
Mom would brush me while she was waiting for the bus to pick Middle Lad up for school. She would stand in the driveway, brushing me, and great clouds of white would fill the air. When the bus passed, the children on the bus would see me and all that fur flying about and laugh hysterically. At the time, our street was a cul de sac, so the bus would turn back around, and the children would laugh again as they got their second chance to see the great fur clouds.
One Spring, Mom was trimming bushes in front of the house and discovered two bird nests, left from the summer before. Each bird nest was lined white with Tyler fur insulation! (So I nurtured others as well as my family.)
After I was gone, Mom went on to have Mulligan (who has joined me at the bridge) and now has Sophie and Pennie, both of whom actively update their Dogster pages.
April 24th 2010 3:47 pm
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It's a long time ago since I was adopted! I went to the Bridge in June 2005.
Let me see, it was almost 10 years ago!
I was abandoned at a Boarding Kennel of all places. Sheesh, my First Mother dropped me off one day and then she moved all the way out West somewhere! The kind Kennel owners found a Rescue Lady who paid a portion of my Kennel fees and came and walked me a couple times a week. The Rescue Lady had quite a few dogs already (over 10, but under 20) and I think if she added me, that would have put her over the edge from "Rescuer" to "Hoarder" so I stayed at the Kennel.
Meanwhile, Mom and Dad were "between dogs." Mom was 7 months pregnant and dog was she huge! (Little Lad was a big baby, who knew he'd turn out to be such a weenie little runt considering his birth size.) Mom was insistent that she did not want a dog until "after the baby was born."
Boy was I lucky! Mom was out at the Zoo with Middle Lad and Dad happened to come home from work early. DAD answered the phone when a friend called and said he had heard about ME, Tyler, at the Kennel, and how much I was like Mom and Dad's Old Dog. Mom came home from the Zoo and Dad just piled everyone back in the car to go look at me!
Once at the Kennel, Dad walked back, and came out with Me on a leash to meet Mom and Middle Lad. I looked nothing like Samson. Samson was a grey and white wolf hybrid and I was some kind of white/brown Shepherd. I guess Dad decided he was over-ruling Mom's "wait until after the baby is born" command because next thing I knew I was being loaded into the Family Car. Barely Five Minutes passed between the time the Subaru pulled into the parking lot and the time it left with ME, Tyler. On the way home Mom and Dad stopped at the Pet store to get supplies.
Meanwhile, Oldest Lad was away for about two weeks. Mom and Dad said NOTHING to him in their phone calls and never let Middle Lad talk to him for fear of giving away the secret. On the day Oldest Lad was set to come home, everyone went to the Airport, including Me. Middle Lad and Mom went inside to meet Oldest Lad. Dad and I stayed in the car as it was too hot to leave me in the car with the car shut up. Then when Mom, Middle Lad and Oldest Lad came out of the Airport, Dad drove up to pick everyone up.
Oldest Lad got into the car and there I was! He was shocked! We were instant friends.
When I was adopted my family was told I was about 3 to 5 years old. In reality I was probably well over 8 years old. Mom said I was such a great dog that she never regretted adopting me as a "Senior" and only having just under 5 years with me.
May 22nd 2009 10:39 am
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When I came upon the scene at the "Pre Mulligan Compound." Wait a minute. For Dog's sake, how big WAS Mulligan's ego? Samson, the Great Wall of Wolf Hybrid lived here. I lived here. And Mulligan names this 0.6 Acres of Suburbia after Mulligan?
Samson raised Oldest Lad. I, Tyler, raised Middle Lad, and got Little Lad well on his way. Hmmph.
Anyhoo, when I, Tyler, came upon the scene, the home was in much disarray. Mom was quite rotund with Little Lad in her belly. After years of "trying," and several surgeries to fix her (not fix her like female dogs are fixed, but fix her so she, well whatever,) Dad had managed to Do His Part (he was never at fault) just in time before he fell apart and was "out of commission in that department" for several months due to serious back injury and surgery. Mom vomited her way through most of the first half of her pregnancy, yet Little Lad grew HUGE; one would never suspect that since he now is in less than the Tenth Percentile. The TYLER Compound was OVER-Run by MICE and MOLES. Dad could not even bend to load the dishwasher. Mom used to threaten that if Dad was not nice to her she would put the shampoo and soap on the shower floor, since then he would not be able to wash.
As soon as I got here I began to dispense with the MOLES. Oh, yeah, those Moles that I did not dig up and eat, quickly left their tunnels and moved to adjacent yards.
The MICE? Well, Mom and Dad had to have an Exterminator come into the house to treat for mice. The mice began to die off. In the walls. In the Duct Work. It was summer. Every time the Air Conditioning came on, the smell of decaying flesh filled the house. Mom called the Exterminator. He said: "Oh that is great! If the mice are dying in the Ducts, then their bodies will dry out quickly!" Mom and Dad did not think it so great.
No visitors were invited to the house for fear the AC would come on and the house would be filled with the smell of decaying mice.
At that time, Middle Lad was undergoing intensive Speech Therapy. Mom was sitting in the Observation Room, watching Middle Lad having Speech Therapy via a TV monitor and head phones. Middle Lad was, in his speech that was about 10% Intelligible, animatedly trying to talk to the Speech Therapist about "The Odor." He kept pointing at the Walls. The Ceiling. Then talking about "The Odor."
Mom was in absolute stitches in the Observation Room, with no way to explain to the poor Speech Therapist what Middle Lad was trying to express, knowing that Middle Lad was talking about The Odor in the walls and Air Ducts. After his session, Mom met up with Middle Lad and the Speech Therapist and had to explain all about "The Odor." Fortunately this Speech Therapist had a daughter on the same swim team as Oldest Lad, so she already knew Mom was an absolute Nut Case.
I, Tyler, could get rid of the Moles. I could teach Little Lad to Read. I could not dig the Mice out of the Walls and Air Ducts. OK, I could have been like Pennie or Mulli and Dug the Mice out of the walls, but I HAD MANNERS.
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