Friday, April 3, 2009

Scout


Dogs are my favorite animals. My family has had a number of dogs over the years, and I've loved all of them. Growing up I always wanted a dog that could be in the house. Since we lived on a farm and our dogs were always getting dirty, my parents never let us have any pets in the house.

My junior year in high school we got a new puppy. She was a Jack Russell Terrier. I had never really been a big fan of little dogs because we always had rather big dogs; however, something about this litter of Jack Russells caught my eye. I also knew that if I got a smaller dog, there was a good chance my parents would let me keep it in the house. There was one particular pup that I really liked. She had more spots than the rest of the puppies and she was very fiesty. She was always growling and wrestling around. I chose her because she seemed like she would be the most fun. What I didn't know was that I was in for quite an adventure.

The first thing I do when I get a new animal is try to pick a name. Sometimes it's hard to choose a name before you actually get to know the animal's personality. I was having a really hard time trying to pick a name for my new puppy. She was very active and she was mean most of the time. The only time I could really get close to her was while she was sleeping. After a couple weeks a name finally came to me. I decided to name her after a character in one of my favorite books. My favorite book is To Kill a Mockingbird. The character I chose to name my puppy after was Scout. I chose this character because she is a tough little girl that likes to fight.

This name turned out to fit my puppy perfectly. Scout would attack my feet every time I sat in a chair. When I walked through a room she would bite my pant legs and I would have to drag her several feet before she let go. She also would destroy anything in sight. We had to keep everything away from her. After the first few weeks I was worried she would never out grow this awful puppy stage.

Scout did eventually grew out of her puppy stage, and she has turned out to be a really great dog. Scout plays fetch like it's her job. Even if she is completely asleep but she hears her ball bouncing across the floor, she will jump up and bring it back. She doesn't really chew things she isn't supposed to anymore, but if you give her a toy, she usually has it destroyed in about five minutes. One of the funniest things about her is that she notices the T.V. If a dog or any other animal appears on the screen, she runs up to the T.V. and barks at it until the animal is not longer on the screen. I assumed she would also outgrow this too, but it seems she only notices more and more all the time.

Scout has turned out to be one of the best dogs anyone could ask for. It's hard to thing that during her terribe puppy stage we considered getting rid of her. Luckily we decided to keep her and it all paid off. Now she is a lot calmer and lovable, but she is always willing to play. In my opinion, that is the perfect combination.

1 comment:

  1. Aw, I've owned two dogs, but had to give them away. I first had a pomeranian mix named Lucky, but had to give him away because he developed a tendency to bite everyone that got close to him except my dad and I. Then my second dog I had when I was in tenth grade. Her name was Elsie. However, as my family's schedule got busier and busier, we felt we couldn't spend time to take care of her so I gave her to my sister. Then my sister passed Elsie on to one of her friends who renamed her Fat Carl and eventually that changed to Hot Carl. It was bizarre.

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