We have this 5-year-old grandson who’s a bit overweight for his age. Yes, he truly does weigh 100 pounds. We occasionally watch him for 24 hours or so at a time every now and then. Brinkley is amazing, and we absolutely cherish him. Unfortunately, he drops a LOT of his beautiful blonde hair on our hardwood floors, and it shows. It really, really shows. ***sigh***
But we adore Brinkley anyway, and so does our tiny 6-pound maltese-poodle rescue dog. Ali just LOVES having Brinkley here to play with – and obviously Brinkley is crazy about Ali, too, since he accepts the fact that every now and then she attacks him for no reason at all. OH! I may have forgotten to mention that Brinkley is a really large, slightly overweight golden retriever.
We’re told he’d never barked – EVER – until he met our teensy dog and began playing with her as though he, too, were a tiny, happy-yapper. His yapping is about a thousand decibels lower than Ali’s, of course, but it’s just hilarious to watch him play with her. He tries to “catch” Ali while she zips and zooms and hides under furniture. She prances, he gallops. They’re quite the Mutt and Jeff combination. (Ali also fishes with us in Minnesota, by the way. She’s actually been known to catch more bass than me.)
We babysat Brinkley for a day and a half over the 4th of July weekend, and we enjoyed it as much as the dogs did. What was really hilarious was when Brinkley started copying Ali’s way of playing. You should’ve seen this 100-lb golden trying to prance, and paw the air doing his best to imitate 6-lb Ali, to entice her to play with him. It was SO precious.
The only problem we had was that apparently nobody told Brinkley he was going to sleep here that night. His bed wasn’t here, so he KNEW Tony and Hallie would be arriving any minute to get him. The poor sweetheart spent the whole night laying by the front door.
Oh well – he was absolutely thrilled when they showed up the next day. In fact, he was so happy that he played with Ali exuberantly. And unfortunately, his exuberant claws make indentations in our red oak hardwood flooring with its high-gloss finish. You can also see every dusty footprint from both dogs. One of them looks like it belongs to a cat. In comparison, the other set of prints kind of looks like we might have received a late night visit from Sasquatch.
“Sasquatch” seems to excrete immense amounts of waste, too. Huh. Now that I think about it, I’m wondering if it’s possible we had one of the Budweiser Clydesdales here grazing in our back yard while Brinkley, Ali and the humans were all sound asleep.
other blog entries from »
p.s. I dropped your name on Gina's post, Barb. ;)
thank you so much Lisa, that helps a lot. I know he tried to blame me for so much stuff, but like I told all of his family and mine none of that added up to a divorce. I do realize it's his needs, it just hurts so bad to think how many years he's
gorgeous… both of them.
Thanks, Lynnette! Little Ali has her problems, but she doesn’t think so. And Brinkley, bless his heart, just forgives her immediately every time she attacks him for no reason at all. All dogs should have his personality.
Hi Duffy,
What beautiful dogs! And I swear Ali looks like she knows how to run that boat!! Animals are the best.
Thanks, Lisa! Ali just loves being up in Minnesota – long walks, new SMELLS!!! And oddly enough for a dog that can easily be hyper, she just completely chills out in our fishing boat. We fish 3 times a day for 21 days, and she’s out there with us for 8 to 9 hours a day.
It’s not the water, because she doesn’t like water…. but she loves being in that boat and just quietly studying everything – the birds, the shoreline, the houses, the FISH! (She helps us by poking them with her nose when we put them in the livewell.)
I’ll bet they give you hours of pleasure. What fun.
They do, moongoddess – thanks. I wish I had a video of them playing, but Brinkley’s SO huge, we keep getting knocked over in our living room while trying to video-tape them, LOL! He’s so gentle with her – and yet she somehow magically whips him up into a state of excitement he didn’t know he could reach. It’s just really something to see.
The tail wagging and general waiting for the love we have for them is something I miss. We had to put our 12yr old Siberian Husky down last November. I can still hear her running up and down the stairs in anticipation of her play time. She became an indoor dog after we moved here from Colorado. She never got used to the humidity and insects here in Missouri. And, we live in an unfenced neighborhood so she had to be on a long chain. She hated it. We hated it. We let her do her running in the house. It was fun to watch her skate on the tile floors. She loved it. We now have a little black cat we renamed Pye. Short for Pywaket. We haven’t replaced our dog, just another whole world of cats to explore now.
