The day Fred arrived

It was Mothers Day 2008, I really didn't think I wanted or for that matter needed another dog especially not a little dog. Quite a few months prior to "Fred's arrival" I had to put my beloved golden mix to sleep, an agonizing decision to say the least and it pretty much took the wind out of my sails. I still had my cat Buddy and I was fine with that. Well my friend kept talking about Bostons, and how great they were and how fun and blah blah blah. I started thinking about another dog, and seriously studied up on these little Boston Terriers, the word terrier alone bugged me. I pictured a little yapping dog, and I really don't appreciate that kind of dog, especially not in my neighborhood, and I didn't want to be the one owning one. Well it turns out Bostons aren't barkers, far from it, Fred's bark is kind of like a snort grunt sneeze combination, he actually startles himself when one sneaks out, makes me jump too, and he is certainly no watch dog. He will let me know if someones at the door or to something that may need my attention but that's it. He will not be the one to actually check. Apparently that's my job, and that's fine I didn't want a watch dog. Anyway, the more I read the more I started to actually think about getting one. So I started looking around for breeders in my area, which are few and far between in the Pacific Northwest. I called on one that was about a 45 minute drive from my home, they were very nice people, they were more interested in me it seemed than I was about them, which is a good thing, I knew just from our conversation, that these babies were extremely loved the day there born. So we made arrangements to meet and the next thing I know I'm at the pet store getting the necessary accoutrement's, you know food, bowls toys, more toys, clothes a few more toys and so on and so forth. Now I had the goods, all I needed was the puppy, they had a mix of girls and boys and I had said that I would prefer a boy, I wasn't in to the whole breeding thing at all, I just wanted a companion. The owner and I met at a neutral area that was easy to find for both (McDonald's) and she brought out two little itty bitty guys, wriggling around in a box with blankies. We let them out on a grassy area to get a feel for the personalities, one of them marched right up to me then romped around and played with various invisible objects, the other one was a little bit more cautious, he finally came over to me, crawled into my lap and looked up at me, well that did it, I was in love. Decision made, she signed off on the various paperwork, yes he's papered, but I never registered him, I really didn't see the point, I was going to have him fixed. If I would have registered him his name would have been...drum roll please, Prince Alfred Maxmillion Martin Hauser, we will call him Fred going forward. So with dog in lap I drove home, grinning from ear to ear about this cute little miniature manatee. Once again, I was a dog owner and I was terrified by that. Thinking back on that day, I realize it was probably the best thing I could have ever done.