I used to be a “cat person” who thought she hated dogs. Then I found out I was allergic to cats, so after our last one had to be put down in the late 80′s, we somehow ended up taking in a rescue poodle mutt who was the world’s most trainable dog. He totally converted me. All pets, though, are soothing and the LOVE they give us is invaluable.
Well…. having said the above, we now own a rescue dog who – while loving us, will nevertheless make us bleed if we pet her or try to show her affection in any. Unless she’s giving out obvious signals that she happens to be in the mood to be shown some affection. Actually petting her is still very iffy, though – so I never do. Sadly she’s definitely NOT a cuddler, but we love her anyway. She’s a never-ending, hilarious source of amusement when it comes to playing with her.
So nice. There’s nothing like pets, no matter what kind, to fill a home. Brinkley looks very much like our beloved Molly, who passed away a year ago last May. She was 13 & was so immensely loved by everyone. This dog was the kindest, most gentl soul I ever met. The pain of losing her was excruciating. We had her cremated & her ashes are nearby. (I just changed my profile pic to one of her. It was taken just before a nieghbourhood luaow, or however you spell it!…click on it to see! ha!)
Anyways, the dogs are such good company & especially for each other. Sorry to hear of your floor getting gouged. Think of it as Brinkley’s signature! I bet the kids named Brinkley after Tom Hank’s dog in You’ve Got Mail.
Oh my GOSH sugisme – you were right on both counts – Molly and Brinkley look like twins, except I don’t think Brinkley’s ever worn a grass skirt, LOL!!! I just found out this weekend that Brinkley was, indeed, named after Tom Hanks’ dog in You’ve Got Mail. I didn’t even remember him having a golden, or what its name was – duh on me!
It sounds like Molly had the same personality as Brinkley. Hallie (our d-i-l) says her first golden was different only in that he’d run if he got loose. Brinkley will wander if he sees people he just knows want to pet him, but he panics if he gets too far away from his “parents” – and that’s a good thing.
I’m so sorry you lost your fur-baby Molly. It’s hard when they’re like our beloved children, it’s REALLY hard. We’ll never find another dog like our first one we had, and that’s why we’re glad we waited 4 years. This way even though we know there are huge differences, we’re able to not dwell on it.
Molly was the same way when it came to sticking close. We’ve never had a fence, nor our neighbour’s & she would just wander & meander over to the neighbours to say hello. One day I stepped outside & could hear our widow next door neighbour yacking away. I walked over to say hello, & there was Cathy kneeling in her vegetable patch busy weeding & talking away with Molly, laying about 3 feet from her. So precious.
I was so lonely without her, but I managed to wait 6 months. I waited until I got to the point of not to replace Molly (impossible) but that I missed having a dog by my side. We now have a funny mutt who’s 3/4 golden & 1/4 yellow lab, Quinn. Sometimes we think Molly is whispering in her ear for she’ll do something that was typical Molly.
Yes, sugisme – exactly. It was the “not having to replace” part for us, too. We didn’t want to replace our all-but-perfect dog Coco. In fact, because we take 2 extended vacations every year (FL for the month of February and 3 weeks of bass fishing in MN every July/August), we tried really hard to not need a dog in our lives. We managed to make it 4 years before the craving for that special unconditional love from a dog became too much for us.
And then we unfortunately ended up with a dog who has the personality of a cat – as in “Don’t touch me, *I* will let *you* know if I want attention, and unless I do, leave me alone or you’ll bleed.”
She’s a fun and darling little goofball, though, if we’re just careful to watch her body language and not try to make her be/feel something she can’t/won’t just because it’s what WE want. And when we’re in Florida or Minnesota, she’s SO happy and relaxed and loving – because just like us, she loves being somewhere different. And she especially loves being in our fishing boat, LOL.
I’m so happy for you that Quinn has that great golden personality – and that Molly occasionally whispers in her ear. :-)